teacher training – A Teacher in the making

I’m sure I’m not alone in saying how important prioritising is when it comes to time management. It’s something often discussed in the introduction sessions to courses (or at least, it was for me for both of my degrees), and during the first year of my Bachelors degree, I was one of those students who rolled their eyes at the subject and laughed “yeah yeah, i’ll just do it all at the end of the module, it’ll be fine, Uni is mainly about fun, life experiences, right?!”.

When you choose a new career, University course or even a new hobby, you’ll likely hear a lot about time management and the importance of prioritising. Up until I went into my second year of University, I never really payed attention to all of that. My priorities were having fun and building ‘independence’ (and by independence I mean not living with my parents and being able to get up as late as, and stay out as late as, I wanted).

It wasn’t until I was faced with a bout of anxiety, stress and loneliness at the beginning of my second year did I realise just how important time management and prioritising really is. I’d like to think I was motivated to change my outlook because I had an epiphany or finally ‘grew up’. In fact, what motivated me was I was lonely and anxious and rather than spending time fretting over these emotions, I decided to dive head-first into my degree. (And boy, am I glad I did.) Not only did I find that time management helped me deal with stress and anxiety (deciding to do work progressively over the module, rather than at the end, really does eradicate some of that stress!) but it also helped me truly understand what it meant to be passionate and driven. This turning point in my life at 23 years old, really did change me – I would not be where I was now if I hadn’t decided to turn my negative emotions into a positive experience.

Now, I’m not saying I wouldn’t have arrived here eventually, I have no doubt (some may call me ‘big headed’ or ‘cocky’ – I call myself confident) that I would have made it here sometime – I may have just wasted a few more years prioritising “having fun and partying” like I did in my first year of University.

Prioritising and time management are two very important aspects to any career that involves study, research and constant personal and professional development. Take yesterday, for example, the first day of my Teach First Summer Institute (yaay!) having received our personalised timetable last week, I felt well prepared to start the day and had almost convinced myself that I could: complete the first two units; attend various live sessions; have a break for lunch and dinner; find time to network with peers and you know, still have a relationship with my partner! In reality, I could not complete both Units. I completed the first Unit and was disappointed in myself for not feeling like I had the energy to start the second Unit. Did I manage my time well enough? Why didn’t I manage to do everything I wanted to do? Did I spend too much time talking to people in my many new network groups? Did I spend too much time on my break? Etc. Etc.

While I may have experienced initial disappointment, these questions help me understand whether my disappointment in myself is valid. Did I manage my time well enough? Yes, you were up at 6:45am, working from 8am and familiarising yourself with the various platforms we need to use throughout Summer Institute and the programme in general. You networked, because it is very important to build these connections. As teachers (and professionals in any field) you need to establish support networks early on and use these to your advantage (and while personal support networks are great, it’s also important to build professional ones, with peers). Why didn’t I manage to do everything I wanted to do? As always, I set myself unrealistic goals. The allotted time to do both units was more than the time I had, when I factor in the live sessions, breaks, learning the platforms, completing one Unit and networking. I know this will be something that I’ll always struggle with, but I find it easier to set slightly unrealistic goals (and be disappointed for a few minutes if they aren’t quite met, and reflect on this) than to set goals that don’t challenge me in the slightest. Not only does this allow me time to reflect on my time management, it also helps me to understand where my priorities lie and establish whether I need to change things before the next day or session.

I read everywhere that time management as teachers is very important, but I also, somewhat contrastingly, read that teachers and schools are often ‘chaotic’. I begin to wonder what time management in this profession really means. Time management isn’t about being the most ‘put together’ person in the profession. It’s not about always getting it right and always hitting your goals the first time around. It’s about learning to prioritise the order in which you carry out tasks. It’s about holding yourself accountable, if you didn’t meet a goal, why was that? Can you change this next time to make it better? If you did reach a goal, great! How easy was it? Did you set your goals too low or was it just right? How unrealistic were your goals for yourself? Did you, in fact, spend too long procrastinating?

Time management, in my opinion, is as much about reflection as it is about doing. You won’t always get every part right. You will sometimes have to assess and change. As you develop as a professional in your field, you will learn how long certain aspects take. You will also be able to carry out these tasks quicker, the more confident and skilled you become. Your priorities and time management will change as you become more proficient in your field. For me, I’m pretty good at time management and being able to establish where my priorities need to be at any given time. (For example, before Summer Institute, I needed to complete my reading list. As much as I wanted to start reading a different, teaching related book, this could wait.) (And yesterday, I knew when these Units needed to be completed, and I knew that I had a whole other day (with no live sessions) to complete them.) So there is no need to be disappointed in myself for not completing them both yesterday, I prioritised what needed to be done, and I enjoyed every minute of it.

Prioritising and time management isn’t something that will always work out and if you’re both as critical and confident in yourself as I am, then you’ll often over estimate how much you can do, and then criticise yourself for not achieving it! This is something, as a teacher, that I need to work on.

R x

As Teach First 2020 Summer Institute is just around the corner (we start on Monday) I have been spending a lot of my ‘spare’ time (when I say spare time, I mean time outside of my full-time job – luckily I finished this job on Wednesday) over the past couple of weeks preparing.

Unsurprisingly we were given a reading list to familiarise ourselves with prior to beginning the five week summer course. I am not the best at distinguishing between whether a reading list is something we need to just be somewhat comfortable with, or whether we’re expected to have read it all. I always opt for the latter – better to be over-prepared than under-prepared in my opinion.

The reading list included six fantastic texts, which I have found myself fully engaged in! Me and my partner have been getting into a better routine (up at 6-6:30am) and the first couple of hours of my day have been spent listening to instrumental jazz (my favourite music for concentration) and spending time engaging in and enjoying the reading list.

Teach Like a Champion (TLaC) is one of the texts on the reading list, and something I have thoroughly enjoyed reading (and watching). It has been challenging to imagine myself doing some of the techniques mentioned in the book, as I have no experience in schools – the addition of videos makes it so much easier to do this. While this book was written and is mainly based off of American schools, I can see how many of the techniques can be used in schools here, to help engage pupils and create a fantastic, supportive and safe working environment for pupils of all ages.

I will be teaching primary, lower KS2 and I am incredibly excited and interested to see how I implement these techniques in my classroom from day one. Before even starting my Summer Institute course, I already know some of my favourite techniques in the book. ‘Threshold’, ‘Cold Call’ and ‘Plan for Error’ are three of the many techniques that stand out to me. I can see myself creating my classroom culture from day one and implementing these techniques in one way or another.

Today I watched the Chartered College recent Webinar with Doug Lemov where he talks about the importance of “Building a Thriving Classroom Culture” and draws upon some of his favourite techniques from the book. During the webinar, he narrates videos of some of the techniques being used in schools. The addition of the narration really helped give context to these techniques and as an inexperienced future trainee teacher, this is very helpful. View the webinar here. (You’ll need an account, for student teachers it’s free!)

Other papers we have been asked to familiarise ourselves with look at research based approaches that look at the science and psychology behind how people learn and they were truly fascinating! As a person who feels her memory of childhood/early adulthood is lacking, I was interested to learn about our ‘working memory’ and our ‘long-term memory’ and how a lot of what we do is just information from our long-term memory. I find myself interested in finding ways to tap into this more to help influence my teaching. I also found that, when reading these articles alongside TLaC, I was able to find some of the scientific research that backs up the techniques in the book. As teachers, we need to use research based approaches (whether this research is field based, like TLaC, or scientific based) we cannot be expected to teach successfully and create the best environment for learning without using these research based approaches.

I love getting stuck in to research, it was always one of my strong points when studying my BA and MA in Photography. Learning the theories, techniques and reasoning behind photography and Artist’s work was something that fascinated me. (This could be because I am a inquisitive person, but I’d like to think being inquisitive is merely just showing interest in other people.) I’m extremely excited to start to develop a more critical understanding of the research I have done around teaching, and I can not wait to engage in more. (Goodness knows there is a lot of research on teaching out there). I need to be sure to find the right research and not be overwhelmed by the masses that are out there. Another technique I put down to my previous degrees’ is my understanding of the importance of being very specific with the research you carry out. Don’t just search generic terms, be specific, and use the experts you already have access to (be it tutors, mentors or colleagues) because they already know and practice a lot of the theories and techniques you need to learn – use them to your advantage! I’m sure they’ll be more than happy to point you in the right direction.

It’s crazy to think that my official journey as a trainee teacher begins in less than two days. It feels like a very long-time coming, and I feel terrified, excited, thrilled and privileged to be given this opportunity to help give education a brighter future in the UK. I’m excited to start my career as a teacher, one I hope to stick with for the foreseeable future.

Bring on Teach First Summer Institute 2020. While it may be virtual, I’m sure it will be just as challenging, enthralling and fascinating as it normally is.

I’ll check in again soon, take care.

Tag: teacher training

Prioritising, Time management & Reflection

Teach Like a Champion