Cam’s Ramblings

It’s been a while, but I just haven’t had the time!

I am a bit over two weeks into my official teaching career (to be honest it’s about 2.2, as I am one out of five days through my third week!), and am loving every moment. I’m yet to lose my voice, have lost my temper, have made many mistakes but am always learning from them.

My load is pretty much as it was when I received my timetable back in November, a few slight changes but nothing to worry about significantly.

So, where I am after two weeks? Well, I’m feeling under the pump to push my classes through the curriculum. Of my two year 11 classes, both will need some serious pushing, for very differant reasons. One group I am beginning to see quite clearly who is interested, keen and motivated, the other group is taking a little while longer to figure out. But I’m getting there.

As for my year 7s, well I feel like I am teaching two or three different curriculum. I had been following one roadmap I’d be been given, but a lot of the day to day classes I shouldcbe doing appear to be totally different. The important factor though, is that the ‘differant’ classes are the ones I should be doing, as they are what lead to the assessment tasks for this term. So tomorrow I launch into the official term 1 curriculum, after spending two weeks doing some background work. It puts me a little behind other classes, but I’m confidant of my ability to catch up.

In terms of ‘outside the classroom’, I am spending time most days in the yard, either on yard duty or just chatting to kids as I walk around to do my various little odd jobs. I’m getting to know a lot of my own students now, which was always a worry for me. I’ve expressed interest in being a part of a few other programs, debating in particular, so hopefully there will be some other avenues to get to know people.

Well its time for me to get back to work and plan the rest of my week… as a graduate teacher trying to adjust to full time work (from a life at uni), I’d like to think I’m doing pretty well. Many of the staff around here are telling me that too, so I s’pose they must be right.

Check it out!

My student site is pretty much ready to roll at teh beginning of term one next year. I spenta a good part of my day relaxing after a family Christmas thing last night, and then this afternoon spent some time fiddling around and settin gup the student site. Basically I’m aiming it to my two Year 11 classes, with each topic and sub-topic given its own page where I hope to upload notes and provide additional examples and solutions to students. I took the breakdown of pages (for Methods) from the 2009 Student Unit Planner, (and for General) from the 2007 course outline I have… I’m sure I will get a 2009 version in due course.

As for the year 7 pages, well I’m not yet sure how much use they will get. I suppose it all depends on what we actually do in the classes and whether or not I think it’s going to be worth it.

But yeah, just thought I’d share the news of a now updated and ready to roll student site!

I like Windows Live Messenger (WLM, formerly known as the ‘Microsoft Network’, or MSN). I’ve been a user of this program for many years, and have been quite impressed by its continual improvement. It began as a simple chat client, became a great tool for keeping in touch with specific friends through the power of instant messaging, allowed you to speak in real time to a person at another computer, let you share files with each other and now you can video call.

I am all for the advancement of these sorts of programs. Recent years have seen the introduction of VOIP, a protocol which allows users to easily talk to each other through the internet. One of my subjects earlier this year required us to participate in an online lecture where we all listened in and were able to communicate with the lecturer (who was sitting in her office) by pressing a single button. She would know who wanted to speak, and would give control of the ‘lecture theatre’ to them.

But anyway I was using WLM earlier today to chat to a few friends. I had several windows open, and I was typing away madly to a few people, and actually talking to one. Despite all the advances in the software, and the hardware Microsoft must have in place to operate such a network, it still has its bugs. And some of them are quite significant.

My home connection is not great. I believe it is the slowest speed they can call broadband (256k or something like that). I’ve used Skype and WLM to talk to people before, and there is a noticeable difference between the two. WLM, which has evolved over time is the inferior to the new player Skype, which was purpose built. Maybe it’s just my shoddy connection,but I struggled to maintain a decent conversation tonight using WLM.

So here lies the question – how do we harness this technology in the classroom (I seem to ask that alot these days!)? I’m working with a great teacher next year who has been doing some great things for e-learning, and I hope to learn a lot from him. One of the things I would love to do is set up a series of ‘online classes’, especially for my VCE classes as they approach exams for them to contact me in an easy manner and get some real time help. I don’t know whether such a network is already in place, maybe it’s something worth investigating. Maybe it’ll be a big flop. I know many staff are using websites, blogs and wikis to share information, I’m just hoping to push the barrier one further next year!

Today I received my first lesson in school politics – don’t hesitate. I decided that, while the few remaining students at school were out on various fun activities, I would take the opportunity to have a wander around the place and continue to familiarise myself with my place of employment for next year.

I had a clear goal in mind. Find my homeroom and find my office. I called first into the office, just so they knew I was there. I bumped into one of the APs, who upon seeing me remembered they needed to ask me something. There is a chance that next year I won’t be the glorious homeroom teacher I was to be, instead I may have landed myself a year 7 drama class. It’s the only change that may occur to my timetable, and by no means is it final, but I jumped at the chance. After all, I do enjoy the theatre, and would love to be able to share one of my passions with students.

So I left the admin building and started wandering down towards B block. I walked through the building, and then down to the B and H block portables. This is the area I mostly wanted to check out. I went up and down the rows of classrooms, attempting to find two certain rooms. I was having no luck whatsoever. So I went back to the start of the portables, and what should I find but both the rooms I was looking for. So I spent a few seconds on what may still be my homeroom, then a few minutes in what is to be my office.

When I got in there, I found out that of the six desks there were two left. One I was told did not have a working internet point. So that kind of made my decision easy. I’ve left a post-it note with my name on the desk, which has a filing cabinet next to it and a bookshelf behind it.

This is where the lesson comes in to play. I hesitated. Not when I was there, but all day I’ve been thinking to myself ‘is it really worth going into school just to have a look at two rooms?’ Turns out that yes, yes it was. My desk, you see, is in the middle of the room right next to one of the doors. This means that if I’m in there I am quite likely the first contact person for students looking for someone. It also means I don’t have a corner. I like corners… my desk at home is on a corner, and it works beautifully for me. But Not I have to rework myself to work in a straight line. I’m sure I’ll manage.

So the morale of the story when it comes to school politics… don’t hesitate. If there is something up for grabs, and you want it, go ahead and take it because if it’s something good then many others will want it too!

Things are moving… the economy is slowing down (which is driving petrol prices down, I paid 104.7 yesterday), work is speeding up and Christmas is coming. All of these things point toward one thing… a very frustrating month at work.

I sell school uniforms. I work in a shop which supplies school uniforms to about 12 schools in the local area. We are having a number of special days for each of these schools, where we advertise extra staff and benefits of coming in, to attract people in this side of Christmas. We had our first such day last week, I think I worked about 10 hours non stop. We have another tomorrow, fortunately I am only rostered on for the second half of the day. I am working a total of four of these days, I predict each one will be bigger than the last. But that’s not the point I was aiming to make…

Withparents starting to get serious about their kids uniforms for next year, schools are also very seriously looking at next year (I assume they have been for some time though). As with my teaching position sorted out for next year, I hopefully begin to gain an insight into what actually goes on. The first ‘official’ visit I will have with Kambrya is on Orientation day, 9th December. A day to meet new students, staff and not get lost trying to find my way around. It’s a day I’m looking forward to, because will be the first time I am surrounded by the people and the environment which I will be working in next year.

Before that though I will be calling in to meet with some of the leading teachers, and the obligatory paperwork. I just have to get in touch with Deakin, find out when I can actually supply what I need to supply… as with most administrative tasks at Deakin, I don’t expect this to be easy.

So there you go, things are moving.

(on a side note, I just did a spell check – every time I typed a word starting with wi, it separated those two letters and said it was spelt incorrectly. I should start typing these things in Word, at least I know I’ll get a decent spell check. And I know I need it!)

Last Friday I finished the last part of my uni course, my last teaching round. I now have about three months off in which to relax and get ready for the classroom in 2009. I am spending a week on the Gold Coast soon with a few friends, and then intend to spend a little bit of time around Kambrya getting to know the staff, some of the students and learning more about my role for next year.

So the next few months might be a little bit uneventful… what I am going to do is set up this blog to become a suppliment to my student site which I am going to develop properley once I know what I am teaching next year. But until then, not a lot will probobly happen worthy of comment.

In other news, I have done a very evil thing and joined the dark side….. I got a facebook profile. It’s been a great tool for finding old friends and keeping in touch with uni people as we all disperse our separate ways. Over the next little while I’m going to explore it and find out how I may be able to use it in the classroom.

I have learnt one big thing in the past week. Never take anything I know for granted!

I was always told when going into the classroom to assume my kids nothing, and once they demonstrate some skill or knowledge then adjust the plan. I was given this advice again this week, and I thought that I had written a series of lessons for my years 7’s which took this on board. How wrong I was!

I am currently doing a unit with these two classes where I am introducing them to algebra. We started with patterns, then writing in algebra and proumerals, then substitution and finally like terms. Initially I had planned to comlete this unit in about a week and a half, giving students one period per exercise in their textbooks. However by lesson two I saw how much these kids were struggling, because I aimed my ideas and examples above an introductory level.

In turn, I have adjusted the lessons so much. The unit is now running for two and a half weeks, which means that instead of doing the unit on equations I will only get the chance to to introduce it which isn’t too bad. I’m happy with what I have done on these rounds, and am feeling more than ready to step into the classroom next January.

And because my laptop battery is about to die, and I can’t be bothered going to get the power cable, I will end this post now.

When I was in year 7 (about 9 years ago) I decided to put myself up for nomination to our schools Student Council. I got elected, and started to go along to all of the meetings. After about a term, the Council had decided that it was time to nominate a charity or community group to raise funds for. The traditional ideas went around, Good Friday Appeal, CFA, Life Savers…. there were a few local groups too I hadn’t heard of, and also some church based groups (I went to a Christian school). I thought that a group I had been involved in, a scout group, could use some money. After all, the scout group had few resources, dwindling membership and a dilapidated hall.

Despite all of this, there was still a need for us in the community. Whenever we did anything community based, we always got a lot of support, however we were not able to do as much as we had once done, because of a lack of funds (which was a result of less people). So at the Council meeting, I put my hand up to suggest my scout group. A few other hands were up, and their ideas taken, however when I was te second to last hand still in the air I decided very quickly to put it down.

A boy in year 8, who later became one of my good friends in high school, turned around and drew attention to the fact I had put my hand up to say something, then quickly drew it back down. He said to me, quietly, ‘I know you’ve got something to say’. He then drew the entire group of students in the room into it, and I just baked down, shy little me, and claimed I had forgotten.

This catchphrase caught on however, and was often how this year 8 boy (let’s call him Garreth) would greet me. Truth is, I never ever revealed to him (or anyone at the school, for that matter) what I had originally intended. I still don’t know why I decided to not put my idea forward, it’s never something I gave a lot of thought to. And for some reason, I was thinking about that meeting today.

The other thing that got me thinking today was what my Year 9’s were doing. They were using a program called Audacity. It is a free program which allows uses to record, manipulate and save audio files. The class were creating their own radio shows today, importing songs and recording interviews. I haven’t had much experience with Audacity but I am about to go and download it now. It serves as a potentially useful tool for creating podcasts, as you can save into mp3 format for easy upload to a website.

I don’t know how these two topics are linked, but I’m sure they are somehow.

Today I started the very final part of my uni studies – my last lot of teaching rounds.

I am teaching three classes this time, two year 7 maths and one year 9 IT. The year 7s are so far behind in the curriculum we are going everything we can now to ensure they get the basics. The year 9s, well, I don’t know where they are at. I see them on Friday only, so will no doubt get some time to chat to their class teacher about where they are at.

I spent most of today planning what to do with the year 7s, who are to start their new topic of algebra on Wednesday. As usual, I’d like to think I have some good ideas to take into the classes with them, I am trying to seriously cut down on the amount of time I spend teaching from the textbook.

My initial planning saw me go back to teh book so many times, however I have tried to keep myself from relying on it. I have a bad feeling though that by early next week I may be just trying to push through again. As I said, the classes arre so far behind where they should be, it’s all we can do.

In the past week, I have had three job interviews at three very different schools. The first is a very large school, which has been around for about 6 years. The school has developed a lot of its own integrated curriculum ideas for students in years 7 and 8, with an innovative program being run with the year 9 students. The second is a much more established school, with fewer students but over the past few years has been involved in setting up a new school in a nearby suburb. The third school is an independent school down the road from where I live, is only three years old and is going into Year 9 next year, with plans to work upto Year 12 in th next four years.

Last Thursday night I recieved a phone call, and subequent job offer, off the first school. I had every intention to accept this offer.

While I was out, I received a voice mail from the second school, the message saying that they would call me back today. I never got another call.

Friday morning, I contacted the third school to inform them that I had this first offer, and as I was very interested in their school I was wondering where I was standing in terms of an offer. They informed me that I was going to be contacted later in the day, with a job offer.

This left me confused, the two schools which had offered me a job were two of the schools I had placed on the top of my ‘wish list’. All day Friday I agonised over this decision, the state school vs the independent, the developed vs the developing, many of these issues I worked through in my head.

So I suppose I can now officially say that Friday afternoon I contacted one of the Principals to accept their offer of employment. I am now employed as a Mathematics and Information Technology teacher at Kambrya College in Berwick (http://www.kambryacollege.com/). I chose the state school which is well developed, has an abundance of resources surrounding it and what I hope will provide me with a supporting team environment for the first few years of my teaching, possibly with the view of building a career.

So there you go. I am now (graduation pending, of course!) a member of the teaching profession.