This is Omar’s blog

I really like my computer, i use it a lot. To communicate with friends, look at random stuff, maybe watching some tv episodes, do some work (occasionally).

But having to put IC-bloody-T in every lesson plan just because you have to, whether it useful or not is just stupid.

That is all.

Seems to be 50mph, round here a least. All the national speed limit signs are being replaced by 50mph signs. The buggers.

It feels like their saying the national speed limit is 60 mph but you won’t find any signs for that. Hahahahaha where’s someone who works for (any) council when you need them??

Kermode loved it (film of the year - whether that means anything to you will vary. I do like his movie reviews, his rants on Pirate of the Caribean are cool). So i was tempted to see it and i haven’t been to the cinema for ages. I can’t even remember the last film i saw… possibly The Squid and the Whale a fair while ago. I never got around to seeing Children of Men.

We saw the late showing (1120) and they didn’t mix the popcorn (but it did mean that we got sweet popcorn half way through the film, though i was scoffing for England) and it was in the smallest screen and there were very few people there. Never the less.

Anyway it’s about a girl in Spain whose mother marries a evil Captain in the army. Anyway, he’s quite nasty and there’s some quite brutal violence and he’s trying to get the rebels hiding in the hills.  At the same time it’s this big fairytale where the girl is told she might be a lost Princess. So the two stories kind of intertwine and do so seamlessly, strangely enough. It’s quite absorbing though and i think i really liked it. Though i did like the civil war stuff Jenn, though perhaps the ending was maybe too brief? Or was that the point. See i don’t know, the fairytale stuff was done nicely, the faun was both ugly and lovely - in contrast to the Captain (i read that bit). The civil war stuff was quite dark, in this isolated mill.

I liked it, it was a bit unlike anything i’ve seen for a while - which is always good and you don’t even notice the subtitles after a while (funny that).

Whenever i think of them i can’t help but think of Bill Hicks and his view on them. With that in mind, it’s all the new adverts that don’t reveal who they are for until right at the end. And at the beginning of them it’s all this life affirming you-can-be-anything you-can-do-anything you want to just get out there, take a chance carpe diem and so on and so forth. Which is great and they are really nicely done, positive things. It’s just at the end it says and to do that you need to buy our product, you need to be on our phone network - because if you don’t you might as well not bother.

Yeah. I don’t like those adverts.

You know you’re doing it, that how you feel is in my ways completely disproportional to what is happening. Still, you do it anyway don’t cha?

I ordered this t-shirt (top one) on a bit of a whim but to have a hand made t-shirt that is relatively unique shipped from America - total cost £9. Lovely.

So, it’s like this. I am so far from being on top of the work it’s not really funny and i’m typing quickly because when i think about it, it makes me nervous.

BUT, the teaching aspect is great. We (Louise, one of the other PGCE students in the school, she’s in reception) basically acted as supply teachers for the morning yesterday, so that our two teachers could have a meeting about literacy. How did i feel about that? It was good, i’m aware the TA’s sit on them (figuratively speaking) a little more when i’m teaching but i kind of let them - it’s fine by me really. So i took the lesson at 10 minutes notice, working from the weekly plan and it went fine. The oral mental starter was good (and made use of the IWB), the intro was fine and the main part of the lesson went well, little shakey on the plenary but all in all.

SO. I don’t know, i have tasks that i don’t think i’m going to get done this week that i should be more organised about. Depends on what the point of it all is? If it’s to get us to think about specific things by getting us to record and work through all these tasks, i think i might well fail. But if it’s about teaching - i think i’m really getting somewhere. It’s probably both isn’t it?

DAMN.

That is all.

All strategies for encouraging a more positive frame of mind gratefully accepted.

Too much to talk about really, too much that i haven’t done really. Hmmm.

The school, my class teacher, lead mentor, all the teacher’s really have been really, really great. Have all been supportive, only too happy to help. I took my first lesson today, that i planned for (till late last night) and actually carried out. This was, kind of my first proper experience of teaching, have taken a whole class before but only working from the teacher’s plans. To be fair, it felt like it. I was doing place value with 24 5/6 year olds.

[it's interesting, well i think it is, how when i think of the number 15 - place value is completely and utterly taken for granted. Who thinks of it as one ten and five units, that's what it means but we all think of it as 15. Anyway]

I think it didn’t go so well, i wasn’t clear about what i wanted them to do and how i wanted them to fill in the sheet. The intro was a bit hazy but the plenary was great, we played this on an interactive whiteboard so the kids could hit the right number. I was being observed, the teacher thought it went great! Hahahahaha  Well, it’s all good practice. It was good though, really really good. I feel like i’m making real steps with the ‘teaching’ part of it, if not the planning.

It’s just the paperwork. There’s just so much of it and i feel like i’m drowning under it at the moment. It’s the one thing that i’m really really worried about. All the observations and tasks etc. It’s just all jumping through hoops. Am having real trouble staying on top of it all as well as letting go for a bit - it’s not happened this week. I’m working, i say working, i can’t do really focused work and then stop. It’s not me. That makes me rubbish! I thought a drink might help but haven’t finished it (i gave alcohol a try in the past - it just doesn’t work for me).