High

Sep 27, 2008 at 11:32 am (Politics, Teaching) (mccain, obama, palin)

It’s been a good week.  I’ve genuinely come out of this week feeling confident, prepared and excited.  I suspect this feeling is going to be short lived – pretty much until I get to my placement school.  However there has been encouraging progress.  I’ve taught mock lessons to my classmates and not felt the need to collapse on the floor and die. I’ve finally clicked that lesson planning and behaviour management are inextricably linked because the best way to keep the kids shut up is to keep them busy and / or interested.  So with all my new found knowledge and experience I’m feeling thrilled.

Or at least I was – then I started a bit of research on my placement school.  Of course I read the OFSTED report and the schools website but quite frankly, that tells you nothing.  Instead I went trawling the social networking sites and on Hi 5 (which I hadn’t even heard of until yesterday), I hit a jackpot.  Well I say jackpot.  Basically videos of kids senselessly mocking a teacher and secretly filmling it.  Just what you want to see.  The wobbly feeling is slowly returning to my legs and panic is setting in my chest.

In other news the US are having an election.  I may be a bit of a right wing nut job at times but do you know I have had to completely and utterly stop having any support for John McCain.  Not because I dislike his views that much, nor because I think Obama is incredible.  Frankly they’re both equally bland and non-commital.  However the concept of that gun toting, fundamentalist woman being that close to the presidency leaves me with no choice but to support Obama.  Don’t bellieve me?  Check this out – do you want her with her finger on the button?