The Survival of Semester One.

When I entered this course in August Christmas seemed a lifetime away. I went in with the horror stories of previous h-dip students who never left their room for a year ringing in my ears, and honestly couldn't see how I would survive up to Christmas, let alone survive with my sanity intact. Yet, here I am. I just completed my first semester as a student teacher, and sanity is alive and mostly well. The semester went by in a blur of lectures, lesson plans, and school bells, but I thought, as I know a few wannabee teachers read this blog, that it would be beneficial for me and for you to look into the blur and try and pick out the things I have learned over these 4 months.

I could go into details about learning objectives and the importance of classroom differentiation, but I think anyone who reads this blog doesnt really want to hear about that. Honestly, I don't really want to write about it. So other than the nitty gritty that the universities pump into every student teacher's coffee-addled brain, what have I learned?

1. Teaching must be your life, but not your whole life.
It is easy to fall into the trap of everything being about teaching. You spend your day in college talking about teaching with people who teach about teaching surrounded by people paying thousands of euro to learn about teaching, and all you have in common is teaching. You then spend your days in school surrounded by teachers (most who do not want to talk about teaching and rather talk about their Friday glass of wine or the 5th year who randomly shouted 'testicles' in class) and students who are only there because they have to either teach or be taught.
Key to survival; Do something not teachy with non teachy people. This does not include your mother, who will ask 'how is teaching going?' and then you are off again. Find the time to do something social that's not drinking. Your sanity depends on it.

2. The internet is your saviour and guide.
It will get you through every god forsaken hour you spend racking your brain over 100 different ways to say the word 'understand'. Google everything! Don't be afraid of not being original. You can be original when you are qualified and have discovered the difference between an learning objective and an lesson aim (it's like explaining the Cloud. You can try).

3. There are tricks to the staff room;
Bring your own cup. Make sure you contribute to the kitty for the coffee. Take note of names of teachers and what they teach, as there will seem like hundreds of names to learn and nothing is more embarrassing than not knowing a teacher by Halloween. Try keep out of political conversations, and steer away from those who like to diss the principal. You need a reference from her at the end of the year. And get involved in something extra curricular with the students. Looks great on a cv and there is no better way of getting to know them.

4. Accept the fact that 90% of your course is horse s**t.
You will have lectures from people who have never taught kids but have a PHD in the theory of teaching kids and they will tell you to teach certain ways that, if implemented, would have 30 kids running riot on you. You will learn 90% of the useful stuff in school. Accept that you simply have to pass the exams/essays to get the qualification, and take college as a break from school rather than something to get stressed about, which leads me to my final point ...

5. You have a choice; be stressed or not be stressed.
Yes its important to pass, but its not important enough to warrant giving yourself stomach ulcers. Its easy to get caught up in panic, but as a teacher you need to know when to stop caring so much that it bothers you. This is something I never thought of before starting the course, and it resulted in moments of sheer panic as the education office likes to spring extra work on you with no logical reason as to why. Having a clear idea of the amount of f***s you give is very important, as you have to know when to cut off caring. If you dont know your cut off point, you will wind up sitting in the corner of a dark room muttering about schemes of work while surrounded by coffee cups, crusts of sandwiches, and critical essays on 'Bloom's Taxonomy of Education' and other mindboggling theories. There has to be a point where being Irish kicks in and you just say 'fuck it, sure, t'will be grand'.

This is what I have learned over the last 4 months. Never mind all that actual teaching stuff. Its not really that hard ..... :-/

Amy.

Finding My Teaching Feet

This week I underwent a transformation. I am no longer a student looking for the nearest bar with drink promos (although I am broke like one). I am no longer a retail worker thinking of the day I wont have to worry about making a sale. I am no longer someone working towards a job that I have dreamt of since I was a kid. This week, I became Ms Dalton. A real life teacher (in training. But they don't need to know that).

As part of my course I am teaching two days a week in my school, and although it only amounts to 4 classes a week, I can tell you, its still terrifying. I didn't realise how scared I would be! I thought I would go in, like my lecturers have been saying, and I would be thinking about how to include the weaker students, or how to make my lessons accessible to visual learners, and preoccupying myself with Assessment For Learning procedures (don't ask. Seriously difficult to explain), but I didn't do any of these. I went in and stressed out over them all staring at me, and the codes I had to put into the computer to get to the internet, how to mark them into the roll online, and getting them to simply stay on track and not go off on a 'I have a personal story' tangent which 12 year olds like to do. I won't even go into the panic that ensues when one of them asks you a question you didn't anticipate and don't really know the answer to! Christ. I realised the basics were all I was going to learn this week, and I was pretty ok with that.

Friday morning, I suddenly wasn't ok with my lazy basics. The loud staff room phone rang at about half ten in the morning, and my co-operating teacher answered it. She said the name of my newly allocated supervisor, and I nearly got sick. The second day of teaching, my supervisor had decided to give me the only assessment I would receive for the whole term. I didnt eat a thing all day with the fear. Every little bit of self doubt I had about my ability to do this job was screaming in my head, and I didnt want to even think that she may tell me that I was utterly horrific.Criticism I wanted, as I will admit I don't know what I am doing second day into the job, but there is the fact that some people are not meant to be teachers. I couldn't face the idea that maybe I was one of them.

She sat in on my lesson with her little black book of notes and watched me give my first ever lesson to this group of second years. I tried my best to ignore her, and I did most of the time, but then I would get a glimpse of her writing in the book and my stomach would turn. I did the best I could. I followed the tips of fellow teachers in the staff room  to smile, keep relaxed, put the learning objectives on the board and keep referring back to them, keep the students disciplined without shouting, and follow the lesson plan. In the end, it turns out I didn't need to worry much at all. Apparently, stress is a good thing. As I have been so nervous and conscious of myself as a teacher, I pay attention to what I am doing in the class, and I am ticking most teaching boxes. I came out of her feedback meeting with a massive smile on my face and finally thinking, after 6 months abroad, 2 years of saving, 2 months of scary lectures about all the stuff teachers have to do in a class, and years of thinking about it, that I actually can do this job. It turned out that the shock of a supervision on a second day was possibly the best thing that could have happened to me.

Now to survive next week, and the next 18 months after that.

Amy.

Teacher or Lunatic?

This teacher craic is overwhelming!

When I signed up for this course, I had many friends who had completed or were in the middle of completing the year long version, and I was accustomed to hearing of weeks spent locked away drowning in piles of lesson plans and nightmares about schemes of work and giving detentions to 100 students. I expected that my life was going to be take up by lots and lots of work. Turns out I seem, so far, to handle the work quite well. There are lots of reading lists to mull over and assignments to keep track of, but it's manageable at the minute. What I didn't anticipate was the lectures.

I spent three years in Maynooth in lectures, and I always just went in, took notes, and came out in the same mental state as I went in. This is now not the case. Before, my lectures were simply knowledge. They were fact, or at least the search for a fact (arts students get what I am on about). But now, I am surrounded by the intrinsic nature of students, the psychology of the individual, and the methods for planning 10 weeks of lessons around an every changing mass of hormonal teenagers. The importance of the job, the complications of trying to accommodate for 30 students who rotate every 40 minutes 5 days a week is nerve wrecking. You have to think of their learning styles, their economic stance, their social situation, their personal home life, their emotional issues, and try to steer them all towards not only being well rounded and functioning adults, but also beating the competition in the leaving certificate, which happens to be the entire population of 18 year olds in the country. No pressure.

When I was in Thailand I went to school every morning, I taught the kids how to order a McDonalds, or get a bus ticket, or describe their family. I then went to get a massage or a manicure. I don't mean to scare any prospective teachers who read this blog, but it's bloody scary thinking that as a teacher in western society the responsibility upon you is to basically create a functioning adult in 5-6 years. The modern education system is a lot more than fill their heads up with knowledge like we were taught. You have to teach them to control emotions, learn discipline and respect, and teach them a massive curriculum in a certain, very specific, way.

And you know what the mad thing is? As terrifying as it is, I secretly love it. After three years of a degree in subjects I naturally absorb, and two years of cruising job wise, it's invigorating to have a challenge, something to be concerned about, to think about, and to care about. That's why we all go into teaching, right? Cause we all could have had an office job, but we are are all really just insane. Its more interesting than a spreadsheet.

Amy.

Getting My 'Wouldn't It Be Lovely'

Self doubt is, in my opinion, one of the most self destructive things a person can do to themselves. It's the root of some of the greatest mistakes, regrets, and missed life changing opportunities in most people's lives. Yet, we all do it. We take the job doing the same thing we have done for 10 years because we don't think we can do the harder job. We don't apply for that course because we think that we wont be able to pass it. We don't go and talk to that person we have spent the entire night looking at across the bar because we think that they won't like us. We have all been there. But, if we take the leap, the chance to do something that we thought we could never do, it can feel amazing.

I had a moment like that this morning.

I hopped on a bus to Dublin at 9am this morning to head to Trinity College Dublin. For my readers who aren't familiar with Trinity College, its the highest ranked University in the country, it is the oldest University in the country, and it has produced the best minds of the country for centuries. Getting into Trinity, whether to do an undergrad or a postgrad, is a long and hard process. It is in my opinion, or was, waaaaay above my ability level. As an undergrad, I did reasonably well. I was always a person who did reasonably well in nearly everything I set myself completely to. I rarely fail at anything, but then again, I rarely think I can do anything more than average.

So when I came home from Thailand and was completely sure I wanted to be a teacher I knew Trinity was where I wanted to do my Masters. Did I think I could honestly get a place? Hell no! I come from a family where my Grandfather was a porter in security, and my father started his many years working in Trinity cleaning kitchen floors at 15. I grew up thinking working for Trinity would be the closest I would ever get to going there. It was a dream up in my head, a nice idea, a 'wouldn't it be lovely'. I applied to every college in the country that offers my course, and I surprisingly got an interview with Trinity. I went in, put on my best 'I am not terrified' face, and tried to convince them to ignore my average results and concentrate instead on my volunteer work, experience teaching abroad, and my passion for English and History. I went home, considered the interview an experience to learn from, and refused to let myself think that I could actually get in.

I did.

I have to say, and I am not an emotional person, but I choked up a little crossing the road at Dame Street this morning to head through the massive front gate as a student of Trinity College. 2 years of Leaving Certificate lockdown, three years of college, a year of travel and teaching, and a year of building up thousands in savings, here I am.

In this rat race, we should allow ourselves a little leeway. We shouldn't spend so much time thinking we can't, and a little more time thinking 'maybe I can'. Its amazing what we can achieve if we give ourselves the opportunity.

Amy

Student Teacher; Day One

I think it’s important to keep a record of the exciting things that happen throughout your life, as it’s easy to forget how you felt, or the little details, 30 years down the line. That’s why I started writing in this blog when I went to Thailand. It was new, exciting, scary, and ultimately interesting for both me the writer, and you the reader. I now have a new exciting path to write about. Today I took my first big step towards being a teacher here in the western world. I started in my placement school as part of my 2 year Masters of Education course.

For the purpose of this blog, I will not be directly naming my school, any teachers I work with, or naturally any children I teach. Let’s call the school Sunny Highschool, and my mentor teacher Ms. Wisdom (as she appears to be the fountain of all knowledge teacher related).

I was told on Wednesday to come in for a meeting today to discuss timetables etc, and I have to say, I spent the night dreaming of students who refused to do as I tell them, and horrible dark classrooms with nasty looking teachers in it. It was like going back to school myself! Terrifying. After a small breakfast, a disgraceful amount of coffee, and a lot of ‘I can do this’s in the car, I tottered in to meet my future. It’s a lot brighter than my nightmares allowed. The corridors were hectic, every student was looking wondering who I am (and probably why I look the same age as them), and Ms Wisdom was telling me every bit of advice she could regarding curriculum, discipline, resources, assessment. There were numerous names, dozens of handshakes and smiles, even one sarcastic mid 30s male English teacher who decided to mess with my head and tell me to run while I still can. I decided to take it as a joke ….

 It’s busy. It’s more than busy. It’s organised chaos. But then there was a moment after the madness of introductions and photocopying id numbers when I walked into the classroom with Ms Wisdom, and she introduced me as Ms Dalton, and I sat down to observe the lesson (I won’t be facing teaching myself for a few weeks at least), and she began with a smile to the girls. Suddenly there was calm. They all listened to her and they answered her questions, participated in the discussion, came up with their own ideas, and she seemed to masterfully conduct the entire think tank like it was an orchestra. She moved them in certain ways, brought about certain words, nudged them towards certain ideas and thoughts, and then brought it all back to their own lives. I have read the articles about teaching methods and lesson planning, and it sounds exhausting and so complicated, but suddenly the reality was there in front of me. It was a near perfect lesson, and she did it all without any problems. Grant it, she has 30 years or so more experience than me, but I have a whole year to learn from her, and she has a lot to teach.

Observations. Conversations. Assessments. Lesson planning. Lectures. Debates. Reading. Studying. Exams. Marking. Eating. Sleeping. Drinking. Keeping sane. For the first time since I finished college, I feel like I am moving forward, and forward seems ….. interesting (let’s keep it positive. It’s only day one)

And so it begins. 

Amy.

Give Me Sunshine .......

According to webmd.com (and they are always right you know, except when they always tell you that you are going to die from a head cold) people in Utah in the US suffer every winter from a bad case of the SADs. Seasonal Affective Disorder comes about when the population lives under grey clouds for the winter months and are in want of a bit of sunshine. Natural sunlight is proven to combat stress, depression, and general 'get out of my f*****g face' disorder. Unlike Utah, Ireland gets about 360 days of cloud and rain a year. So, when the blissful sunshine pours from the sky for the 5 days a year (usually leaving cert week or thereabouts), the whole country and it's residents are temporarily transformed.

Driving to work today at 9AM, it was a gorgeous 16 degrees out with the promise of 25 by lunchtime. The dogs were happier when I was leaving them, the cuckoo was having a good cuckoo in the garden, and the radio DJ was singing his way out of and into each song. Throughout the whole day standing in the shop I witnessed one happy person after another come and go. Whether they were on their way down south to visit relatives, or taking their first day out with a new baby and the mother-in-law, everyone had a smile and said the same thing; 'beautiful day isn't it?'.

Even in the world outside of my little bag shop, things seemed cheerier. I watched pictures put up online of friend's sharing ice creams on the beach and little kids playing in paddling pools in the garden. Kids outside the shop were taking off their velcro shoes with their little pudgy fingers and paddling in the shopping centre's beloved fountain while the security guard turned a blind eye. People were sending in stories to radio stations of how they were pulling sickies with their children and spouses to spend the day in the sun with them. It all just sounded so perfect and ideal, because even if it's only briefly, the whole country's priorities seemed to be aligned.

I didn't understand until this evening that it's not the vitamins in sunshine that makes people happy. It's the idea that comes with the sunshine that we don't have to be dark like the sky. You don't have to run with your head down in the rain, ignoring everyone around you. You can look up and take your time and see the world. people like to think that for those 5 days of sunshine we have a little bit of freedom. It's kinda like a snow day in Orlando. It's full of unexpected things; adventure, joy, laughing out loud, new memories, sunsets, tastes that remind you of a time when you didn't have to pay an ESB bill. We all want those things, and sunshine somehow makes them seem a little more possible.

Enjoy.

Amy.

ps. here is some Passenger. He just sort of fits the mood.

Scare Away The Dark

Mediocre

I miss writing.

Its basically the only reason I am sitting here typing away.

I watched a movie tonight. I am a sucker for them. But this one was one of those that will stick with me I think. It was called 'Julie and Julia' and was about a young(ish) Amy Adams who found herself stuck in a life she considered boring and unfulfilled. She decided to shake things up a bit. Most people get a new job, or improve their sex life (usually involving an ambitious read of 50 shades and the purchase of some scary looking leather), but Amy decided that was all too overdone. No. She was going to cook 500 and something recipes in 365 days. Sounds boring right? But it took off. Suddenly her life wasn't as boring as she thought it was, and she realised other people found her interesting, and cooking saved her.

I feel writing sort of saves me. It clears the head, you know?

Walking through Dublin city the other day, I sat myself down in one of my favourite spots; St Stephen's Green. Ultimate people watching location. It struck me, as it often does when I make a visit to the big smoke, how interesting people are. They are from little towns or big cities, they have lots of sisters and brothers, or grew up in foster homes. Their favourite food is sushi, or pizza, or marshmallows simply because they remind them of a camp-fire kiss after a few too many home brewed beers. They married someone they love, or someone they hate, or someone they really don't know. They have decades of stories and memories and thoughts. They go about living what they usually consider to be mediocre lives, but to the person next to them who considers their own life to be mediocre, they are anything but mediocre. There is really nothing mediocre about the lives and thoughts of anyone.

I personally have been working away in retail when I am not travelling too and from England to visit the other half, and have recently been accepted to Trinity College Dublin to begin a Masters of Education (English and History) in September. I shouldn't feel like that is mediocre and boring. That isn't mediocre. That's pretty interesting. So why am I not writing? The answer is, there is no reason why I shouldn't be. I have simply forgotten to push out the word 'mediocre'. I do and see and think interesting stuff every week, and judging from the work load of a student teacher, I am going to have a pretty interesting, albeit stressful, life come September.

So, I am writing again. About what? I don't know. Maybe the bird man in the park. Or the book on the bedstand that has been calling me for the past 4 months. Or maybe I will cook ..... Ok let's not get too carried away.

Amy.