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The staffroom

Whether you're a permanent teacher, supply teacher or student teacher, you'll find others in the same situation on our Staffroom forum.

The Twenty-Sixth Republic -Half Term Horror?

999 replies

StaffAssociationRepresentative · 23/10/2020 17:51

You are most welcome to this school staff support thread to get us through stressful times. It is meant for school staff only – a sort of room of requirement. Baiters, haters, goaders and bashers can jog on somewhere else.

If you are NOT staff and just have a general education query please start your own thread.

You can play here if you are a member of one the following groups-

-ABBA - anti bashers and baiting association
-SWAB - school workers against bashers
-SWOT - school workers opposing teacherbashers
-STARS - schoolworkers together against ranting + slurs

Do not give ‘The Every twat for Themselves mob’ the staffroom password as a number of them are operating in an alternative reality.

No DfE muppets allowed

Other requirements for staff room entry include the ability to find the staff room, the ability to find a clean mug in the staff room, knowledge of the photocopier codes, and the ability to sniff out where the toffee vodka is hidden.

If you are fed up with cakes and biscuits there is now a cheeseboard on offer

If you come with a stick to goad us then that is not allowed in the staffroom and you will receive a detention

OP posts:
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MrsHamlet · 26/10/2020 16:44

@SmileEachDay

talk a bit, read a bit, ask a bit, get them to write a bit. Pack up

Haaaa. This is my lesson planning. Except I add “silently do recall task” at the start.

You're clearly an AST, smile
Frlrlrubert · 26/10/2020 16:47

Piggy

In a previous life Sunday was a workday for me. Yep, I rocked up at 6am instead of 7am.

Luckily I could just crack on and they let me go home a bit early (overtime anyway so didn't make a difference).

I did feel like a right idiot though!

Funny thing was, I wasn't the first there, someone else had remembered but put their clock forward instead of back, and turned up two hours early.

SmileEachDay · 26/10/2020 16:47

You're clearly an AST, smile

🤣🤣

Piggywaspushed · 26/10/2020 16:49

Gravity, ClickView was deemed too expensive and no one used it when we had it before. Sad

MrsHamlet · 26/10/2020 16:52

piggy apparently it's possible to stream through teams (but I don't do it and the instructions I've been given don't work)

HarveySchlumpfenburger · 26/10/2020 17:07

@noblegiraffe

That KS3 lesson plan is, in my very humble opinion, a very long drawn out lesson starter with too much navel-gazing and not enough kids actually doing maths. The task that is set for homework hasn’t been modelled sufficiently to allow them to have a clue where to start. They’ve made the mistake of providing the most difficult task at the time when the pupils have no support. But hey, at least they spent ten minutes of the plenary writing bobbins about how they thought like a mathematician.

If you notice, it covers less stuff than the lesson it is replacing too.

I wouldn’t normally criticise someone else’s work but this is what the DfE have put out, so fair game.

I’ve only got as far as the starter & recap but my first thought is that the spaced retrieval starter is the sort of thing that doesn’t really need adapting and has been, but the recap probably does and hasn’t really. And clearly no one proof read it because they might have noticed the mistake about d = e.
HarveySchlumpfenburger · 26/10/2020 17:09

It’s going to be like that time they released videos of a gold standard phonics lesson that really wasn’t, isn’t it?

Piggywaspushed · 26/10/2020 17:24

Not copyrighted film Mrs. they ahve software that prevents it. The odd YouTube clip excepted.

MrsHamlet · 26/10/2020 17:26

Bugger

SmileEachDay · 26/10/2020 17:27

That KS3 lesson plan is, in my very humble opinion, a very long drawn out lesson starter with too much navel-gazing and not enough kids actually doing maths

We use a mastery curriculum (bought in by the MAT) that is exact this. Endless naval gazing and lessons that kids could spend 45 mins not actually doing any English.

It’s a pain modifying the lessons - be quicker to just plan from scratch!

DreamingofBrie · 26/10/2020 17:53

Hi all,
I've lost track of the thread, in amongst getting to half term! Hope everyone is well and having/had a well-deserved rest. I've stayed away from the TB threads, haven't got the fortitude to be dealing with them at the moment, but thanks to those of you who do. Been doing a bit of crochet over at Woolly Hugs, as a form of self care.

I was just musing today on my way into town - the students often ask me why I changed career into teaching. I'm generally pretty honest with them, but I also always say to them "I've got a lot more patience with children behaving like children, than I do with adults behaving like children", which usually makes them laugh.

Big pile of prep/marking to do for next term. Maybe start tomorrow Gin.

TheHoneyBadger · 26/10/2020 18:09

But then I’m devoted to my method which would be: talk a bit, read a bit, ask a bit, get them to write a bit. Pack up.

Yeah add a gcse pod or youtube clip (in with or instead of the read a bit) and that's basically my lessons too Grin Bit of recall and a plenary if you're lucky but if no one's watching that's kind of just weaved in throughout rather than needing a fanfare.

HarveySchlumpfenburger · 26/10/2020 18:53

We use a mastery curriculum (bought in by the MAT) that is exact this. Endless naval gazing and lessons that kids could spend 45 mins not actually doing any English.

Grin Mastery curriculum was my first thought. I’ve always suspected that the abstract part of the CPA model tends to go AWOL in some U.K. classrooms.

Perhaps it’s just so you squeeze the maths round all the extra time you’ll need to teach the English.

Piggywaspushed · 26/10/2020 20:00

I am now the proud owner of a dead washing machine. Fab.

noblegiraffe · 26/10/2020 20:03

I’m no English teacher but I don’t think you mean proud, piggy

Commiserations. Is there a wash stuck in it?

MrsHamlet · 26/10/2020 20:09

Arse, Piggy :(
I like the idea of a plenary fanfare. I might do them more regularly if a load of trumpeters would appear and fanfare. We have oodles of trumpeters in school.

WhyNotMe40 · 26/10/2020 20:10

@Piggywaspushed

I am now the proud owner of a dead washing machine. Fab.
Oh no! Fixable I hope? We have a washing machine magician round here who seemingly can raise the dead...

Those lesson routines seem familiar Grin
Mine is: 10 short recall questions (repeated from last lesson plenary) in silence while I gather my shit.
Talk a bit
Model a question or give a practical demonstration or show relevant video clip.
Ask a bit
Get them to answer some questions in writing.
10 short recall questions (without taking marks in) that will be repeated as next lessons starter.
Pack up Grin

Piggywaspushed · 26/10/2020 20:11

No ,no wash stuck in it, thankfully. It just cut out and repair man says it is control panel and beyond repair. As mrsH says , arse.

At least it's half terms and got nowhere to go, I guess. can spend time waiting about indoors in dirty clothes for a delivery.

noblegiraffe · 26/10/2020 20:11

We all seem very Rosenshine Grin

MrsHamlet · 26/10/2020 20:13

You can tell I'm an English teacher from my erudition, right?! Grin

noblegiraffe · 26/10/2020 20:13

Hope you can get one delivered soon, piggy

I did three loads of washing today and that is my entire accomplishment. I even had a nap.

Piggywaspushed · 26/10/2020 20:13

Oh, I just chat a bit, read a bit, have a festival of highlighting, maybe draw a picture, chat a bit, tidy up, do a spelling test for extra fun every so often. If they are very lucky we watch something.

Hercwasonaroll · 26/10/2020 20:17

Plenary fanfare... Plenaries are less and less frequent for me now. Might bring them back if I got a fanfare.

The more I look at that maths lesson, the worse it gets. So much bullshitery around discovering the rule. Just model it and let them practise. Never mind the Internet connection and kids ability to use the tech.

WhyNotMe40 · 26/10/2020 20:23

@noblegiraffe

We all seem very Rosenshine Grin
Absolutely. And I suppose I seem an old stuck in the mud, but I'm only in my 40s and already seen too many fads come and go in teaching. I would need to see some proper evidence before I move on from something I know works well. Recently my school has been into dual coding stuff as if that was ground breaking stuff - but when I looked into it, it just described what I do already, except in fancier terms than talk a bit, draw a bit, scribble a bit Grin I'm a bit like piggy's husband in that I mainly scribble on whiteboards to teach, I have supplementary PowerPoints for nice pictures and video links etc, but I do an awful lot of extra annotations Grin
Hercwasonaroll · 26/10/2020 20:27

Dual coding has been completely bastardised (as with most edu stuff) by people shoving bloody icons on everything.

I loved Adam Boxers rant about it.