The Forty-fifth Republic - Is there anyone there? Surely time for half term

[Staffdontblowitnow]

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 staffroom password just in case it attracts the wrong sort

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 booze is stashed - Thirsty Tuesdays, Fizz Fridays now in operation.

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

The selling market is good at the minute MrsH. Sounds like selling up and splitting the proceeds is the only way for you both to be able to move on. No kids if I'm remembering rightly so a simple sell and split the profits?

You can't move on until you move on as twee as that sounds. Limbo sucks the life out of you imo.

@DrMadelineMaxwell isn't that stuff lovely? One of my favourite letters is from someone to Darwin telling him off for packing his samples badly so they went rotten.
@TheHoneyBadger I know. You're right. I need to put on my VERY LARGE FAT PERSON BIG GIRL PANTS and get it started.

If it's any consolation I fell off the diet wagon massively yesterday to the tune of an enormous piece of lemon drizzle cake, a whole box of Milk Tray (even the nasty ones) and one of those big Christmas tubes of smarties. I blame hormones and the hatefulness of teaching full time in school and simultaneously remotely while worrying about Covid.

Yes, lovely stuff. And quite handy for distance learning too this term.

Drivein oh no! I hope you'll all be ok x

Quick check of the other threads, and comment of the evening goes to Noble for " Everything is beyond the wit of the DfE "

It's all a bit sucky at the minute. Pissed off with my landlady for deciding to put the rent up at a time like this and it's just a reminder of how vulnerable my financial situation is really. Took on this place when I was with my ex so my part time salary and the rent and bills here already aren't the best match. I couldn't move if I wanted to because on paper I don't earn enough to give a tenancy to - got this place because there were two incomes. So I just have to suck up rent increases.

I just think it's utter greed - interest rates are at an all time low and their mortgages are nearly paid off anyway (they own two rental properties plus their own massive house) and they rent privately so no estate agent fees to pay and I've lived here 2.5years and always been on time with rent and taken care of the place. I know none of this is their problem and they can do as they like but their timing sucks in the middle of a pandemic and with only 4 weeks notice. They know full well I'm on limited income. Makes me wonder if they don't want us here anymore but that could be paranoia. She's just switched to a very officious tone in communications where she used to be quite friendly.

Every little thing with work is getting to me and I'm just getting very resentful and irritable - hate being like this. I'm going through a meds switch at the minute for antidepressants. Hoping the new ones will be better but a bit of a potential rollercoaster during switchover and until the new ones settle in. I figured that rollercoaster is best undertaken before being back in school teaching as normal so decided to bite the bullet and do it now whilst mostly working from home.

I seriously hope we can fly in summer. I think if that gets cancelled again and I can't go anywhere that will break me. It'll be two years since I managed to get to my flat come summer and if that gets cancelled too it'll likely be another year because I need at least a month out there to sort things. I haven't pinned my hopes on anything thus far but I can't help but pin them on summer.

@Loshad that sounds awful. Sorry you’ve been pushed to that point. Write stuff down before meeting your HoD do you know what you need to say - I think always easier if you know what you want the outcome to be or a possible alternative solution if you can suggest one/think of one?

Do you teach on teams? You can make it so they can unmute unless they put up their hand and you choose to let them, you can turn it off and on in the lesson if that helps get through the explanation at least? I can tell you how if that helps...

I'm just permanently irritable. It's exhausting. Sitting at a desk doesn't work for me. Calcification of the shoulder joint is causing transferred pain - only swimming works - and now my right boob really hurts too. Proper stabbing pains. I had the same last June, resulting in mammogram and scans, so presumably it's all about being in a chair. I've got a riser and a keyboard for the laptop, but it's not working enough.

What's the opposite of virtue signalling?

Is it 'I'm a nasty heartless bitch who makes Katie Hopkins look sweet' signalling?

Lot of it about tonight...

Sorry to read everyone's woes. It really is tough out there at the moment for so many reasons. I feel like an emotional roller-coaster, one minute everything is fine and the next it's so overwhelming.

I hope knowing that we're all out there listening to each other helps.

piggy I think it's called being a cunt.

Enemy no idea where he got it.

Live college lesson tomorrow. It's good for DS to see his classmates, but I'm the parent you all hate who can't get Teams to work properly. Last week I made a copy of the worksheet for DS to work on in the live lesson, but somehow he managed to write on the big class whiteboard.

Oh, yes, maybe just that herc....

I was just about to post Herc that this funny little corner of the internet is my safe place.
In the outside I'm trying to support a colleague with a terminally ill wife, so I'm resolutely upbeat and can-do with him, and my students, and my colleagues.
In here, I can just breathe. You're all bloody fab and I don't want to poison you.

drive that made me laugh! I'd have given him student of the week for his commitment to my sanity for that 😂

Oh good. I'd have to stop stealing the gin if there was a risk of poisoning.

I worry that I sound like a bitch with half of the things I need to vent about but I don't think people judge it on here and understand it's just a need to vent

What's the book, name and how long is the unit?

MrsH has pretty much said everything. I'd do quite a lot of work on character in the lead up (and possibly plot if that'll be relevant to the content of the letter). Otherwise you are going to end up with all the letter conventions right place and several paragraphs of random stuff in between the greeting and ending.

Yes, to write in character they need to know loads about both characters.

@RafaIsTheKingOfClay only a short unit - a week and it's the way back home. A letter as the final write.I'm thinking lots of questions from boy to alien and vice versa about their homes. Maybe some setting descriptions. Recap some spag. Will also have to make it work for remote learning as well as a huge range of needs.

I have totally fallen off the diet wagon too.

Local shop has those 4 bars of Cadbury somethings for £1....guess who ate 4 double deckers in a day. In my defence they weren't full size but yeah, all 4. And I don't regret it. Which is more worrying for my "skinny 2021" ambitions.

Me and a block of Wensleydale with cranberries are having a lovely evening.

Letter convention, look at models/org devices
Character related vocab/thoughts/feelings
Grammar objectives for main body of text
Planning/write half
Write/edit

Double deckers are amazing.

Hoisin duck pringles here tonight.

No cunts on this thread.

Double Deckers are the food of the gods. I could easily eat four in one day and I know this because it has happened on more than one occasion.

Double Deckers are all yours.

My mum used to shop monthly and we had a sweet tin and multi bag of crisps and whatever was there had to last us and when it was gone it was gone.

Double Deckers would always be the last thing left.

Strangely ds loves them so it's a safe thing to buy if I want to have treats in the house for him that I won't be tempted by.

I've had nothing since the fish and chip equivalent of a snake swallowing a cow. Except gin and tonic obviously.