I turned the ripe old age of 23 today. I'm still less than half the age of most of the other members of the maths department, who have more experience of teaching than I have of breathing. I made the faux pas of not bringing in biscuits to the maths office; I really need to learn the unwritten rules of the department. I will correct this tomorrow, including differentiating the snacking-needs of the teachers by providing chocolate and non-chocolate varieties to cater for a range of calorie attainers.

I got some good presents but no one bought me the things I put at the top of my birthday list: more time, a sure-fire way of passing my NQT year and nicer pupils. Oh well, there's always Christmas.

Sometimes you can't help but feel that the headteachers at schools are omnipotent beings keeping an eagle eye over their staff. This is certainly the case with our head. I'm scared as hell of him, which means he probably frightens the kids pretty well too.

This morning before briefing he came up to me to comment on my observation yesterday. This was frightening because it involved talking to him and it means that I must register on senior management's radar. There I was naively hoping my presence would go unnoticed, it seems that way with the kids sometimes. Fortunately his comments were positive, as were the comments from my head of department this lunchtime. Apparently some NQTs are doing really well, but some are also doing really badly. I appear to be in the middle somewhere, which isn't necessarily such a bad place to be, though I don't exactly feel a beaming sense of pride in being 'average'. The plus-side of having everyone think I was doing terribly before is that by being 'average' I look like I'm making great progress. I think I've underachieved so far, but have no intention of putting them right on this because it means I have no weight of expectation on my shoulders. Fantastic! Or maybe I mean plus-good?

'Hiya sir!' a friendly year ten shouted through my door, 'hello' I cheerfully replied. I might not have been so cheerful after she turned to her friend and said, 'I like Mr [my name here], he's so sweet.'

Sweet? Hang on, isn't that something you'd say about a geeky little boy trying his best to fit in and not get bullied by the other kids at school, not a geeky little man trying his best to fit in and not get bullied by... On the other hand perhaps you can see where she's coming from, though I'm struggling to think of someone authoritative and sweet.

Still, I suppose it's nicer than some of the graffiti I read on a desk saying 'I h8 Mr [me] 4lyf.' I've been racking my memory but I can't think of anyone in the past who has declared a lifelong vendetta against me, so congratulations to this hateful little individual for becoming the first. The most reasurring thing about this is that should the author become a tyrannical dictator of the country at least their poor literacy would stop them writing my death warrant.

One of the deputy heads came in to observe my lesson with year nine this afternoon. Seeing as (1) she has formed the impression that I have no classroom management skills (this is of course untrue, I have few classroom management skills, which is quite different from having none at all as this means I am more adept than a chair) (2) the head of maths has recently had what we shall politely call a bit of a falling out with senior management and (3) she isn't famed for her mathematical ability I was a little apprehensive. Add in to the mix the last lesson on a Monday factor and you have a recipe for disaster.

As it happens my lesson was rated as being 'satisfactory' which is... satisfactory, I suppose. This was inspite of the malevolent little toad who complained that I hadn't marked his book (I had) and the pupil who appeared to have left his brain in a jar on the kitchen shelf in the morning. I could have hugged one pupil though, who said as the deputy head walked past that he hadn't understood the work before but did at the end, which is ultimately the whole point of lessons.

Simultaneous equations and triangles were cast aside today as it was the school's PSHE day on health. I spent the majority of the day with the form that I register on occasional Wednesdays and Fridays.

One lesson I had to teach was on boy's puberty, which was about the biggest nightmare possible.

'True or False? The testicles are located in the scrotum to keep them cool.'

How to hell should I know? Experience tells me that it can get pretty sweaty down there, so it can't be true can it? But, surely sperm needs cooling. Luckily the class weren't particularly interested so it didn't matter much. At least I didn't have anyone asking if wanking was the same thing as masturbation like one of the other NQTs did.

Unfortunately the video we were supposed to be watching decided to sabotage the lesson by not working, leading to unrest and disatisfaction. The next moment one of the senior management team walked in the classroom. Not good seeing as they rate my teaching as pretty poor at the moment anyway. It's just not fair sometimes, though at least it didn't shatter any illusions they may have had.

The rebellion of the VCR meant that we had a 'discussion' lesson loosely based on the changes that take place during puberty including extra hair, mood swings and noticing girls. When asked to summarise what they'd learned at the end one pupil said he'd learnt that the video didn't work.

The crowning glory of the day was an 'aerobathon' in the sports hall with all year seven forms and their tutors. This was my opportunity to give the pupils a good laugh as I have about as much co-ordination of movement as a trolley on black ice. I can just about manage to move my legs okay and my arms too, but not both at once. If I was being assessed by the dance teacher I'd probably be rated as 'working towards a level 4'. On the plus side I enjoyed seeing the lovely English NQT strutting her stuff. Perhaps I'm going through puberty again.

In the classroom I sometimes find myself having to hold my tongue. In this afternoon's lesson with year ten one of them asked me if I knew who Mr 'Y' was, 'he's well weird, don't you think sir?' My honest thought was, yeah, he is a bit, but I managed to keep the words slipping from my mouth and the smirk off my face and delivered a: 'show respect to the teachers at this school'. Thank god teenagers aren't telepathic.

Seeing as I notice the attractice looking female teachers at school, it is reasonable to assume that there must also be attractive looking male teachers. I of course wouldn't know about such things because as a member of the unfairer sex I reserve the right to feel very awkward about commenting on another man's appearance.

However you can tell who the popular male teachers are by the reaction of the female staff and pupils to them. One of my year tens said to me a while back: 'do you know who Mr 'X' is?', I replied that I did not. 'Well you should find out. He's gorgeous!' Leaving aside why they thought this information would be of an use to me, I thought it was a litte crass. An NQT could get jealous here, am I not at least mildly attractive? Though I suppose some questions are better left unasked and therefore unanswered. Since then I've noticed that the female teachers fall over themselves to make Mr 'X' cups of the treasured elixir that teacher craze the most, tea. Oh, to be King!

'This should be your bible' said my mentor, holding up a copy of the 2008 GCSE Mathematics Specification. Well, it would appear that I've been living like a heathen for the past three months seeing as I'd never even heard of a 'specification' before, nevermind treating one as sanscrit.

This may help to explain why, among with other things, my lessons with year ten had been so abysmal. My mentor had just been to a meeting with one of the senior management team and they'd raised concerns about my professional development, especially regarding my teaching of my higher year ten group. Apparently some of the class had complained about my teaching and asked if something could be done. Well, talk about taking the wind out of a boy's sails, in fact it's more like taking away the wind and replacing it with a very angry rottweiler that hasn't eaten for a week and had his leg broken as a puppy by a young maths teacher.

Other than the lack of a specification - which in theory is the sort of thing I should ask for, but that's hard to do if you don't know such a thing exists - the problems stem from not giving them notes that they're happy with, trouble getting them to listen, not being the teacher they had last year and having a rapport with them that could be best described as arctic. I could probably go on but sometimes you can only take so much criticism, even if it is from yourself.

Suddenly the words 'give up' seem very appealing. Damn.

Whilst watching Gordon Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmares last night I couldn't help but draw parallels between the poor sap getting an eff-ing roasting from Ramsay and my current experience in the classroom.

The trouble with the restaurant was that the manager was making everything too complicated, with a choice of seventy-two items on the menu, including chocolate prawns and chicken with banana - I kid you not. And that's what my lessons are like. One of my year tens, quite a pleasant one in fact, had said to her form tutor that my lessons were too much like fun and she was worried that they weren't learning anything.

I think all the cut-up bits of coloured paper and activities involving group work may have been a little too unconventional for some tastes. I think I'll stick with baked beans on toast for a bit.

It's not a huge surprise in a school to find that some children as less easy to get on with than others. When you first come across them you give them the benefit of the doubt: perhaps they have a tough home life, perhaps they've just lost a close relative, perhaps their dealer is pressuring them for the money they owe for that crack they snorted at the weekend. After a while you become hardened and realise the sad truth, they're just little buggers.

And so it seems with my 'good' year ten class, who in theory should be getting A's and A*'s in their GCSEs. Constant arguing back, more requests for moving seats than someone sat next to a screaming baby on a plane, refusal to believe anything I say and just not shutting the hell up when I tell them to.

The extent of this today was me putting half of them in detention then walking out of the room (and tempted to just lock them in) for someone else to deal with because I couldn't stand to spend another minute anywhere near them. I was discussing them with a colleague who described one of the girls as being 'evil' and that if I'm telling her off one-to-one I should make sure there is also a female member of staff in the room. Oo-er, I presume this wasn't meant as extra moral support. Not that it'd ever just be her in detention, the others in the class could never manage to behave well enough for that.

As the famous quote goes: 'Don't let the bastards grind you down'.

In tonight's staff meeting we were discussing tracking: how well are the pupils progressing through the national curriculum levels. The main purpose of the meeting seemed to be to show off the fancy computer software they use to highlight any potential under-achievement. In order to demonstrate this point the senior staff picked a random student, who we will call Claire, who just so happens to be in my top set year nine class.

'If we look at Claire's tracking for maths we see that her level, a 7b, is highlighted red. This means she is not on target to meet her predicted grade for the SATs of an 8c.'

hmm, well possibly or perhaps the teacher was being very cautious in the hope that things will look brilliant when their pupils make massive progress throughout the rest of the year. Or maybe the teacher is just plain incompetent, who knows?

I'm one of several NQTs at my school. This leads to many comparisons, not least when looking through the timetables of my fellow young teachers. Being slightly competitive I couldn't help but compare the number of free periods and found that I have the least. I think I should get bonus points for this. The drama NQT has a full seven frees per week, as well as one lesson manning IF (which means sitting around and making sure the kids don't smoke, talk to each other, sit staring out of the windows, or just throw each other out of the windows, possibly whilst talking and smoking). Not that I'd dream of complaining about actually having to teach a few lessons here and there, because I suppose that, technically, that's my job.

After chipping away at them throughout last term I seem to have managed to get my pain-in the-neck year tens on task and working. It took many detentions and alot of 'I'm sure your plans for the weekend are fascinating but I'm really not interested in hearing them' but we appear to be going in the right direction.

Unfortunately my supposedly nice year tens are taking up the mantle of pissing me off big time.

Pupil A: 'On no, we've got him again!'

Followed up by: 'I'm going on strike' and a bit of a wander around the classroom.

Pupil B is flicking bits of rubber onto the overheard projector, I politely suggest that he might be better off not doing so.

B: 'I'm not! Why is it always me?'

Me: 'Firstly, I saw you. Secondly, I do not appreciate you answering back'

B: 'I'm not answering back!'

Priceless.

One of my year seven form members informed me today that they'd seen graffiti on a desk saying that I am 'a pleb'.

Firstly I'd like to declare my pride at having my name in graffiti. It's truly an honour that someone dislikes me so much as to vandalise school property.

Secondly, the dictionary definition of a 'pleb' (see plebeian) is 'a commoner, a member of a despised social class.' Seeing as I teach maths I find it hard to argue with the description.

The jokes on them.

My year sevens and year eights took tests today. Here were some of their responses:

'All angles in a quadrilateral must add up to 360 degrees so you find out what angles B and D are then you find out A and bingo you've got it'

'Saturday because most people brought ice screams because they cool you down also most people brought cola drinks and they also cool you down'

Question: Katherine uses a calculator to work out 19.8 x 4.1. Her display shows 811.8. Without working out the answer decide whether Katherine is correct.

Pupil 1: 'No because if you times 19 and 4 together you get 76 and then you times 8 and 1 together and you get 0.8 and you add them together and you get 76.8 well thats what I got anyway'

Pupil 2: 'Yes because if you look at the answer it is a sensible answer because if it wasent it would be like 645.347'

Pupil 3: 'Dont no and its far too hard'

Pupil 4: 'I think its right because if she uses a calculator it makes sense'

Question: Look at the diagram above and write down:
a) x degrees
b) y degrees
c) z degrees

Pupil Response:
a) x degrees
b) y degrees
c) z degrees