Tuesday 24 February 2009

On Returning To Juggling My Monkies

Ah... Back at work. Again.

I'm not expecting any sympathy here. I know full well how lucky I am getting holidays to write/read/drink/stroke my Disco Kettle (and no, that's not a euphemism). But even so. Mondays are Mondays and the first Monday in a while is a shock to the system.

This Monday is still going on, a full 24 hours after it started.

Increasingly my Mondays last for days.

Increasingly my Mondays are tougher to get through.

Increasingly my Mondays are creeping into my weekends now. A long, slow recovery from the previous week. A sinking, heavy feeling in my chest at the prospect of the week to come.

I am dropping monkeys.

Monkey blood on the walls. No ice-cream in sight...

For example. A meeting on Monday. At 8:30. In the morning. A Breakfast meeting. No bacon provided. No toast. No cereals or pastries. No coffee.

At least not for me.

Boss: You haven't yet passed on your detailed, lesson by lesson, homework by homework, plan of action for the whole of the year.

Me: I know.

Boss: (not smiling, silent, tapping pen against her clipboard. Yes. Clipboard.)

Me: I have a vague overview you can have, and I have a list of assessments with deadlines. How's that?

Boss: Not detailed enough. Why isn't it done?

Me: Because I've been teaching it.

Boss: Teaching?

Me: And marking (lies lies lies).

Boss: Marking?

Me: And then planning on how best to build on what we've done, or how to approach tricky bits in new ways.

Boss: Planning?

Me: Yes.

Boss: Well I think your priorities need thinking about.

Me: So not the teaching bit?

Boss: No. I want your paperwork done.

Monkey bleeds on floral carpet.

So there you go. Teaching: It's all about the paperwork.

And after I'd done so well smuggling my piles of paperwork out to the recycling bins undercover of darkness. Buggah.

Ah well. At least I'm making good use of my time now eh? As we speak I'm training up my Marking Year 7 Student (now year 8, and progressing well into planning and form filling out) to write schemes of work.

It's longer, I admit, in the short term. The training and support needed to train a 12 year old to write complex and detailed schemes of work, but hey. That's what I do. I teach. Besides, it'll be worth it in the long run.

Right. So. Almost lesson 4. Where's me Monkeys gone?

12 comments:

DJ Kirkby said...

I am so with you on this one! I dropped my hours so that I now work few enough (at my teaching job) that I get to spend my days there simply teaching (or prepping to teach) without any nasty meetings thrown in. I mean I began teaching becuase I wanted to TEACH...*grump*

Vix said...

Well.. you know my views on this. Bureaucratic 'teachers' will be blamed for the students cabable of nothing other than blindly filling out forms with no concepts of language structure or practice. Proper teachers will be blamed for not taking a stand.
It wont matter. By then the mindless ignorami will be running the infrastructure of, if not the country itself.
And the Bureaucratic bastards will be in their care.

By then we will have started our own country of lovliness where none of this shit matters and everything works right nice.

There will be monkeys.

watching9987 said...

DJ - I know. I'm thinking of moving into lecturing. I quite fancy that. Leading seminars, having discussions actually getting people to think, having time for me (and the students) to be original and creative... That I could do...

Vix - Monkeys? You promise? I do like monkeys... monkeys on bikes. In little jackets...

Roz Wyllie said...

Am loving the video...and the promise of dress up monkeys...finally got around to writing a little review of your novel on amazon today...sorry for the delay...things have been hectic so even now it's only a wee small review...maybes I'll expland on it when I get a breather...

Hope all is going well and your mintness is being recognised.
Pipppity Pip

mhuighuig said...

Wow.
This dude's my form tutor and I really didn't know he hated meetings this much.

Vix said...

*falls off chair laughing*

FAME!!! THEYS FOUND YOOOO!!!

Roz Wyllie said...

I've with Vix on this one...ha ha ha...now it's gonna start to get a little more interesting!!! (not that it wasn't brilliantly interesting before) but can't wait for the bosses to find you too...xxxx

watching9987 said...

Ah crepe...

watching9987 said...

Ah crepe...

watching9987 said...

Ah crepe...

watching9987 said...

Ah crepe...

watching9987 said...

Ah crepe...