foolfillment: the blog

I’ve been toying with this idea for a few weeks, but I’d not done anything about it while I was offline. Now I am finally getting into gear.

I would like there to be a TeachMeet in the Scottish Borders sometime, mainly for selfish reasons as I do not think I’ll be able to make it to the Scottish Learning Festival this year. I realised that unless I (un)organise it then it is unlikely to happen so here I am asking you for your help.

I have a sneaking suspicion that there will be a fair few people in the Borders and surrounding areas who will also not be able to make it to SLF this year, but I don’t know how many though, and crucially I do not know how many people there are who would consider getting involved as well as just turning up.

If I go ahead and try to sort something out I will need help - I don’t know where I would find a suitable venue, I don’t know my way around well enough yet! I was thinking somewhere in Galashiels.

I also have a few questions, I’ve put together a short Google form which you can answer, or of course you can leave comments here on the blog.

My big question though is this - one option is to have it running on the same night as the event in Glasgow, with a possible link up. How do people feel about this? My own personal feeling is that it would be great for the people who wanted to get to Glasgow but can’t, I also think that it might be good to encourage new people along if it were mostly ‘locals’ - but the risk is nobody comes… What do you think?

At last, after nearly 6 weeks in my new flat I’ve finally got an internet connection back! I could rant about how long it has taken, it’s certainly been frustrating but that is maybe for another post. Maybe even, as David Gilmour suggested, it could have some key links thrown in to see how tuned in my service providers are…

Anyway, I’ve been nearly a week at my new school and I’m loving it. I’ve got a great timetable, with some really great classes. By the end of tomorrow I’ll have met all of my classes and have finished my first 8 period day!

So far I think things have been going well, I’ve not really pushed the use of any new technology, more concentrating on getting to know everyone and making sure that my classes, and me, can get settled in. What I have been doing though, at least last week is starting each S2 class with a quick starter exercise where the pupils have to unscramble letters to find the names of tools they should know. This has been really useful to get everyone in and settled until the whole class is there, it also gave me the time to get a seating plan written out. I’ve got a series of starters for other classes as well and this is something I want to work on so that I have something for the start of each period.

Anyway, time for bed. Now I have my connection back I’ll be online much more in the future.

With only two weeks to go until the new term, I’m feeling a lot more relaxed than I did this time last year. That may turn out to be me being foolhardy, as in so many ways I’m in a very similar situation. I’m about to start at a new school that I barely know, with colleagues and pupils I’ve not really met properly, except this year I have a full timetable and I don’t have weekly meetings with a supporter and the safety net of calling myself an NQT (except I think that term applies more now more than last year). Of course the big difference is this year I have a huge amount more experience and confidence to draw on.

Doug Belshaw wrote a great post last night, 4 quotations that will guide me next academic year, and it focussed my thinking a little. I’ve had loads of ideas running through my head ever since I got the job at Hawick about what I want to try and achieve. It’s easy to go into a department for just a few minutes and think that you can make changes, when of course you never get the full picture in such a short visit. There’s loads of good practice going on in Hawick and while I want to make changes and do a lot of my own things my first aim is to really make the most of the experience that is there already. Here’s another quote for you, one that has been all pervasive in my year at East Lothian : “We learn from our experience…..if we reflect upon our experience” John Dewey.

As I said Doug’s post focussed my thinking a little. Mainly about what I want to do with my first few months at Hawick, and I’ve now got a more organised set of targets. Doug also got me a little more focussed on another idea which I’m working on. I’ll tell you about that in a future blog post, I hope you’ll all be interested in it.