Pupils! Huh!

At least the day started well. I observed our NQT and she taught a really interesting lesson to a low ability class, using a wide range of teaching and learning strategies to motivate the pupils. They were really enthusiastic in the lesson and learnt quite a lot.

It's a shame the day had to go downhill with my classes! My year 11 group decided that it would rather make silly noises rather than follow my interesting and varied lesson plan that I was so pleased with last night. My year 7s - well, there are not enough desks for them now, never mind chairs and books, so I suppose it's not surprising that I was being constantly attacked on all sides by little people asking for this, that or the other now! now! now! Aaaargh! It took my Year 10s about 15 minutes to begin to settle ... most managed to complete copying out the key words, although with very little input from me because of their poor listening skills, and I only sent one pupil to our school pupil referral unit, and eventually when the bell went, they were quiet enough for about 10 mins for me to read a section of the book and make sure they should have learnt at least one point about the Church. Still loads to do. It makes me feel like pulling my hair out sometimes. It's so frustrating, planning interesting, fun, focused, learning objectives-led lessons, that end up boiling down to "copy that page into your book" just to try and get some order in the classroom. Order, that is, rather than learning. Frustrating.

We also had a year group meeting. That was interesting, since we looked at some pupil support plans. There is a lot of support put in place for many pupils; often the teachers aren't even aware of what support the pupil is receiving, since they can receive it from so many different places. And yet still the pupils sometimes can be so difficult .... !