31 teaching days to go

I've just had another shocker - If I don't prove that I can teach in the first 2 weeks of next term, they have told me that I'm either gonna be out or I'm gonna have to come back next year to take part of the course again. As you may have noticed from the countdown of teaching days, the latter option sounds like being sent to hell for eternity and so both options pretty much strike me as being the end of my course.

Problem is that I've failed pretty much everything consistently since the start of this course and improvements have been slow and very painful in coming. If it does turn out that I'm called back for another term, or if I fail completely in my attempt to teach next term, I will have to hold up my hands and say that I bit off more than I could chew, that I cannot teach. Of course it's gonna hurt my pride but goddamn it there's no point in pretending when it's clear to all that I'm not competent.

There is still the tiniest bit of hope of passing this course, and I'm losing my mind trying but glimmers of hope are like shadows on water.

Wahey! I'm the 1000th visitor to my site!

Yes I am that sad...

40 Teaching days to go - Justice is served

I find myself constatnly reminding myself to focus on the task at hand. My mind naturally wanders off task but this job has seen my mind veer so violently off course so often I live 2 lives similtaneously these days, a real one of constant work and a make-believe, Walter Mitty second life. Sometimes I like to dream that I am Ancient Japan, a concubine to a sex-mad emperor, who won't leave me alone.

I shag and I shag and I shag all day long and by the time I get back to my mundane existence I'm actually quite pleased with my life because it seems easy in comparison. Or I am a starving victim of famine under a tyranical regime in my second life. Or I've had both my legs blown off by a landmine.

I used to dream of better things, an alternative second life of luxury as a form of escapism only to be frustrated that reality just wasn't playing the game. But recently it's been alright to dream high.

At Year 8 I have a brilliant class who are a pleasure to teach. I have a right laugh with them.

I've been provisionally accepted for Oxfam Glastonbury stewarding and my Police course is going great.

And on top of that I got 3 letters this morning saying that, following the successful prosecution of the 3 scumbags who tried to mug me and my mate on the train at the start of the course back in November, I have been awarded compensation of 50 quid each from the 3. Hurray! Justice is served!

53 teaching days to go - Any other options part 1

Does the world really need more accountants? More faceless middle managers, assistants and auditors? Of course we need to have some of those around to keep the world running smoothly, but at the expense of innovation and leadership every time.

There is a difference you see between Management and Leadership. Where the former strives to implement systems from the top to keep the machine running smoothly and constantly, the latter strives to push forward the machines and systems themselves, always aiming to change the very fabric of the system they are working with.

But that leaves me in a quandry. As usual I refer again to the goddamn hard profession I'm in. Central to my position is the idea that within that classroom and within the school I am a leader. My task is to guide these pupils through their development, intellectually, morally spiritually. It's a lot to ask. No 2 days are ever the same, and I don't expect them to be, always having to make snap decisions and having to work out later if I had done the right thing.

As the leader of the class, all eyes are on me to get it right, and sometimes I do but often I don't. As a leader everyone knows when you've got it wrong.

So, just like every day, today after coming back from Family Lebanese Restaurant (What's the URL Matt and Jess?) the great Lebanese Restaurant on Harrow Road, I found myself thinking ahead about my options when all this was over.

While my mind and ideology points it's finger in the direction of teaching and tells me to stay on the road I'm on, the narcolepsy-inducing exhaustion of every cell in my body was definitely telling me to abandon my naive ideals and become an accountant.

The thought repulses me, the idea of adding someone elses hard work up, but I found the thought strangely attractive when the other choice is to go in and work 60 hour weeks in poor conditions and have no life at school. I wracked my brains for a solution, I've even thought of joining the army for fucks sakes! And you know things are getting bad when you'd rather get shot than go back into work.

I have never been accused of being a negative person but in the case of teaching I seem to see a lot more negatives than positives every time I look at it. Hell there are some positives, like the odd good class or a great student who you can see a future in. But when you teach 180 different kids a day it gets more an more difficult to see those little specks of colour beyond the uniform.

Just over 50 days of teaching left to go then I think I may be an accountant or something. It's a long long road.