What is he thinking?

mumturnedmom

I’m linking up with the lovely Sara at mumturnedmom again this week for her new linky ‘The Prompt’.

I’m taking a slightly different angle on this weeks prompt, I hope you enjoy it.

Sweater, n. Garment worn by child when its mother is feeling chilly. Ambrose Bierce

I open my eyes. It’s dark in here, apart from that blue light coming from behind the chair. I think I’ll just lie here for a bit. I might try out some of those noises I’ve been working on.

Still here. That woman who is always around usually comes and gets me after a while. I’ve rolled on to my tummy but now my hand seems to be stuck down the side of the mattress. Maybe I need to make my noises a bit louder. Ah, I heard someone moving. She’ll be here in a minute.

The light is on now. It’s very bright after I’ve been lying here in the dark. The woman has got my arm out and turned me on my back. I don’t want to be on my back. Oh, now she’s taking my out of the cosy thing and…jeez, it’s cold in here. And I bet she’s going to put me on that cold plastic mat thing in a second. Yep. I knew it. It’s OK though. I’ll just roll onto my front again. I can see what’s going on then.

Why does she keep turning me back over. Doesn’t she know I want to be on my front? Ooh, what’s going on now. I’ve suddenly got a cold bum. She’s taken that massive nappy off that I’ve been wearing all night. That’s better. I can kick my legs more now. I can probably get that foot in my mouth if I try hard enough. Or maybe I’ll roll over again. Oh, and look. If I push with my arms it makes me move backwards. That’s new. I want to try that again.

Damn it woman! Stop turning me over. No, I don’t want another nappy on. It’s harder to get my feet in my mouth when I’ve got a nappy on. Alright then. I’ll lie here just for a minute. It’s done now, are you happy? What? You want to put those trousers back on again? You only just took them off! No my feet aren’t cold. Why are you putting those socks on me? Never mind though, I know how to get those off. What do you think I am, a baby or something?!

I’m hungry now. Where’s my milk? No, don’t put me down. I don’t want to play with that stupid squeaky animal thing. Although, ooh, it’s quite nice when I put it in my mouth. But then I can’t fit my thumb in there. And what’s that outside? Why is that tree moving? And, hang on…I’m still hungry. I suppose I’m going to have to cry if I’m ever going to get what I want round here.

Yes. That’s what I wanted. Milk. It’s not warm enough though. You know I don’t like it when it isn’t warm enough. No, don’t just put it back in my mouth. I pushed it out for a reason. Ah, I think she’s worked it out. It’s warmer now. I’ll just lie here and suck for a bit. And I’ll try and grab this dangly thing coming off the woman’s jumper. Why won’t she let me pull it? What was I doing again? Oh yeah, milk, that was it. I’m bored of sucking now though – I think I’ll push it away again. Maybe just look at it for a minute. What happens if I pull on this rubbery bit? Oh milk in my eye! Actually I think I’m still hungry. Give me that bottle back! No, don’t sit me up. I don’t need to burp. Why are you rubbing my back? Can’t you see I’m still hungry? Oh, for god’s sake. Why do you never listen??

 

Wouldn’t life be easier if we knew what they were thinking?

 

The state of education

mumturnedmom

I’m linking up with the lovely Sara at mumturnedmom again this week for her new linky ‘The Prompt’. I really enjoyed reading all the other posts that linked up last week. It’s interesting to see everyone’s different takes on the same prompt.

And so, to this weeks prompt…

I was saddened by………….

I was saddened by a tweet I read this week in which someone said the TV documentary Educating Yorkshire, which this week won a National Television Award for Best Documentary Series,  made them “despair for our education in this country”. As a secondary school teacher myself it made me think about the impression those with no experience of secondary education, other than their own, have of our schools today.

I live in Fife, in the east of Scotland and in my four years of teaching I have taught in four different schools. Three of those schools have a high proportion of pupils from low income families. The school I taught in most recently over 40% of pupils are eligible for free school meals. The pupils I deal with every day (when I’m not on maternity leave that is) are not dissimilar to those kids you see on programmes like Educating Yorkshire, or Educating Essex which came before it.

A lot of the kids I teach are often labelled as ‘challenging’. It’s been in the news recently that two-fifths of newly qualified teachers leave the profession within five years. To me this is a shocking, but not surprising statistic. According to the Ofsted Chief Inspector, Sir Michael Wilshaw – “Many new recruits are quitting the classroom because they are inadequately prepared for dealing with unruly pupils”. And I can believe it; behaviour of some pupils in some schools is appalling. If you’ve seen Educating Yorkshire you might have an idea of the kind of things pupils get up to – if you haven’t let me give you a few examples of the kind of behaviour that I have had to deal with in my four short years as a teacher:

  • I have been sworn at more times than I care to remember
  • I have kids flatly refusing to follow any instructions they are given
  • I rarely get through a lesson without having to send someone out of the room for causing a disruption
  • I have, on two separate occasions, had pupils overturn their desks in anger
  • I have waited more than 15 minutes for a class to stop talking so I could start the lesson. (I tried every tactic I could think of to get them to be quiet – in the end, waiting it out seemed the best option)
  • I have kids pushing or hitting each other almost daily
  • I have had two 14 year old boys have a fight in my classroom, with chairs, when I was about 5 months pregnant!
  • And that’s not to mention the general chatter, answering back and disrespect that happens in every lesson.

I can understand why some new teachers can’t cope with the behaviour they have to deal with. I’ve been lucky that in every school I have worked in there has been a decent behaviour policy in place which is backed up by support from senior members of staff. And there are always some kids who are well behaved, who do want to work and to learn. I’m sure there are schools where the general standard of behaviour is better, but to some degree or another wherever you find kids, you will find badly behaved kids. There have been many times over the last four years where I’ve thought I couldn’t cope, that I had made the wrong decision by going into teaching and if you look at the way teaching is portrayed in the media then you would wonder why anyone would do it.

But this is what makes me sad; we shouldn’t despair over the state of education in this country, although I’ll be the first to admit I’m glad I teach in Scotland, out of the reach of Michael Gove and all the terrible decisions he keeps making about education in England. Because, these kids don’t need despairing over, they need help to overcome whatever it is that makes them behave the way they do. They need some hope, that if they work hard at school then they can achieve, that they can make something of themselves. My main role, as a teacher, is not to teach these kids French or Spanish. It’s to teach them how to respect one another, how to work with other people, how to communicate, how to trust that there are adults who will do their best for them, how to ask for help, how to become responsible members of society.

There are no excuses for bad behaviour, but there are often reasons behind it. Some of the kids I teach just don’t know any better. Maybe, the kid who is falling asleep at his desk, or staring out of the window in a daze didn’t go to bed until 1am last night because he had to stay up and look after his little sister while his mum was working the night shift at the 24 hour supermarket because that’s the only job she can get. Maybe the kid who shouts and swears is just following the example of his dad, because that’s what he does when he wants something. Maybe the boy who is having a fight is so angry with everyone because he lives in a children’s home and when he sees his mum every third month she makes him promises she can’t keep and it takes the next month for his teachers and support workers to get him back on track. Maybe the boy who can’t sit still in his seat and keeps shouting out the answers is really trying his best to keep his ADHD under control but sometimes his impulses are stronger than he can manage.

So I try to understand why these kids are acting the way they are (and believe me, their stories make me feel sad every day), and I do what I can to show them the right way to act, the right way to behave, and therefore, hopefully, the right way to learn. I set consistent boundaries and I stick to them. I don’t let them get away with poor behaviour but nor do I just shout at them, because sometimes they spend their time at home being shouted at, adding my voice to the mix isn’t going to get them to do what I need them to do. So I talk to them, I reason with them and I get them to do what I need them to do but I make them think that it was their idea. And I know that there are thousands of teachers out there who are working their asses off to do the very best they can for all the kids that they teach. So don’t despair for the state of education in our country. There’s really no need.

State of Education

Guilt is to motherhood. . .

Mummy guilt

I’m linking up this week with the lovely Sara at mumturnedmom for her shiny new linky ‘The Prompt’. Each week Sara will provide a prompt – the rest is up to you. I’m already joining in with a few photo linkys so the idea of one focusing on the writing appealed to me and hopefully I’ll be able to join in every week. You can read more about why Sara decided to start the prompt here.

So without further ado…this weeks prompt…

Guilt to motherhood is like grapes to wine. Fay Weldon

It is morning. I hear my baby wake up and start babbling to himself. I don’t get up, I wait. He goes quiet, I turn over and go back to sleep. Ten minutes later I hear him again so I drag myself out of bed to go to him. He is happy, lying in his cot and grinning at me, but I feel guilty in case he has been lying awake and waiting for me.

I sit on the sofa, scrolling through Twitter on my phone. My six month old son is lying on the floor, wriggling and reaching for his toys. He is happy and yet I feel guilty that I am not giving him one hundred percent of my attention, that I am not down there on the floor playing with him.

My boy is in bed having a nap. I hear him wake up and call out. I don’t go to him straight away. I just nip to the loo first and get the washing out of the dryer before I go and get him. He is happy looking at the stars and planets on his wall and yet I feel guilty that I don’t go to him as soon as I hear he is awake.

We go out to the park to meet our friends. Toby is sat on my knee whilst we chat. He reaches out and tries to grab the teapot which only a few minutes earlier contained boiling water. I move it away and he is fine, the teapot was cool, and yet I feel guilty that I didn’t think to move it out of his reach earlier.

Home from the park, and it’s time for bed again. My son loves to sleep and I know he needs his nap and I yet I feel guilty as I hope he sleeps for a few hours, so that afterwards I don’t have to entertain him for too long before it’s time to go and pick up his daddy from the station.

Only an hour until bedtime. The little bear is happy playing with his daddy and yet I feel guilty for counting down the minutes until we can have some time to ourselves.

My baby is clean and ready for bed. He lies on his daddy’s knee having his last bottle before bed. I kiss him good night and tell him that I love him. He is happy……… and so am I.

mumturnedmom