Year 2: Back in the Habit

Well here I am, the eve of the first half term of the school year and what a half term it has been! Much like the sequel to the popular film 'Sister Act' I am now well and truly 'back in the habit' and as my absence from blogging indicates I've been a very busy Mr Collins indeed. It seems like an age since I was writing my blog post about my new classroom and the set-up for the start of the year and now, 7 and a half weeks down the line, it feels like the Summer period never happened. Here are my reflections on the past half term...

As you will know from reading previous posts I have started teaching back at the school I once worked as a cover supervisor. It was 2 years ago this school year that I left to go and do my GTP and then subsequently my NQT year at 2 different schools in the local area. I've just received my 'induction' certificate from last year and with this came the realisation of what has perhaps been missing this half term...the teacher training meetings and ongoing evidence collecting. Now, don't get me wrong, the evidence collating I am more than happy to have disappeared from my weekly tasks, but I can't help but miss the weekly/fortnightly CPD that trainee teachers receive. I'm particularly talking here about those CPD events that are held externally, whether they be part of your Universities training programme or events held at local schools that your school have partnerships with. I like these days away from the classroom where you get to reflect on your teaching, meet colleagues that are in the same position as you, learn new techniques, ideas and gather teaching resources and essentially keep learning. I've noticed that without these sessions this year it really is just about getting down to it and getting on with the job of teaching. However, there may be something new on the horizon, which I'll write about at a later date.

So, without the trainee teacher element of my job what's changed? The main thing is the timetable...and all experienced teachers will know exactly where I'm about to go with this...my teaching time has rocketed! Last year I had my NQT time,which allowed me at least 6 free periods a week in a 25 period week. This year, without the luxury of the NQT time, I have only 3 free periods a week and this has made a sizable difference in my teaching time, planning time and (of course) marking time. Couple with that the challenges of starting a new school (albeit a school I know very well) and it's no wonder I've not been able to keep up with the blogging!

Now, I know my school very well having held my previous post as a cover supervisor for 2 years. However, in the time where I have been gone learning how to teach at other schools a lot has changed. Also, as I worked as a cover supervisor before and not a teacher, all the procedures that teachers are expected to follow and I suppose all those little things that differ between schools have had to be learnt, remembered and followed through. For instance, the behaviour policy and procedures are far 'tighter' than the schools I have previously worked at, and this is all for the better in terms of the teaching and learning that takes place in the school. This means that now, unlike in the past, there are behaviour points to log, reward points to log, phone calls to log, warnings to log, postcards to write, uniform letters to send etc etc. All these little things that are different take a while to embed in your daily routines.
The easiest part of being back at the school I previously worked at is the relationships I have with the kids and my colleagues. I am lucky that the classes I have in KS4 all knew me before I walked into our new classroom. This has allowed me to pick up on relationships I had already built up and take it from there. I have some fantastic classes to teach and this has made the 'settling in' period easier than I could have hoped for.

The one thing that has taken a while to sort out this half term has been the ICT in my classroom. I have persevered over the past 7 and a half weeks with trying to get everything the way I have had it in previous years. This has mainly centred around getting my interactive (SMART) whiteboard working. Now, by no means would I say that I have become dependent on my SMART board, but as I have made so many resources using the SMART notebook software it did have an affect on my teaching in the first few weeks of term. I had to find other resources to teach from, it took me longer to plan my lessons and I didn't feel as confident as perhaps I would have done. It also frustrated me as the IWB was there, but wasn't usable. I even started referring to it as the 'potentially interactive whiteboard to the kids'. However, all good things come to those who wait, and with the help of the ICT team after week 6 we were able to get the software working with the new Windows 7 laptop I had been given to 'trial' as a new member of staff. I even purchased myself some new SMART board pens/eraser to fill the gaps that were previously homed by a glue stick, board pen, blue tack and pen. Here they are in all their glory...

 For the past week or so I have been enjoying having the use of the SMARTboard back and I feel loads more confident, I can use all my resources I spent the time creating last year and the reaction from the kids is brilliant. I don't actually think there are many other working SMARTboards in the rest of the school that teachers use. This, for me, makes my proficiency with the IWB a tool I can use to my advantage as everything seems new for my students. When I first wrote on the board they seemed shocked, when I drag objects across the screen it feels like magic and as for the trick of rubbing out a circle and then tapping in the middle to erase everything inside the circle...I've become the new Dynamo! The only thing I then needed was some sound...as there were no speakers in my room I got some of those too and now I can use YouTube videos (from my channel or otherwise), the Chris Moyles Quiz Night videos for short starter tasks - my current students have loved these the past week, and of course...and yet to be introduced to my new students...Maths DJing :)

The above goes some way to summing up the challenges and differences of starting at a 'new' school this year. In addition to this there have been a few events that I have helped out with this half term. The biggest of these were the school's Open Evening and the Y6 Problem Solving Day. The school's Open Evening was fantastic and was one of those events that I was looking forward to. The reason behind this is that I love the school I work at, I went to the school as a kid and having worked there previously and now being back, I couldn't be happier. So, I'm keen to make sure that future students, our local primaries and our community see all the good things that I have and do at the school. So, at open evening I helped the Mathematics department ensure we displayed all the good work our Year 7s had been doing in the first 3/4 weeks of term (something the department have always done). Then in a separate classroom we had two activities running, one that the department have done in past involving measuring arm span and height and seeing the 'Mathematical perfectness' of a person. The other was an idea my colleague and I came up with and was to have the good ol' horse race probability task big scale on the class floor.
We created a 12 by 6 grid out of masking tape, had my numbered tiles in the 'starting squares' for each 'horse' (Y5/6 child, parent, uncle, aunt, Y9 prefect etc), we had the Y9 prefects rolling my large foam dice and encouraged visiting parents and children to take part in the horse race. For each race we explained the rules of rolling the dice to generate the numbered horse who would then advance down the grid. The winner being the first horse to reach the 'finish' square. The activity was a great success with children and adults taking part, healthy competition building between relatives and (of course) some good mathematical reasoning, language and logic being applied. It is something that we will look to do in future evenings.

Then, another idea I have for future evenings came about after speaking to my HoD about other tasks we could have going on around the room whilst the 2 main activities were going on. I suggested doing the 'frogs problem' and then said it'd be great to have a large version of that too and if only we had some large frogs! I have of course done this in the past using the students and chairs, but wanted something tangible for the children to pick up and move/leap. Cue my HoD's knowledge of another of our colleagues whose hobby of knitting stuffed animals could come in handy. She is brilliant and 5 more of the below little beauts will be made after she has finished knitting Christmas presents for her nieces and nephews...

How cool is he! I've named him Freddo.

As for the Y6 Problem Solving Day I'll be writing about that in a separate post as there's far more I'd like to say about that and resources to link.













Finally, a list of other notable events/things that have occurred this half term...

the staff vs staff football match against a local school (we won 1-0, undeservedly so)
the strike day, school was open for Y11, I was there
3 INSET days
Y9 'enterprise day', the less said about this the better
5 of my Y11 top set being entered in Nov and getting them prepared
regular staff football on Fridays (I've missed this)
Y11 invitation only parents' evening
the Y7 Fresher's Ball (I was the DJ)

Probability Lesson & NQT Final Assessment

For my official, and final, NQT observation/assessment I was told that I would be observed on May 10th and that my NQT assessor could come into any of my 4 lessons I had on that day. This meant that I spent a fair amount of time the weekend before ensuring that my lessons were planned and I had all my resources ready to go regardless of what lesson my assessor would be popping in.

A quick tip for any NQT/PGCE/ITT starting in September...for any official observation make sure you give your assessor/observing everything they could possibly need for that lesson. This includes lesson plan, seating plan, class list, assessment results or scans of your mark book and copies of all the resources you'd be using that lessons. This way the see that you've clearly prepared for the lesson, have thought about what they need to see and they then should be able to see previous class results and link these to your lesson objectives and context for the lesson being observed. Also, have the class' books handy to show progression over time and marking - this all goes down well too!

On the day, I e-mailed my assessor just to say I looked forward to seeing them at some point that day (a gentle reminder). I then received a reply saying that the plan was for them to come and see me P2 (year 7). P2 came and went and I still hadn't seen my assessor. P3 was when they actually turned up and this lesson was with Year 8. A lesson on probability following their recent assessments. I don't know at this point if the statement of what lesson they'd be coming in was a 'test' of some sort, or whether it was just a matter of circumstance...I'm inclined to believe the latter.

Anyway, the lesson that was observed...I received an 'outstanding' grading for the lesson and so I thought it was worth sharing, and for my own personal teaching reflecting on and remembering for the future.

I knew the lesson I would be doing with this class (set 5 year 8) would be on probability following their recent assessment where the probability questions were not done particularly well - so I wanted to address this area of weakness. Now, even in my short time as a Mathematics teacher, I have used many different ideas/activities when teaching the topic of probability and its one of those topics that Mathematics teachers enjoy teaching in all manner of different ways. In the past I've done the Monty Hall problem, the horse race, watched Derren Brown's television shows, done a 'Maths Vegas' themed lesson and even observed other teachers using 'gambling' as a resource by 'betting' (fake 'money') on 'wacky races'. I decided to keep things a bit simpler this time round as I wanted my students to be comfortable with the vocabulary used in Probability and mainly, how to write a probability.

Here's my 5 Min Mathematics Lesson Plan for the observation (yes, this was perfectly acceptable for my final NQT lesson observation)...

This lesson plan was adapted by @ilovemathsgames from @TeacherToolkit's original 5 Min Lesson Plan. Both can be found on their respective Twitter pages/tweets and on the TES.

http://www.tes.co.uk/teaching-resource/The-5-Minute-Lesson-Plan-by-TeacherToolkit-6170564/











Before the lesson started I set out my classroom so that all of my 9 students (yes, I only had 9 students in my set 5 year 8 class) were sat around a single grouped set of tables. I then laid out the cheap paper tablecloths I got as part of my experimentation with #poundlandpedagogy. My aim with this was that the students would write on the table cloths throughout the lesson, rather than in their exercise books. The table (and cloth) were then added to with whiteboard pens and felt tip pens for the kids to use throughout the lesson.

The lesson started with an image of the answer/s to one page of their recent assessment (putting the lesson in context) with the particular question I wanted to address, the probability question, circled.

In addition to the image on the board I then started to introduce the lesson to the students as they got sat down. I showed them a bag, in which there were 11 multilink cubes of various colours and 1 'fruitella' sweet. I asked the students to write down any key words as they were said throughout the 1st task (and lesson on the whole). I then started to ask students to pick at random, from the bag a multilink cube. At this point they had no idea what was in the bag or what colours the cubes were, how many cubes there were etc. The point of this was to see if they could come up with an estimate for how many of each colour there were based on each students' picked item/cube. I went round the table after each student asking questions such as 'what do you think the chance/likelihood/probability is of that colour coming up?', 'is that colour more or less likely than another?', 'do you think the probability of that colour being picked is more than 1 in 2?' why? why not? etc.

After each student had had a go, and none of them had picked the sweet, I revealed to them all the contents of the bag. Throughout the task they had been writing down, on the table cloth/table the results of each student's picks. We then compared, after a brief moment of shock at the fact there was a sweet in the bag, the results with the actual items in the bag. Here I checked their understanding of how we express probabilities by asking what the probability was of each colour coming up. I then checked this further by going through 2 slides on my notebook file I created for the lesson...

 As you can see I checked here whether the class were able to express a probability as a fraction, revealing the convention when a few struggled. We also discussed here that probabilities of as single event occurring add to 1.

 To provide a link into the main activity I then did a similar thing with a dice rather than a bag of marbles to show that regardless of the event the conventions stay the same in terms of how we express probabilities. The dice on this slide is an interactive tool that when clicked 'rolls' the dice to generate a number - really useful. I got this off the TES somewhere but can't remember the particular resource. If it's yours let me know so I can link to it!

After this checking (mini plenary if you like) I set up the main activity by revealing the lesson objectives, showing what we had already covered and what we were going to look at next. I then explained the main task and gave out the dice and counters for the class to use. The main task consisted of each student individually rolling 2 dice. The numbers rolled on each dice would then determine which of 3 counters they would move up a space on the strips of paper they were given. If they rolled two even numbers one of the markers would move, two odd numbers a different counter and if one was odd and one was even they were to move the other (and final) counter. The winner was the one that got to the final 'square' on their strips. Here's the slide and image of the strips they were given to use...

The instructions, which some of the students found tricky to understand 1st time, were left on the board and reinforced to those that needed it. I worked with one student as I didn't have my LSA with me that lesson and they needed a bit of further support to get rolling!
There was an extension on the board too for those that finished quicker than others, which 2 or 3 of them got onto after being reminded what a square number was and what a prime number was. At this point I referred these students to the prime numbers display they had done earlier in the year (posters of the 1st 10 or so prime numbers).

This was the 'strip' of paper the students were given to place and move their markers up and down.

After the activity was done and each student had found a winner, which they wrote down on the table cloth, I went through our class results and then posed the question to the class 'why do you think this happened?'. I took a bunch of responses to the class and then drew up a sample space diagram to illustrate why it had happened.

We discussed the 'liklihood' of each counter being moved and then moved on.








The 2nd main activity involved rolling dice again. This time, I gave each student a sheet with numbers 1-36 written on them in a grid. I gave each student 10 markers to place on any of the numbered squares in the grid and told them not to show their partner. They could put more than 1 marker on a square, but no more than 3 on any one square. This was something that needed explaining a few times. I kept the instructions on the board too whilst the activity went on. I told the class that I would be rolling two dice and then multiplying the numbers that came up. If they had a marker on this number they would then take it off. The person with the most markers left on their sheets at the end would be the winner.

This is what their grids looked like. After the rules had been explained the students started to ask questions based on what they had just learnt about the dice and the probabilities of certain numbers coming up. We had a brief discussion of each question (without spoiling the outcome of the activity) before then starting to roll some numbers. At the end of the task I asked the students to now place their counters a 2nd time based on the squares they thought were best to put markers on (i.e. those that couldn't come up based on the rules of the game). This checked their understanding of the task and of the probability of certain numbers coming up, or not.

Finally, the plenary...

I really like these types of plenaries as they really do highlight who has grasped the lesson and who hasn't. They were each asked to write down, on the table cloth again, an outcome to which the answer was on the board. One by one I then went round the students asking for them to read out their outcome (a bit of literacy here) i.e. 'tomorrow will be a Saturday', 'the probability of rolling a 6 on a dice' and then asked another student to state what the probability was of that student's outcome using the probabilities and key words on the board. This was also differentiated by ability by the probabilities that were chosen. Most chose the worded probabilities like 'impossible' and 'evens', but there were a few at least that used the fractions to express their outcome (and correctly so).

Here's how the table looked at the end of the lesson...

As you can see, lots of key words written over the table. My explanation of '1 out of 12' and how this is written too with the 'out of' being the line between the numerator and denominator of a fraction...what is this line called? Is it called something? I think I have heard it referred as something other than a 'line' before? Answers on a postcard please (comment below).

The feedback I received from my assessor was really positive as my final assessment showed. His only 'concern' was the writing on the tables. One student had to write on the table as the cloth didn't stretch right the way over the grouped tables. I had written on the tables in the past with the class as it rubs off easily (I checked beforehand). My assessor's concern was that students, if allowed to draw on the tables in my lesson, could go to another classroom and do the same, assuming it was ok.
In an ideal world we'd all have whiteboard paint over our desks, on the walls etc to create a truly interactive environment. I have seen 'white rooms' before in libraries and universities where students can literally write on the walls, floor, ceiling, tables, chairs etc. All of which can be rubbed off and reused. Something for the future perhaps.



So, that's that. I got that 'buzz' throughout the lesson that tells me that everything is linking and going as I had envisaged; this doesn't always happen! The class were working fantastically throughout the lesson and were asking questions throughout. This was not the 'norm' with the class by any means and at times they had been difficult to teach/control. This lesson (and plenty of others) however, they were fantastic. I feel they got a lot from the lesson and just hope that they remember it for the future; retention is a key problem with the class.

I will use this 'format' of lesson in the future with small lower ability groups and may even use it with larger class sizes, students in groups with perhaps a different probability task to complete for each group. I may even do it with 'home' and 'expert' groups to get students moving round the room after each task to discuss their findings with other groups who hadn't seen/done certain tasks.

I hope my experience of my assessment will help others, and that ideas can be taken from the lesson I did with my year 8 class. It was one of the most enjoyable lessons I had with the class and one of the lessons that stands out from my NQT year (lucky timing on my behalf here).

Musical Chairs

Throughout the year I have experimented with many different seating layouts in my classroom, which I revelled having this year. Each of the different layouts had their own purposes depending on what I was intending on doing with certain classes at certain stages throughout the year. I'm sure everyone has their own particular favourite seating layout. Personally, I still don't think I've found a 'perfect' arrangement. There are pros and cons to each, but I ideally think that your seating layout should fit the purpose of the lesson and in an ideal word we'd all have a set of magical Maths trolls that would come out between each lesson changeover and move the furniture accordingly.

Now, for many teachers I'm sure space in their classroom is a major issue in terms of whether there is literally enough space to have the tables and chairs spread out in groups or in rows. One problem I may face next year, when moving back to the school I was a cover supervisor at (very excited by the way), is that my room isn't as big as the one I've enjoyed this year and has a weird 'side room' within the room. There's currently a load of filing cabinets in this space, but I'm hoping to clear this area for some sort of 'TA table' where my LSAs/TAs can work with small groups as directed/discussed.

I'm sure I'll find a way of rearranging the furniture such as I have this year, but for now let's see the different layouts I've used this year. You'll probably see gradual changes in my room displays too, throughout the pictures. I tried to change things and mix things up as much as I could this year. Mainly due to wanting to keep my students on their toes, give them a stimulating environment to work in and ensure they had that wonderment of what was going to happen in their Mathematics lesson that day; what the room would look like, would they be doing group work etc etc.

Start of the Year:

 

To start the year off I kept it simple...rows! I kept a walk through in between the desks for me to easily move up and down the classroom. On the odd occasion I'd use the back of the classroom (quite a big area) to teach here too, or use the back wall display to refer to something another class had produced (or remind a class of what they had done previously).

 

The advantage of the rows at the start of the year was that it enabled me to set out my stall. Rows are great for maintaining discipline and setting out the boundaries. All students are facing the front and so have no excuses for not looking towards the front when expected. It is easy to see those that have turned round to chat to those behind them. I found that it was also good when seating my SEN students at the start of the year and getting to know how much/little support they would need early on. These students were either sat on the front row or on the ends of the rows, easily accessible via the gap going down the middle.

 

The negatives of this layout are that I found certain students, depending on where they were sat, did not get as much of my attention as perhaps other students did that were easier to get to. The students that are sat on the ends of the rows nearest the walls/windows, especially in the middle of the classroom where those that were just physically hard to get to without having to squeeze past chairs. A major downfall for me was also that, as many of my classes were lower sets they only contained a maximum of 12 students. These students found it hard to concentrate and would need sitting with and extra support to understand their work. The rows made it hard for my LSAs and I to easily get round them all and sit next to them to support them if a row was 'full'.

So, I felt a change was needed.

 

Before the actual 'change' from rows I did experiment by moving the desks into other arrangements when I was doing group based tasks that I didn't think rows really complimented. Here are a few, 'one off' arrangements that I did for those lessons where I felt rows were not suitable...

 

 

What I would call the 'as exam-style as I can get' layout. This was used when I needed the classes to work in exam-style conditions. This mainly occurred when doing the termly assessments. However, this layout was also good for paired work, especially when the tasks were quite competitive between pairings.

 

'Circle Time'. I used this layout with my Year 7s a few times as I liked the way we could discuss certain things together. One particular lesson involved looking at sequences. Another, collecting like terms.

 

After the rows (with some dispersed 'one-off' layouts) I went to a 'spine' layout...

 

 

The 'spine' layout was possibly the least successful layout for me personally. Although, another teacher that used my room when I was free said that they really liked it and was a bit disappointed when I changed it.

Note to any NQT/ITT (or teacher for that matter) whose room gets used by other members of staff when you're not teaching in there...make sure you make those members of staff that teach in your room aware of any changes to the seating layout! Some members of staff will get a bit 'perturbed', shall we say, of constant unannounced changes, others will adopt an attitude of 'it's your room, do what you like with it'. Know your colleagues!

What I was hoping to do with this layout was to have a layout that allowed the ability to work in groups at the same time of everyone being able to face the front and still act as if they were in 'rows'. However, what I found was that there were far too many distractions for my larger classes. Not only could they see the person sat next to them, and the other pair that were linked to their table, but they were also able to see over to the other side of the room. This led to some silly behaviour at times with the more difficult students. There was a lesson where the poor student sat on the back right's bag ended up under the table at the front left in a game I'll call 'pass the parcel whilst Collins' back is turned'. My smaller classes (size wise, not height wise) did benefit from this layout however, as my LSAs and I were able to support students easier and were able to teach the students in smaller groups, which at this point in the year was becoming far more important as it became evident quite quickly that they, as a group, did not have the attention span nor concentration to be taught 'as a class'. Teaching in groups was how I found best to teach my lower sets - with the much needed support from my amazing LSAs (who I briefed at the start of each lesson/ beforehand if possible).

 

So, this 'half way house' just wasn't good enough and so having tried grouped seating when doing group work in the odd lesson here and there I decided to go the whole hog and change the seating layout to 'groups'...

 

 

 

The 'groups' consisted of 5 grouped desks, which each sat 6 students. There was then a single table for 2 students to sit on that I had at the back of the room. The difference this layout had on my set 5 classes was just what I needed. It allowed me to work with one table of 6, my LSA/s to work with the other table of 6 and then we'd swap over for me to check understanding of the other table/teach them whilst my LSAs went and supported the other table with the work they had just been taught. This worked well for these classes (of which there were 3). It may not seem like the most practical way of doing things, and yes it did mean a lot of repeating what I had said on a number of occasions. But, what it did do, is for me to easily see where everyone was with the work, move those students on faster that were capable to do so and give further support to those that were struggling. It meant I could sit students on either of the tables based on where they had got to in previous lessons and there was a good element of competition between the groups when the task allowed it.

The larger groups didn't lose out either. My classes where I had 32 students remained working well as they had done. From the dispersed group work lessons at the start of the year, and from the feedback my survey monkey survey provided me, my classes liked doing group work activities. My 'exam classes' were now sat based on their mock grades so I had students of similar ability working together, allowing me to differentiate class activities more easily. I even used the front table in my top set year 9 class as the table for my G&T students. They were all sat on this table, right under the class board, which allowed me to go through trickier problems/concepts as and when they finished the main class tasks. I did of course invite others that had finished elsewhere to join in the discussions as and when this happened, rather than singling out the front table as being the most able.

Luckily, the room space allowed there to be a lot of room still between desks and it was much easier to ensure I got round each student in the class, more so than I was able to do (subconsciously anyway) with the 'rows'.

 

Finally, towards the end of the year, I thought I'd go completely bonkers and combine the two main layouts ('groups' and 'rows')...

 

 

Now, I feel I need to give this a bit more of a go next year, as I see potential here. Half the class in 'rows' the other half in 'groups'. This allowed me to do the best of both worlds in terms of my set 5 classes could still work on 2 of the grouped tables, and we ignored the 'rows' half of the class, unless of course I needed to use this space for naughty students! The larger classes were slightly tweaked in terms of who worked best on groups and those students who perhaps worked better individually and preferred a bit more quiet to just get on with their work. Knowing my students helped a lot here.

As I've mentioned above, I think I may need to try this out this coming school year to really examine the benefits of it. Possibly at a time of year where the activities I'd be doing aren't so much 'end of term'.

 

A few things to note about changing the layout of your room:

 

Make sure their is a purpose for doing it, and not just because you got bored in a free period.

Be aware of any students with SEN (particularly ASD) as they will need to be given prior warning of the change and will need to know where 'their' seat is/will be.

You'll need to change your seating plans, this will take a bit of time to change if it's an electronic version, easier if you just take a photo and write over it.

Let other staff know if/when you're going to change it.

Don't change your expectations just because the seating changes. Reinforce your classroom rules in the first lesson of each new layout.

Where will you sit your most 'tricky' students? At one point in the year I thought it'd be a good idea to sit my 'trickiest' 2 students together, at the back of the class. My reasoning being that they'd distract less students all that way back their...WRONG! This didn't work, and neither did they!

Where are your LSA/TAs going to sit? Get their opinion on the new layout/s.

Tell the class why you've changed the layout and their seating positions - they'll feel as if they've been involved in the process rather than just told what to do with no explanation!

 

If anyone has a particular favourite layout that they've used, be it one I've used this year or one I'm yet to experiment with I'd love to hear about it. Comment below or tweet me @mrprcollins.

 

Term 3 of my NQT year - an insight for future NQTs/ITTs

It seems like ages since I last had some time to sit down and write any sort of blog post. In fact, it's been since the start of May that I've had this luxury when I blogged about organising and hosting a TeachMeet at my current school. Since then, a whole host of things have taken place and needed doing that have taken priority over being able to take some time to write about all the things I have been using/doing in my classroom.

So, having finally found an hour or so to sit down and reflect on what has been an extremely busy 3rd (and final) term of my NQT year I thought it'd be good to give those that are about to start their initial teacher training or NQT year an insight into what they could experience towards the later end of their training years. Obviously nobody's experience will be the same as another's, and this year has been completely different to the end of my GTP year, but there are similar things that will crop up regardless of what school you train/work in.

The main difference in my NQT year from my GTP year has been the pressure of having a GCSE class to prepare for their examinations. Last year, I shared a bottom set Y11 group, all of whom got their C grades (bar 2 students), but this year I was solely responsible for a 2nd set Y10 class, a bottom set Y10 class  and a shared bottom set Y11 class. So, with this, came a lot of revision focused lessons, past paper practice, morning revision sessions, regular revision sessions after school and the general 'pressure' that surrounds you and your classes when trying to not only cover the content of the examinations, but also provide timely feedback so your students know where they are with the exam content and what they need to still work on.
The difference between the classes was massive in terms of their readiness for the examinations and my 2nd set Y10 class were fantastic in terms of the preparations they were making independent of our lessons. In the lead up to the examinations I had half the class (at least) stay behind after school once a week (at least) to go over past questions, topics they didn't understand and things they needed to clear up. I found that my class didn't seem to attend the department's revision sessions after school each week and so decided to set up a revision session after school specifically for them. I provided biscuits to entice the more reluctant students in the group to turn up and I was really pleased with the attendance at these sessions. I hope that the work and effort put in here will reflect in their grades come August when they open up their envelopes.
The other Y10 class were barely ready for the examinations and will do well to get a D grade on the examinations. However, some of them do stand a chance at this. They'll probably sit the same examinations in November or be put into a linear examination (currently they've been doing the Edexcel linked pair pilot [Methods] exams). This class have taken up a lot of time purely by having to constantly think of what I was going to try and teach them and what they'd actually respond well to. They were a difficult class to teach and took up a lot of time trying to differentiate activities accordingly and get the most out of them as possible.

Aside from the Y10 examinations, and preparation for these examinations, a lot of my time was spent sorting out my NQT year and all the elements of this. This included my NQT final assessment observation, the NQT moderation visit we had and the ongoing collection and notation of evidence for the standards. I had 3 (termly) assessments during my NQT year and the final assessment was to take place on a given day and I was told that my assessor would come in to any lesson on that day. Now, I was able to rule out 1 of the lessons as I knew they would be teaching at the same time (and cover was an issue that would not be added to), but the rest all had to be planned and prepared for in the same fashion I would normally, with an added element of 'Ooo...I'm being observed'!  On the day of the assessment I sent my assessor an e-mail to remind them of the lessons I would be teaching that day to which I had a reply that they'd be in to observe me P2 (Y7). So, this lesson I spent the entire time watching the class door awaiting their arrival...nothing happened! So, it got to P3 and still no sign, until halfway through the lesson my assessor turned up to observe the lesson. This, if anything, was better than if they had turned up P2 as the class I had P3, although it was one of my trickiest bottom set Y8 groups, were working fantastically well, were engaged throughout and was one of the most enjoyable lessons we'd had all year - I was a bit lucky in this respect! The lesson was graded 'outstanding' and that, apart from the official form filling etc, was that, for my NQT year.

The biggest time consumer outside of the classroom had to be the end of year reports and end of year assessments. Now, last year I had to do all these things, but as I had only 3-4 classes this didn't seem too much of a chore. I also didn't have a tutor group's reports to do as I shared a form with the Head of English and she was awesome in taking this responsibility. So this year came as a bit of a shock as I had 8 classes worth of reports to do...and my tutor group's comments.
Each of the reports took a good 3 and a half hours + to do if they were a class of 30 odd. My smaller classes (luckily I had a few of these) only took a couple of hours to do. The tutor comments for my form took up about 3 hours due to having to read through their comments from other subjects before writing my general comment about their report and also how they'd been in form time. In addition to the reports, there were also all the end of year assessments for my Y7-9 classes. These all took a while to mark and then plan effective feedback for, which therefore didn't leave much time for anything else.

In Term 3 there were then a lot of other more 'minor' things that took up time like:

organising Sports Day with the form group - this is a nightmare...avoiding clashes, making sure students weren't doing too many events, making sure all students were taking part, making sure the students knew what they were doing and at what times, getting students to do the least popular events etc

taking part in the fortnightly NQT sessions and those sessions provided externally that caused cover to be set up for the classes I'd miss on those days

for our Enrichment week (w/beg 15th Jul) I'm going to Spain with half of the Y8s and we had a meeting with parents to inform them about the trip and answer any questions

as part of our House duties we were asked to do the interviews for the new house captains after the Y11s left having completed their examinations

I was part of the teachers chosen in our department to run a Y6 --> Y7 induction session for 2 of the form groups entering the school in September

All of the above was in addition to the ongoing lesson planning, marking, assessments, meetings etc that you'd expect from any other teaching week.

Outside of school it's been a busy couple of months too, with the ongoing TES resource reviews, moving house and DJing at weddings and Leavers' Balls. All of this has had to squeeze into the weekly routines that I try to get in place and so it's no wonder that I've not been able to get on here and share my ideas etc.
However, there is now only 1 'teaching week' left at my current school, then it's our 'Enrichment Week' where I'm in Spain with Y8 and then...HELLO Summer!

It has definitely been a busy year, especially the final term of the year, and it has been as enjoyable as it has been hectic. Keeping on top of everything has been the main challenge, as well as trying to ensure that the quality of my lessons didn't suffer with the other duties/responsibilities needing fulfilling at the same time. The increase in the timetable time is the main thing to change in your NQt year and I'm assuming this will be one of the main differences next year when I'll have a 100% timetable as an NQT +1.

If I could say anything to myself prior to having started this year it would have been to do my reports as soon as they were available for writing. I managed to do this to a certain extent, but still found myself trying to get the tutor comments done with a day or so to spare. I'd also be a bit firmer at the start of the year with classes than I perhaps was this year. I don't think this had too much of a detrimental effect, but the classes could have been a bit sharper/tighter behaviour wise a bit sooner in the year. All of the experience I have gained from this year I will take to my 'new' school in September, which I am thoroughly looking forward to.

I'll be blogging about all of the lesson ideas/activities I have used over the past term in the next couple of weeks. So watch this space!