All I can say . . .

. . . is that you know it's been a long week when you wake up on a Sunday morning to realise that you've been dreaming that a litter of 30 kittens - which have the names and faces of the kids from your prac class - have been harrassing you for answers to their maths problems.

That's what comes of having a cat sleep in your room after you've been teaching maths all week!

Full wrap-up coming, I promise. First, I have a science assignment to write. What possessed them to make it due the Monday after prac, I will never know!

LMFAO . . .

Those who know me online will know that I have little patience with people who ask questions before trying to look up the answers themselves . . . especially when they've been previously shown how. I'm not alone in this frustration, and it's become a not-uncommon internet snark to say "google is your friend" or some such, or to just direct the asker to a tongue-in-cheek fake website like golookitup.com.

So you can imagine my delight to discover this: www.justfuckinggoogleit.com

Go on, click it . . .

All I can say . . .

. . . is that you know your brain is running on empty when you try to spell 'volunteer' with an 'f' and it's only 9pm.

Apologies for the lack of bloggage - it's not because anything's wrong, just because I'm insanely busy, and prac is so full of sights and sensations and thoughts and happenings that I can't find a sensible place to start blogging about it. Suffice to say that it's going brilliantly, I couldn't be happier, and I wish it wasn't going to be over on Friday!

Hopefully there will be a proper post on the weekend, if assignments allow.

*Blank look*

Just a quick bit of bloggage, because I'm tired beyond comprehension!

Moving took ages with my stepdad's small trailer (3 loads, and it's a 40-minute drive between the two houses!) but we survived and I'm neatly tucked into the little room at my parents' house. I miss my big, comfortable, expensive queen bed though!

Prac looks to be fantastic, my supervising teacher is great and the class (about 28 kids in years 6 and 7) are a nice bunch. We're going on an excursion tomorrow which should be fun.

Internet will be intermittent this week because my stepdad won't have time to put the cable through the ceiling until then, and I can't use the cable-draped-across-the-floor method during the house's busy times of day, nor after the lights are out. But I hope to blog properly tomorrow if I'm not still utterly exhausted.

May the Fourth . . .

Well, it's the 5th now, but I've been reminded by various sites of the "May the Fourth be with you" pun. Ha.

Anyway, I was thinking that if there was an "International Day of Fantasy and Sci Fi", it would naturally have to be celebrated on May the Fourth, don't you think?

Yes, I'm in a whimsical mood. It's a distraction from trying to do a week's packing in one day . . .

 

ROFL . . .

I should have been packing all afternoon - having skived off work for that exact purpose - but I've been feeling kinda dozy so instead I've been sitting at the computer reading funny teaching stories and education jokes. This one I just *had* to share:

Then Jesus took his disciples up the mountain and gathered them around him. He taught them saying:

"Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the kingdom of God.
Blessed are the meek.
Blessed are they that mourn.
Blessed are the merciful.
Blessed are they that thirst for justice.
Blessed are you when you are persecuted.
Blessed are you when you when you suffer.
Be glad and rejoice for your reward is great in heaven."

And James said "are we supposed to know this ?"
And Simon Peter said "will we have a test on this ?"
And Phillip said "I don't have any paper."
And Bartholomew said "do we have to spell correctly ?"
And Mark said "do we have to hand this in ?"
And John said "the other disciples didn't have to learn this."
And Matthew said "may I go to the toilet ?"

Then one of the Pharisees who was present asked to see
Jesus' lesson plan and inquired of Jesus:
"Where are your learning and assessment objectives ?
What range of teaching strategies did you draw from ?
Did you provide a differentiated provision ?
Can I see a cross section of pupils work ?

And Jesus wept.

Found here: http://re-xs.ucsm.ac.uk/cupboard/jokes/jokes.htm

I'm sure the teachers / TAs / Ed students will appreciate why this tickled my fancy!

The jokes on that site are religion-oriented not teaching oriented, but do peruse it, some of them are delightful.

Oh, Wow . . .

Today I got back an assignment for my Learning & Assessment Processes unit. The assignment was written under huge pressure (it was one of the two I was working on when I had that huge fight with my Mum and that really bad episode of depression which I blogged about). I really didn't want it back because I couldn't even remember what I had written, and I was sure I'd written some sort of garbled nonsense.

Well, I got it back . . . 33 / 35, or 94%! A High Distinction, of course, and to top it off, the workshop leader privately asked me if she could have a copy of it! She didn’t ask anyone else in the class, and although there’s many other classes, that puts me at the top of hers at least. I’m hugely relieved and very chuffed.

And it finally feels like my academic life is snapping into focus. My Credit Pass (ie 60-69%) for the pre-semester unit, and my 70% mark for my first English assignment, were making me feel like a failure, because I was an excellent, high-performing student when I finished university, and I felt like I’d somehow lost something somewhere along the line. These two marks show that it was just a case of getting my assignment techniques up and running again. These are the marks I should be getting!

I’m very, very happy  

I've also finally got a placement for my prac which starts on Monday. It's not at the most convenient school, but it's good enough, and the school itself is in a nice area (mostly middle class and upper middle class families) which will be an interesting contrast to my previous prac which was in a very low socioeconomic area. It's good to get a perspective on different school demographics.