Concept Map#1

Hm. Very frustrating. Maybe it was just too hot in my greenhouse-like classroom this afternoon with the winter sun magnified by the expansive windows and barely any breeze bustling through the window to refresh our brains. I also feel that older students are more resistant to new methods. Maybe this isn't fair to say. Maybe I have to try harder to sell a new idea to them as they are used to a certain way of doing things. Maybe also I didn't organise it as clearly and simply as was needed for things to make sense to them. But I felt as if this was not much of a useful exercise to them. Some students didn't even bother to come up with any ideas at all about the poems in the first place which meant that then trying to compare them was pointless. I think perhaps I am moving too fast for some of them. Assuming that it is understood and moving on without consolidation. Afraid of boring them. But I think this is an important point. If I assume kids have a mental framework on which to hang new information but for them it is like a foreign language, then clearly more time needs to be spent building up their basic understanding of the poems we are dealing with. Perhaps I am rushing them too quickly to analysis. It's interesting how seriously one has to take the weather and time of day! It really has such an effect on one's capacity to concentrate. I want to try this again with this class, but first I think I need to do the questionnaire I intended on doing to find out their perceptions of themselves as learners and of how teaching should be and of the different methods I have tried - an initial response test. Although, maybe this is taking liberties at all to experiment with year 11 when the focus needs to be to get them through the exams. I guess I should ask John's permission?

Symbolic Stories#1

Tried this technique with years 8 and 9. Introducing it by asking who liked doodling went down well as virtually the entire class in both cases put their hands up. It seemed to work well in terms of keeping students apparently quietly focused on listening out for what was happening. I feel that I came up against the same issue as was identified in the training session. Should one focus on the content that the students are listening out for or dedicate time to the process. I didn't want to focus on process as I had my 'objectives' in mind. But would this perhaps have helped people use the tool more effectively in future? For example if I had of enabled them to discuss how they put their symbolic stories together and what worked the best to enable the best listening. If I had dedicated the time to doing this, maybe this would have helped the students to understand their own way of learning and listening and to make choices about how to approach the task the next time. The reasons for my doubts are that certain students seemed to get stuck literally on their symbols, such that when asked to go over them and use this to explain what they remembered from listening, they simply told me what each picture was, eg you said 'breast' so I drew a woman's breasts - nevermind that the breast in question was that of Richard III opening up his shirt to offer Anne his bare chest to stick the knife in and thus avenge the husband Richard murdered. This also drew me back to recalling the comments of one of my fellow-students on Saturday, who felt that it was too difficult to listen attentively at the same time as focusing on drawing things that would make sense in the recall part of the activity. A question that strikes me also is how to assess the understanding of material gained from the symbols? Does this lie solely in letting the students feedback their ideas and explain what their pictures represent? Hm. I feel as if there is more to say and unravel but for now my mind is a blank.

small people

this is just a little post 'cos i'm still tired and in need of early nights in order to cope with trundling on my tricycle all the way to the science site, in order then to trip down the hill to dunelm house in my over sized shoes, to be picked up by my fellow trainee and driven to the seaside where schools and deprived communities somehow interrelate.

but i thought i would super-briefly share with you - encouraged by the comments suggesting you lovely people like to be shared with - that this week i have mostly been eating primary school children.

no. it's not true. i haven't turned into a carnivorous lisa-creature overnight, or driven to such desperation by the reality of being with lots of small, medium and large sized people all day long.

in fact, what i meant to convey, when i got side-tracked by an old sketch show joke that demanded to be used right there and then, was that i have to have a week in a primary school to 'get the primary experience' and so every day i have been chatting to, reading to, listening to the reading of, little 6-7 year old people who are quite delightful. and it even made me question, oh golly, do i really want to face sullen teenagers day in day out, is that not an error in my judgement, ought i not to opt for the delights of working with little creatures who are excited to learn, desperate to tell me about what their little sister did last night, or how many pages of stickers they've got. eeek. such decisions are most difficult. i am determined to stick with the secondary malark for the time being as my original aim (well, to be honest, one of) was to challenge myself to learn the skills involved in inspiring, engaging, and quelling the ill-mannered behaviour of, those beasts we refer to these days as teenagers. but i must confess to you - and i am absolutely certain that you will not be surprised as you know me and my innate (and possibly also cultivated) silliness - that brightly coloured, cutely smiling, eager, "miss, i want to be a celt and wear those celtic cloaks and tunics and paint my face with woad and out lime in my hair", little people were sorely tempting me this week to jump ships.

but most of all i just wanted to tell you that this week i was in a small person school and it was super-fun (and also tiring....but that goes without saying....when i rand the bearded one in need of moral support, i was informed that i felt like a zombie for the entire year of his pgce.....shiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiit!!!!!!!!!).

bye xxxxxxxxx

weariness

i would like to write a post. but i am tired. and i have a lot to do. and i'm tired. so i'm resisting the vague urge. which was tronger earlier in the week when i was less tired. but i am enjoying reading the meandering thoughts of others. and responding to them. which somehow seems to take less energy than creating a whole new post myself. i was going to treat you to an inside view of the riverside stadium and tell you about my funny little conversation with my cousin who was playing cricket for nottinghamshire against durham. i was also going to explore some further thoughts on bloggery itself, and different motivations for blogging that i detect in myself and others, as well as touching on the topic of anonymity and comprehensivity. many thoughts i had flashing through my mind, framing sentences and stories to share. but they have subsided into a more distant corner of my mind as said mind is filled with information regarding what i have to do this year, getting to know a multitude of new people, of which: fellow teacher trainees - pretty cool; kids from the lovely town of seaham - jury's out; teachers in school - friendly and supportive, but sometimes a little chaotic and closed minded. and so i foresee that for now, my blog is not going to be a site of frequent and fascinating posts. but you might get lucky...once in a while. probably at weekends!!

Idle Rambling

First of all, Mr Nicholas, nice try, but these are elderberries my friend:



A little darker red than the mystery berries you'll notice. I still have no clue what those super bright red berries are though. We need to get Loula on the blogging scene because she would definitely know - she is the queen of wild flora and indeed of foliage in general!!

Secondly, your 'prize' for having made the best attempt at my little hedgerow challenge....a little something to satisfy your self-professed interest in signs:



And finally, whilst providing photographic evidence of the idle ramblings I have been undetaking whilst - perhaps pre-emptively - luxuriating in the long summers afforded those of a teacherly disposition, I would like to share with you a little something that tickled me today, as I was idly reading a couple of books I had bought today in my favourite cafe in Durham - which never fails to serve me deliciously frothy hot chocolate - the chapter on 'The Ramble', penned at 5 p.m., by the great Idler, Tom Hodgikson, author of my new bible, How to be Idle:

"...the act of ambling is a revolt. It is a statement against bourgeois values, against goal-centred living, busy-ness, bustle, toil and trouble. For the creative spirit, the act of walking harmonizes work and play."

Long live the Wold's Way, I say!!!

I can imagine my revolutionary brother having loved this sentiment when he read it!

And just for the sheer ticklement of it:

a) I loved the citation of Victor Hugo's reference to buses as 'travelling balconies'...exactly why I far prefer to be transported around London by bus than the stinking sweaty tube;

b) I was amused to read something I had never heard previously on the subject of Wordsworth and Coleridge, that a spy, sent - because the Home Office was suspicious of their seemingly aimless amblings in the countryside (as well as, let's admit it, their radical views) - "to monitor their activities saw the two poets taking notes on the riverbank and assumed that they were plotting to bring firearms from Bristol for a planned insurrection." When of course they were just letting their creative spirits roam....highly suspicious!!!

Hedgerows!!

Oh how exciting. This is really VERY exciting.

When Rich's parents came to visit us, we took them for a little walk along the lane, through the fields, you know the story, and Rich's Dad, John, for some reason had hit on the idea that I would be interested in things I could pick from the hedgerows for cooking with, which is true, and he was enthusiastically pointing out to me, Lisa look, here are hazelnuts you can pick (imagine soft thick lilting north yorkshire country accent), they'll be ready soon, and sloes, you can make sloe gin, and so on. And I was so excited about the prospect I took the Richi out for a walk along the same route last night to check on the readiness of the hedgerow offerings that apparently we could live off, but only blackberries were ready



(I say only, I mean, that is exciting in itself, I am going to make a blackberry crumble, and that is one of the great delights of the English autumn) and I set myself to wondering when those hazelnuts would be ready to be made into a cake and I thought to myself I bet the inter-web has the answer and so I looked and I found the sweetest recipe page I have ever come across on the inter-web or indeed in a recipe book, and so I post it here for your fond delight, but also for my own posterity so that I can check it and refer to it when I have picked my hazelnuts, sloes, and rosehips. I knew there must be something I could do with rosehips - they look so ripe and bulging. Anyway, check it out!

Over the garden gate!!

Okay, before I leave you to wander in the garden according to your own whims, I would like to set you a challenge.....just WHAT are these berries???



They are very red! And I suppose I could find the answer on the inter-web myself....but where would be the fun in that. Prizes for those submitting answers before sunday noon!!!

Other delights that can be found in the hedgerows:




Bye XXX

Coffee...

Hello good morning perhaps I should say good afternoon perhaps this finds you in the evening in which case I hope that is good too. Today I find myself with an intense pressure headache clouding my vision and my thoughts. I feel like a drug addict. The reason I describe myself in that way is that I think I am suffering withdrawal symptoms from an evil coffee I discovered in the market from the eccentric ee's and wizz man on the first stall to your left as you come from the entrance by the market tavern. I could, if I were that way inclined, develop a conspiracy theory about this man and what he has put in his coffee. Because Rich and I do have a theory that this chap is a leftover from the 60s, wearing long baggy black robes, a shaggy mane, a straggly beard, and a strange faraway, never quite ready to make the connection with the person he is talking to, kind of an expression, giving the impression that maybe he had too much orgiastic sex and took too many drugs in the 60s, leaving him to live out the remaining decades just a little bit zombified. Anyway, he has a shelf stacked with jars of coffee beans and being an experimental sort of a person - sometimes - I thought, ooh, Turkish coffee, extra strong, extra dark, sounds good. Of course I knew in the same moment that it also sounded dangerous to one with such a delicate consitution as myself, but as is so often the case when one's sensible side is up against one's sensory desires, the little sensible fairy sitting on my right shoulder was ignored, went off in a sulk, and all I can guess is that she is now getting me back. Because I kept having really bad sleep last week, and I thought to myself what is the reason for this, and some instinctive knowledge popped up inside whispering that it was that extra dark extra strong Turkish coffee. And I didn't have any this morning, at all, not even any other kind of coffee, and that's why I think my head feels like exploding. I may be wrong. But just in case my cookie theories aren't entirely half-cock, I cycled into the nearest town and bought some less strong dark coffee.

You will have noticed that my usually colourful entry has been entirely black and unvaried thus far. It is a reflection of my dopey state that I didn't even think of giving you a little colour until now. And the reason I have introduced some colour in this new paragraph, is to signify a different intent. I actually began my blog wanting to share with you - as promised - some of the plantings in my garden. But, as is so often the case, when I began writing, some other force took over and a stream of coffee consciousness ensued. I was actually hoping to post a picture with my last blog, but as I am new to these things, I have to confess that I couldn't manage to do it until my personal wizard faxed me the necessary coding, which, now that I have at my disposal, I intend to use, ah yes, it is true.



So at first I thought this might be a beetroot. I have a great fondness for beetroots, and have just delighted to discover a Polish recipe for beetroot with venison, which I randomly decided to experiment with given the proximity of a Teesdale game counter to the excellent cheese counter in the market, which has the virtue of letting you try before you buy and even if you don't, but I wasn't so cheeky. Anyway, the point is that this isn't really a beetroot, I think it is more likely to be a swedey turnipy type thing - Lou help me out here, you're better with all forms of vegetation than me!!!

Actually the point wasn't really what kind of a vegetable it was, more that this particular vegetable was planted amidst the neatest, bulging-with-health-iest rows of vegetables I have ever seen, in the most exuberantly colourful flower-blooming garden I have ever seen, in a tiny ruined house opposite the well-preserved castle at the far end of the Holy Island of Lindisfarne.





And we weren't expecting to find it, my fellow travellers and I, but there it was, apparently famous, due to the renown of the horticultural architect who had originally designed and planted what we had come across within those four wind-wracked walls. Gertrude Jeckell I think she's called. And I can only imagine that the plants thrive so beautifully because of the rich salt soaked air from the sea gusting through those sweet peas,





real peas,



ox-eyed daisies,



and cornflowers.



But it was lovely, quite lovely. Whilst Rich and Dave sat, marginally disinterested, on a bench





by the sundial,




Lou and I absorbed ourselves in an effusion of flowers.

The end.