Brigid Jones’s Homework Diary

They say it takes a village to raise a child. As the end of the first placement approaches, I can confirm it also takes a village to create a teacher.

The end of ‘School Experience One’ as they call it, signals the halfway mark of the PGCE course. Walking through the front door on the first day, I could not imagine making it this far without crying in a store room. As chance would have it, the only tears I have shed are at the prospect of leaving. *audible cringe*

When I began this course, I was fairly sure I wanted to be a teacher. A few weeks in I was convinced I’d be absolutely awful at it as a career and should be removed from the course. I couldn’t even pronounce Vygotsky let alone remember any of his theories. Fast forward a couple more weeks, a nice long Christmas break and a new Netflix PB and I think I may have finally found my feet. (I’ve just jinxed it haven’t I?).

Don’t get me wrong. There are days where nothing goes right. The computer won’t work when you do have a PowerPoint. The projector screen won’t go up when you don’t. Ten out of thirty kids have forgotten their entire school bag. Once, in a surprising turn of events, my dog almost ate someone else’s homework. Like any job it has its challenges.

But something that I didn’t expect to love just as much as I do, is the joy that standing in front of a room full of wee faces learning for the first time what a “yob” is, would bring. It wasn’t what they were supposed to take away from the class. It wasn’t something I had planned to talk about at all. But their delight at learning a new word and excitedly shouting “Don’t be a yob!” at each other as they left the room made me belly laugh in a way I definitely haven’t at a desk job. 

I’ve had the chance to observe a lot of different styles of teaching. I don’t know if I will ever be chill enough to walk into a room and decide on the spot what we’re doing that day. I don’t know if I’ll ever actually manage to reprimand a student without over-empathising as to the reason why they might have decided to slide down the banister and almost crack their head open on the stairs. But I’ve been told it comes with time!

Speaking of time, it is the one part of lesson planning I do have an issue with. Why should it be up to me to decide how many minutes the students spend on a discussion about how important it is to be able to analyse the agenda of the media? Or how finding a poem you relate to can be a source of comfort and make you feel less alone in tough times? If they’re getting something from it, I am not inclined to stop them to make sure I get through my entire plan. “Linger longer” is the mantra I will take away from this experience and I think it applies to much more than just plenaries.

TEFL to PGCE

If you had asked me as a child what I wanted to do when I grew up, I would have said I wanted to be an author without missing a beat. I loved reading, hoarded books and even kept a little, tiny notepad stuffed with novel ideas that would have almost definitely turned out to be bestsellers if I hadn’t left it in the pocket of my school pinafore and put it through the washing machine.

Long term this is still my goal, I do definitely want to write. But something that ten year old me didn’t bank on was student debt, the cost of petrol, the cost of food, the cost of a crippling shopping addiction and a penchant for expensive gin. 

At eighteen I skipped off to uni to study English Lit with Creative writing, and loved every second of it. At twenty one I graduated and suddenly found myself in the real world, where my scribbles in a now slightly larger and fancier notebook didn’t quite equate to paying my phone bill. I knew that I needed to get a job; I just didn’t know what that should be. I had worked part-time in shops, bars, crèches and offices but none of this had really lit a fire under me. And I knew I was the type of person who needed to be passionate about what they were doing. 

Unsure of the next step I signed up to teach English as a Foreign Language in China. I initially headed off with a desire to see a different culture, travel and experience new things, i.e. run away from my problems and ignore my lack of direction. Over the course of the almost-year that I was there though, I discovered that I really liked teaching. I had not really considered it as a career before. To be fair, I hadn’t really considered much career-wise. But one month in I knew I enjoyed it. I loved standing up, moving around, interacting with people, discussing different things every day and even the less active stuff (like planning, marking and having to be in bed early so that I would have the energy to handle a bunch of children at 8am) was great. More than this I found that I really cared for the students and wanted to see them progress and achieve their full potential.

This led me to apply for the PGCE when I returned from my travels. In TEFL the lessons were focused on the structure of the language, helping students to understand grammar, learn vocabulary and speak fluently. I enjoyed this of course, but when I think back to my own time at school and imagine teaching the likes of Austen, Shakespeare and Morrison, well I will save that particular nerd-out for another time. But basically I am really looking forward to the year ahead and hope that I can pass my love of reading and writing onto others. It’s taken me a while but I have finally found something that I will be excited to get out of bed in the mornings for.

So overall, what I’m saying is; if you don’t know what to do with your life yet, just sign up to a random company on the internet, hop on a plane and go to Asia. (EDIT: Mostly joking here, at least Google them to make sure they are reputable).

Over the course of the year I hope that I can turn this into some sort of ‘how to survive your PGCE year’ type thing, I have heard that it is an intense yet incredible year and it would be great to have the blog to go back and reminisce over when I am unemployed. 

The reality is that I will probably post twice and forget all about it 😶😶😶