It Shouldn't Happen to a Teacher

On Wednesday my year ten class seemed to metamorphose into a scene from the film Mean Girls. I had to step in to prevent an all-out war between the goths and the clones. Except more precisely it seemed like one goth against several clones. It's unfortunately predictable that the slightly make-up obsessed teenage girls don't like anyone who stands out even the tiniest bit.

I've had to discuss some issues with them previously but Wednesday was especially bad. It started as soon as they came into the room when clone-in-chief came in complaining that Goth-girl had barged her out of the way in the corridor. I hate it when that happens: when pupils drag in disputes from the playground into the classroom. I try to keep on top of all the variables that make for a good lesson but when something happens beyond the realms of my room it's very frustrating having to spend time sorting it out. In this instance I took the Goth-girl to one side to discuss the accusation, which I think was probably a lot of fuss over nothing but I had to be seen to be taking it seriously.

If it had been left there it would have been okay but then another clone starts whinging that Goth-girl is threatening to make a voodoo doll of her by pointing to a safety pin. Right, much as the whole thing irritates me I've got to have some respect for Goth-girl because she was able to thoroughly scare some actually rather unpleasant girls using nothing more than a well placed gesture and a safety pin. Next thing you know and I'll be being asked to search her bag for PMDs (Pins of Mass Destruction). She even managed to freak someone out by smiling at them. It really was all a storm in a tea cup.

In an attempt at a resolution I spoke to the main protagonists on both sides about respecting each other and encouraged them to take the philosophy of 'if you've nothing nice to say don't say anything at all', though I'm not sure it was massively effective. I refered the incident to the Head of Year as I don't think it was isolated to my lesson.

And this is a class who had an exam on Friday.

A few weeks ago in the Maths office we were discussing numerous teachers who were off due to illness or stress or whatever reason. Our head of Department told us all how thankful he was that we all turned up every morning. We all warned him not to jinx us and I bet he's regretting the kiss of death he gave us after today.

One teacher was off sick on Friday and today, another looks like being off all week due to falling off his bike and yet another is having to have a number of lessons off here and there because her husband has had a stroke. We're falling to pieces here.

The knock on effect is that we remaining few are left to pick up some of the slack. Our school is fairly well resourced in terms of cover-supervisors, but we all need to chip in occasionally. This morning I was called upon to cover a year eleven top set, which actually was quite a pleasant experience as I knew some of the kids in the group from a trip to Scotland a couple of years ago and we had a bit of a catch-up. Mainly this was to do with recalling the time I 'fell down a hill', which is a gross exageration as I merely tripped and never broke my crown with Jill tumbling after.

I also managed to greatly embarrass one of the girls in the group. They were working through some questions from a textbook when I spotted her looking in this little booklet. I picked it up to check what it was only to reveal the booklet's title of 'Dealing with Homosexuality'. Very much a case of curiousity killed the cat.

I myself felt a little embarrassed hearing the pupils whinge about their normal teacher, mainly to do with her being a little short with them when they don't understand things. Not that she's a dwarf you understand. Even so it was actually quite nice to teach a different class as you sometimes get a bit tired of the same pupils day in day out. Though I wouldn't complain if their regular teacher was back tomorrow.

On Friday afternoon the year sevens were having a street party as part of a humanities project. As we were timetabled to have year sevens for Maths period five this meant some of us would have to cover the humanties teachers who were occupied with the street party.

Our Head of Department was asked which teachers to put down to cover these lessons during one lunch in the Maths office and as there were no volunteers he chose us on the qualification of not being in the room at the time, one of whom being myself. The other teachers just kept their heads down while this conversation was going on. When the covering teachers found out later that we would be teaching Geography, Drama and RE on Friday afternoon we had a good laugh at the cheeky manner in which we were selected. I think one my colleagues was a bit annoyed but we have a job to do and a teacher is supposed to actually teach not sit around drinking cups of tea.

Cover lessons aren't exactly fun because it's always a little outside your comfort zone. For instance I know very little about the Bam Earthquake, except that it's rather an unfortunate name for a place to suffer destruction in that manner. And losing PPA (Planning, preparation and assessment) time can be a annoying, but if you're scheduled to teach anyway that doesn't come into it.

However I was grateful when the Head of Department suggested the remaining maths teachers could relieve us halfway through our covers to share the load. As I run a club after school a little extra time on Friday afternoon is always welcome. Unfortunately there was one refuse-nik who didn't see why she should have to do anything when her name wasn't down on the official cover list. Which is a bit poor seeing as she'd actually be gaining half a free anyway. I think the Head of Department leant on her a bit and in the end everything was done very fairly. It's amazing how reluctant some teachers are to actually go into a classroom and teach.

My ears seem to have been burning this week, and it's not as the result of a unfortunate incident with a Bunsen burner during a science cover lesson.

The Assistant Head gave me an almighty fright this morning at break when he asked me what I'd done to one of the girls in year ten. I stammered slightly as I thought up a defence of 'you can't prove anything' or 'I only accidentally bashed her head with my elbow as I was walking past' before he elaborated.

'She's in love with you'. Oh that's much better, no wait. It's a million times worse, what?!

'No, not like that. She was just telling me what a good job she thinks you're doing' I'd have thought he could have opened the conversation with that comment instead of giving me a heart attack.

I'm glad that my pupils feel the need to tell Senior Leadership that they're enjoying my lessons, though I did have to double check that she wasn't being sarcastic. It's nice to know that I must be doing something right, even if I always try to keep in it perspective as being a popular teacher isn't necesarily the same as being a good one.

PS: No I didn't bribe her.

My year eight class normally has fourteen pupils, however by the end of today's lesson we had considerably less than that.

1128: One of the girls informs me that her friend is off sick and won't be in today. Thirteen left.

1129: A girl comes in and asks for some work because she's on reception monitor duty this morning. Twelve left.

1133: A latecomer arrives, I ask him if his fellow footballer is with him, apparently he was here earlier but mysteriously disappeared before the previous lesson never to be seen again. Eleven left.

1155: The latecomer is doing very little work and I warn him that if he doesn't do it now he'll have to stay at lunch to catch up. 'No I won't' he says and walks off down the corridor. Ten left.

1205: One of the girls is taken for her reading practice. Nine left.

1225: He-who-has-ADHD has to leave to take his tablet before lunch. Eight left.

1226: One of the girls with a disability leaves early as normal so she doesn't have to negotiate busy corridors. Seven left.

All-in-all a successful lesson.