QTS Skills Tests

Definitely not a positive yet - that'll come when I actually pass them lol - but, still worthy of a mention.

I have booked all three tests now. I am going to take them just before Christmas back at home. If I pass them first time [fingers crossed], that'll be something less to worry about. If I don't, Christmas is just a couple of days away to take my mind off it.

Plus, booking them at the centre near home is a weight off my mind. I went to that test centre for my driving theory test. Subsequently, I know exactly where it is and how to get there. If I had booked them up here, I would have had to go to Newcastle. I haven't been to Newcastle since I was really small and thus it would have been rather stressful to take the tests somewhere completely alien. :)

So, fingers crossed they go well. I'll be sure to practise them online first - it'll be like a new hobby lol - and I'm rather chuffed that I've managed to get two positives out of just booking my QTS skills tests lol. Impressive I am sure you will agree! :D

Musical Instrument

Whilst watching Downton Abbey tonight and sorting some files for the morning, I realised that my hole punch was full to bursting with those little circles of paper. I emptied it out onto my desk and was just flittering them through my fingers when I got an idea. Using a small cardboard tube, I decided to turn this mass of paper into my musical instrument. Now I've got a percussion instrument, similar to a rain shaker, decorated with some paper I had left over from my bookmark for DT. It isn't going to win any awards, but I'm rather happy with it. Not least because it is made up entirely of odds/ends which would have otherwise ended up in the bin.

I get to feel green, whilst also having an instrument to take to my next music class [our homework was to make one]. Woo! :D

Jolly Phonics

My view of phonics is still a little murky, as it was never something I recall learning as a child. It has always seemed rather complicated, with digraphs, trigraphs, graphemes, phonemes etc. But, I am starting to get the hang of it.

In one of our workshops today, we were introduced to Jolly Phonics. A class of 30 people, aged between 22 and 50, and every single one of us seemed to have a big grin when we gave it a go. Some of the actions and stories relating to the phonemes [42 in Jolly Phonics although we have been taught that there are 44] are very funny and we watched part of a lesson with reception children and they seemed just as engaged and enthusiastic about it as we were. Having stories, actions and fun little things [like a toy snake when introducing 's' and a mouse when introducing 'i'] make the prospect of teaching phonics much more interesting. It has always seemed like a dry and rather tedious topic, but with a bit of imagination, and a scheme like Jolly Phonics, I am coming around to the idea that it could be rather good. :D

Surviving My First PGCE PE Class! :D

We were meant to how our first PE lesson some four weeks ago, but our lesson ended up being postponed. As a result, a sense of dread had developed amongst my friends and I about the lesson, not least because the tutor is rather enthusiastic, perhaps overly so.

Nevertheless, we survived and everyone seemed to enjoy it. We must have looked like lunatic asylum patients for quite a lot of it - moving in 'trains' by running/hopping/crawling/etc, at other times throwing up a ball and clapping as many times as we could whilst also swapping our balls with another 'trains'. Everyone laughed though and the tutor [thankfully a stand-in as the normal tutor was absent] made sure we all understood the purpose of the warm up activities we did. For example, she showed us the criteria for outstanding PE lessons and we could tick off everything on the list from the activities we did. :D

A few of the sessions to come are still a little scary - dance and gymnastics in particular - but the rest sound pretty good and it was quite nice to do something a little different on a Monday afternoon [3pm-5pm lol]. :D

Nicholas Allan

During one of my maths workshops, the tutor read Father Christmas Needs A Wee to us all. It is a rather humous story by Nicholas Allan, whereby Father Christmas eats and drinks far too much on his journey to drop off the presents and subsequently ends up desperate for the toilet. She said her class adore the book and she seemed rather keen herself lol.
I had a look on Amazon and Nicholas Allan has done so many books! I feel rather bad for not having heard of him before. They are all a little... risque, I think it would be fair to say. For example, Cinderella's Bum and Where Willy Went. This made me ponder... I mean, the content of the Christmas book is pretty good - lots of counting up and down, and repetition. But, I am not sure I would feel all that comfortable using one of these books in class. I suppose it would depend on the school and the children. I can imagine some of them would go down very badly if the school were quite conservative lol. Understandly so.
I guess the positive thing I am thinking is that I've discovered something new and something rather humous, even if they do create a dilemma over whether I would actually use them. I suppose the case for Father Christmas Needs A Wee is solved for this year - I am going into a year 3/4 class, so the counting style of the book is not really suitable. Still, an interesting idea, and one that gave us all a chuckle in our workshop. :)

My First Teaching Placement

Today, we found out where our first teaching placement is going to be. I'm subsequently rather excited! :D

I am going to a small school, which is in negotiation for a new building but is currently in a small blue building. It looks so... cute [for want of a better word].

This is my KS2 placement, as I requested KS1 for my 'long' teaching placement. So, I'm going into the year 3/4 class, although apparently there are a handful of advanced year 2 pupils as well. Split year classes seem very common here, but outside of small village schools, I hadn't heard of them before. That said, this school is a village school - they only have three classes! It'll be a good challenge regarding differentiation and pitching things at the best level for the children, but it seems to be a really pleasant environment to learn those skills in.

A couple of the schools in our cluster are a little... scary. I should probably say challenging, but you know what I mean. Two students in my cluster definitely had a sharp intake of breath when they discovered their schools, which just made our STCC laugh and laugh. He has previously said he tries to put people in a 'nice' placement and a particularly challenging placement to make up the two, so maybe I'll end up in one of those schools for my big placement. But, I'm not worrying about that. By then, I should be more confident and I'll obviously have more experience to draw on to cope in that environment. Plus, you never know, a few of us might be lucky and have two 'nice' placements lol. Regardless, I'm sure all the placements are going to have their own challenges and rewards - I'm just rather chuffed that my first will be in that adorable looking building, in a school that seems to be really good. :)