Secondary teachers, do you ever have shite day with horrid kids and then blame yourself?

[fizzbuzz]

. Totally fed up with difficult pupils....

Been teaching 12 years, but they seem to get worse and worse,now blaming myself

Hercules1 Much more refined than my rant.

Don't apologise AsGoodAs; I thought your "rant" was actually quite restrained.

I used to work in a beacon school with Stepford children. I was bored to tears. I work in a 'rough' school now, it's famous for it's reputation. I love it. Bad days, good days - bring them on!

Trulymadlydeeply, thought you were in France
Do they have Y8 there?????

Wow - that hit a raw nerve. I don't think I said that teachers should be perfect in every lesson - I was just addressing the OP's question: "do you blame yourself?".

I think we all do blame ourselves to some extent, even when it's the class from hell. That's the way that most teachers have been trained to think. Even with the worst class in the school, there are still a few pupils who genuinely want to learn, and we have to do what we can for them (they have to be with these rotters for all of their lessons).

I am a long way from perfect, and in the school I'm in, I really do have no one else to blame. But I've been in places where the behaviour has been atrocious, and I do know what it is like. It is a rubbish feeling when you have to call out for SMT support, and I don't know about others, but I never felt that it ever reflected well on me.

Talking of workplace reform - how is it going in your school?
Last term how:
a) much cover did you do?

We do all our own cover - there's no money for supply teachers, and not enough work for a cover supervisor. Two of my frees a week are set aside for cover and I usually get taken for just one of them and sometimes I escape altogether. Because we have nominated periods for cover, I don't count on being able to mark or prepare in that time. It's pretty normal to volunteer to cover a lesson in your own department so that some teaching can still go on, even if it's not one of your nominated periods. I don't think I got any frees at all a few weeks ago when one of my colleagues was off sick for a week.

b) many displays did you put up?

We do our own displays. It's not a big deal - takes about 10 minutes to do. Who should be doing display?

c) many displays did you prepare?

I do them every half-term.

d) often did you have to collect money from pupils?

I put it in the register and the office staff deal with it. I don't even open the envelopes. If it's a charity collection, the house captains in sixth form handle it completely.

Last year how:
e) many exams did you invigilate?

I was in a different school last year, and the policy there was that you could be asked to invigilate if you would normally be teaching the class at that time. You would be called around half the time.

At the school I'm in now, we use teaching staff for all invigilation, even for public exams. The public exams are a pest because you can't do any work during them, but for school exams, we can do marking and they are really no trouble at all.

Well, I,m not afraid to call on SMT for help, that's why they get paid loads more than me.

I will do what I can in class, and don't really like sending kids out, but if it gets to the point where other kids are affected then out they go. Eg,, first warning, second warning, detention, talk about that it is their choice if I take next step, eviction. I send about 3 kids out every year. But that is what SMT get paid for in MO

I have sent children out in the past. We have a semi formal system in the department (which is large) where disruptive children are sent to work in sixth form classes. We normally have at least one sixth form class running through the day.

I teach quite a lot of sixth form classes, so I tend to 'recieve' more than I send out, but the system is a good one, limits the disruption to the rest of the class, and reduces the amount of paperwork that we have to complete.

We also have a system where welfare workers will come and remove a child from a lesson. Fortunatly (and it it mostly luck, I have mostly well behaved children atm) I've never needed to use this, but it is re-assuring to know that the acility is there

3 kids a year is nothing, Fizzbuzz!

We have that system if a 6th form is running at the same time. Internal exclusion. Unfortunately , they are not always on when difficult class is.

We can also call for support to come and fetchh awkward child, because they quite often refuse to go nothing like digging yourself in deeper.....

If it makes you feel better I once escourted a child to Welfare and she dug her heals in, and refused to move!

We both had to wait there until I could get the head of year to come. She had to wait 30 minutes in the middle of the playground with the kid before she would move.

The worst feeling in the world is when you ARE the Head of Year and the pupil point-black refuses to cooperate! Fortunately it doesn't happen often but it feels awful when it does. The flip side of it is a pupil in your year group refusing to cooperate with a member of SLT and then you come along and they do it immediately. Fortunately our school works very much as a family and (I don't think) any judging takes place in either situation - except teachers judging themselves and we are all our own worst enemies for that I think.

No, I don't think much judging takes place in our school. In fact SMT are always supportive about awful pupils, even chasing them all over the school when they are dodging lessons (it is a big school!)

I once tried to chase one of my form who was absconding across a field. It was pitiful, he was miles away, I struggled along puffing and panting, watching him disappearing over the horizon

Lol! In my first year as HOY I used to have a lad who routinely did a runner when things got a bit much for him. I had to train him to only run as far as the playground, so I could then go and support him, rather than him running home, where his mum would wallop him!!!

Yes, there are always some who run off at a momnets notice.