I often think that marking is the nemesis of all teachers. We set work that is challenging, supportive and will help students learn and advance towards their primary goals. The only down side of this carefully thought out activity is that we have to then mark the bloody stuff.
I have just finished a marathon four days marking 45 essays, all on the same theme, all using identical sources. This is because the lazy sods only used the limited web sites and books I recommended as a starting point, no-one thought to find any additional material.
Because of this I end up marking 45 identical essays, one after the other, slowly losing the will to live. The only relief comes when students make some "howler" mistake and brighten the day.
I will be including notes at a later date of some of the best of these that I have come across over the years.
Monday, 28 April 2014
Sunday, 27 April 2014
The Teaching Game!
I have been teaching teenagers and adults for over ten years now and sometimes I leave a class and feel like pulling teeth would have been easier, other times it's like trying to plait fog. But most of the time,though, it is fun, exciting and I wouldn't want to change jobs for anything.
I am not ashamed to say I love my job. I would like to share with you why. Sometimes it can be a little surreal. From the strange set of characters in the staff room who chose this as a career choice, to the endless supply of eager students who populate the classrooms.
Teaching is a job like no other, a chance to build a professional relationship with people on a level that is quite unique. Teens just starting out, with their whole life ahead of them, getting started on that first rung of a very long ladder. Adults who are making a new start in life and realising that everything they have done up to this point is not enough and they need to start all over again.
My students are funny, engaging, brilliant, infuriating and maddening in equal quantities and I will be sharing my experiences with them here. However all names will be changed and all details kept confidential to protect my students, my institution and my own professional position.
I am not ashamed to say I love my job. I would like to share with you why. Sometimes it can be a little surreal. From the strange set of characters in the staff room who chose this as a career choice, to the endless supply of eager students who populate the classrooms.
Teaching is a job like no other, a chance to build a professional relationship with people on a level that is quite unique. Teens just starting out, with their whole life ahead of them, getting started on that first rung of a very long ladder. Adults who are making a new start in life and realising that everything they have done up to this point is not enough and they need to start all over again.
My students are funny, engaging, brilliant, infuriating and maddening in equal quantities and I will be sharing my experiences with them here. However all names will be changed and all details kept confidential to protect my students, my institution and my own professional position.
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