Now, I've never been one for resolutions - partly because I am aware of my own limitations (the minute I decide I'm going to do something I suddenly find 30354 things I could be doing instead...) and partly because I genuinely believe that people struggle to change. Especially in the cold, dark, miserable month of January after the Christmas jolliness has worn off and the time between now and the January payslip seems endless and the stretch to half term even longer.
However, I have decided, just this once, to be resolute in my resolutions and actually attempt to stick with them more than just half-heartedly. My resolutions mainly apply to, or relate to, my work.
I've been meaning to start a blog for ages, mainly as a record for myself of the pitfalls and successes of the first year of my teaching career and partly as a cautionary tale and encouraging voice to those going through their teacher training - there is a light at the end of the tunnel! Teachers do have social lives! However, the work is also hard and it's not until you have 26 little faces that are all your responsibility gazing up at you that you finally realise that you're an actual teacher, with an actual class.
So here are my 14 resolutions for the year of 2014. I'm expecting I can stick to maybe half of them...
1. Start, stick with, and use a blog in a vaguely useful manner.
2. Think outside of the box more with using my NQT time - admittedly Friday afternoons are not the finest time to barrel into someone else's class and attempt to gain skills through observation, but I need to find more ways to improve my teaching and decide how I'm going to use this time effectively to improve.
3. Retain consistency within the classroom - I've spent so much of the last term launching new ideas that I've gained from Twitter, Pinterest, observations and out of my own head at my class. They're a lovely bunch who gamely have a go at anything I throw at them. However, I feel the time has come for me to stop using them to conduct my educational experiments and start picking and choosing the methods that work, incorporating them into the timetable and sticking with them day in, day out.
4. Look after myself better - Now, I've already had to have two days off school with a delightful vomiting bug so my plan not to be ill through my NQT year is already a write off, but I am determined to take better care of myself. This involves popping a wide variety of vitamin tablets, drinking vast quantities of water and getting enough sleep. Which I am currently not doing. Good start.
5. Push the higher ability kids in my class more - I've got a pretty wide range of abilities in my class and I spent most of last term jollying along my lower ability kids and some of the middle group. While this has definitely reaped rewards in their confidence and their levels it's been a bit detrimental to the higher group, who are very bright but also categorically lazy. This term I'm going to traumatise them by actually expecting them to produce work of their ability levels, so that should be interesting.
6. Be more confident in my teaching - I was starting to get into the swing of things last term and I had a few of those lessons where all the kids make progress, they get that lightbulb moment and I felt like an educational genius. However, I also had quite a lot of moments where I felt like a total failure who shouldn't be in charge of a hamster let alone twenty six seven-year-olds (Ofsted was a definite low low low point) I'm pretty harsh about my own teaching, so I need to focus on the positives and try to continue doing them and ignore the disaster moments.
7. Use social media and the internet more effectively - I am a huge Twitter fan. I mainly use it for following educators (also lots of comedians which I find give me a much-needed giggle on a bad day) I get lots of brilliant ideas from here and then shamelessly steal them and use them in my classroom. Pinterest is also a genius invention and my entire first week of term was composed of ideas gleaned from here. What I really need to do is keep using all the marvellous websites and blogs I have painstakingly collected throughout my PGCE and this year and stored safely in Evernote. And then proceeded to totally forget about as soon as I start planning.
8. Have set nights off where I definitely do not do work, talk about work or think about work - I try and do quite a lot out of work. I am an avid pub-quizzer and I play badminton a couple of times a week but I still spend a deal of that time feeling guilty for not working. I need to stop this for the sake of my sanity and that of the people who are willing to spend time with me.
9. Be more self-reflective about what's happening in my teaching - Enter The Blog. I'm hoping I can use this to record my little victories and disasters in order to remind me to try them again or avoid them completely in future.
10. Get a good observation which proves I've improved - My observation from my mentor last term was really lovely, but I played it very safe. Next time I need to improve on all the things that were noted and show that I am dynamic and interesting as a teacher, not just a plodder who just about scrapes through.
11. Give my class more chances to do their own research and take control of their learning - The school laptops are booked for my class during my PPA time which isn't ideal when I want to teach them research skills. However, I think there is still a place for actual real dictionaries and encyclopaedias and other large dusty tomes. This means my kids need to learn how to use them, and without going 'Miiiiisssssss, I can't find it....'
12. Continue to get better at the piano - I started lessons last September at the beginning of my PGCE and have managed to stick with it for over a year. I am still appalling and don't practise nearly enough, but it's something I really enjoy and I entertain a dream of one day being able to sit down and play the hymns in assembly without them coming out at the approximate speed of a funeral march and without long pauses while I try and remember what those dots on the page mean.
13. Get over my Sunday night fear that I've forgotten how to teach - This happens Every. Single. Week. I can spend hours planning and preparing through the week and still get to Sunday and think 'Oh my God! What am I doing next week!?''
14. Work out what I need to get done, do it, and move on - Procrastination is most definitely and unequivocally the thief of time. My problem is not that I don't want to do the work, it's just that my brain has a butterfly tendency to flit from one thing to another e.g. 'Okay, time to do marking. Oh wait! I need to change the book display. Ooh, that table's a bit messy. I'll just tidy it. Whoops, time for staff meeting. Need to print homework for tomorrow. What was I doing again?' This is me at 22. I dread what I will have become at 50.
So there we go, my first foray into blogging. I have set out a ridiculous and unreasonable number of resolutions but I am hopeful that I will stick with at least one. I did consider doing my old to-do list trick of writing 'brush teeth and hair' so that I can at least say I stuck with one thing but I have been rigid and determined and given myself real, actual tasks.*
Happy 2014!
H x
*Also brushing hair is overrated.
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