Second week of term (in my new school, nevertheless) and only now am I ready to talk about it 😆 we had been back for approximately 0.02 seconds and there they were…

An unfortunate coincidence of circumstances (I’m not in on Mondays and school forgot to call me) meant I found out with 30 mins to spare that Ofsted would be in my lesson. Cannot describe that feeling. Inspector was absolutely lovely and actually got involved with the lesson?! (Doing all the activities with the kids, offering the all-important visitor praise “Wow, I love how X is following your instructions”) Not what I was expecting at all. Was very proud of the kids though - mine find visitors challenging at the best of times but they were TROOPERS. 🥰

Baby’s first Ofsted over and out!

I'm a trainee teacher (Teach First) so of course I'm still developing my teaching and knowledge, but despite teaching less periods than a qualified teacher, having no tutor group and no break duties, I feel absolutely exhausted at work every day. Does this get better with time and practice or is it just part of the job?

Today a year 9 student repeatedly called me a homophobic slur during my lesson. It was framed as: 'Sir, did you hear that? Johnny just called you a f.....'.

After the first time it was said to me, I asked him to stop repeating it, but unfortunately he went on to repeat this to me about 10 times. Only when I raised my voice and asked him to leave my room did he stop and leave. At the end of the lesson I asked if anyone who heard it could stay behind; I asked them not to repeat what they heard and that they may be contacted for statements.

I reported it in the usual way and contacted the HOY and my HOD. HOY offered to call home as I said I was too upset about it to do so.

I have had instances of discriminatory language before, but none this blatant and repetitive. I am quite surprised by it and upset about it.

How should my school support me from this point to teach this child again? At the moment I don't particularly want to welcome him back in my classroom.

There might be a relevant post to this already. I work in a village primary school and we are already feeling the brunt of the declining birth rate with one class already being combined. Having gone from 190 kids to 150.

Is anyone else experiencing the same?
What are the long term job opportunities going to be?

I'm new to teaching FE and was gobsmacked by the behaviour in today's class (T Level Business). Some students found it acceptable to play music out loud on their phones, set off siren sounds on their phones, pull display photos down, and throw opened sugar sachets across the room. Fortunately I only have this class once a week, but I wondered what behaviour strategies you would even implement with a class like this.

ECT2 here (secondary). Trained as a teacher because I enjoy teaching and supporting young people. Over the months, I find myself more and more focused on GCSE grades, grade boundaries, and exam results to the point where I start to see kids joining my class in terms of whether they will boost or hamper the results of the class. Shameful, I know. I realise that a big part of this is due to the school's excessive focus on results - it's the key thing they talk about on INSET days, and we are constantly bombarded by graphs, box plots, and progress 8 calculations, comparing results within and across schools in the academy. Reflecting on this yesterday, I realised that it has sucked the joy out of teaching for me. I still prepare good lessons and follow best practices in pedagogy, but the end goal feels very different now. The school sees students as data on a spreadsheet.

I was thinking it would be great to work in a school that doesn't focus excessively on scores. Yes, assessments are good feedback, and they are important. But a healthy balance could exist. But do such schools still exist?

I’m always curious about what other teachers have on their to do lists….currently I have so many things on mine! I’d love to feel better knowing what’s on yours 😉

Right, this is an incredibly random post but essentially I’ve won a cruise 😭 however, the departure date is July 17th 2027 and my school doesn’t break up for the six weeks until 22nd July. Do we think it’s reasonable to ask for unpaid leave for the last four days of term? I’ve read my school’s policy and it says it’s up to the head’s discretion and in exceptional circumstances, they can allow certain absences etc. I had a colleague (who has since left) who went to Australia for 2 weeks of the beginning of a term after her wedding, and this was granted as unpaid leave. It’s such a once in a lifetime kind of chance but I don’t want to get my hopes up.

My partner and I are both teachers (alt provision and secondary, respectively) and we’re considering adoption. We’re doing a lot of reading and research at this stage before we formally start the process. Does anyone have experience with how adoption interacts with your career as a teacher, including leave, parenting a child with trauma, and honouring other commitments?