Diary of an NQT

9B’s England World Cup XI

THE LONG awaited day finally arrived this week, and after much anticipation, our school breathed a sigh of relief as we waved goodbye to our year 11 students on Tuesday afternoon. Although I don’t have a class myself, I had

joined in the anticipated release, having been surrounded by teachers that were generally quite looking forward to waving goodbye to the little darlings. Clad in signed – sometimes

rather distastefully – shirts, and for some reason what can only be described as fake NHS- spectacles (a bizarre recent fashion trend), we lined their way to the school gates to wave bon voyage, and of course check they didn’t trash the place! I can barely believe it has been

a full week since last I wrote a diary entry. They say time flies when you’re having fun. I rather think that time flies when

you’re busy and although not much fun, it has been an exhaustingly busy week. What with reports, assessment marking and general end-of-year paperwork eating away at my time, I’ve hardly had time to catch my breath. Marking can often be a desperate

activity and it can be easy to become despondent, wading through piles of utter drivel, desperately trying to find a box on the mark scheme for utter nonsense. However, occasionally a piece of work

stops you in your tracks that is iridescent either because of its originality, or because of its hilarious spelling errors. Although many such pieces

Teach it like Torno!

Give us a break, Nick!

“It is not what is poured into a student that counts but what is planted.” Linda Conway.

I was saddened to read the comments of Nick

Gibb, the new schools minister, in one of the Sunday papers this week. According to the piece, he reportedly told top officials he would rather have unqualified graduates from Oxford or Cambridge teaching in the classroom than qualified teachers from what he terms as “rubbish” universities. Not that he identified who these rubbish universities were. The comments give us an indication as to how

teachers will really be treated under the Tories. They have been making friendly overtures towards the profession stating that schools will get greater freedom, but Mr Gibb’s comments already reflect a contempt for staff that have not been to Oxbridge universities. I was rather hoping that those

in charge of us at the Department for Education might have started by praising the work of teachers. On a daily basis many of those from a so- called rubbish university are working long hours and going the extra mile to inspire and bring the best out of pupils. Additionally, as professional

tutor in my school I am in a position to see teachers from a variety of backgrounds. Some of the worst are those with doctorates from elite universities. They speak gobbledegook and fail to make the right relationships with students. On the other hand, I see

teachers from non-Oxbridge universities reaching out to students in fantastic ways. And one of the reasons they can do this is precisely because they are not from the privileged background Mr Gibb talks about. They are from similar backgrounds to the students and can completely relate to them. And what does this say about the

teachers on the Graduate Teacher Programme in my own school? In the last article (Teach it like Torno!, issue 249, May 13, 2010) I spoke about the Ofsted inspection we had and one teacher in particular, Kay Gilbert, who was an ex- student and attended the University of Manchester. The Ofsted inspector graded her as “outstanding”. She relates well to the students because previously she was one of them. She knows how to motivate them and we are delighted that she will be an NQT with us next year.

Is Manchester a “rubbish” university? The key to

great teaching is obviously knowing your subject in depth, but it is communicating this to your students with enthusiasm and passion and that comes from forging fantastic relationships. Not every Oxbridge graduate can do this. While I certainly agree with Mr Gibb that

there needs to be an ever-increasing call for higher standards, I am not convinced it need only come from the elite universities. It is refreshing to hear that both Mr Gibb and the education secretary Michael Gove have taken note of international research, particularly in Switzerland, to consider the effect on British schools, but many teachers will feel insulted that much of their hard work has literally been “rubbished”. I have referred to the 2007 McKinsey report on education a number of times in this column and I acknowledge that it calls for teachers to be highly educated. However it does not call for one or two universities to have a monopoly on teacher training. Teaching is essentially about reaching hearts and minds. Convincing young people that education is a route out of poverty. Will all Oxbridge graduates be able to communicate this with conviction? I am not certain they

could. Only this week I received an email from a former student in my year group who went to live in America when she was in year 10. She is now 22 and has just found out that she has been accepted into Harvard

University to study law. In her email she said: “I just wanted to say thank you for all of your discipline and encouragement over the years because I was

just accepted into Harvard Law School! I am beyond excited!” It certainly was not me that got her there, she did this of her own volition, but it demonstrates the

influence of good teachers. I must admit that I did go to Oxford. I went there to buy a tie, but the shop was closed.

• David Torn is professional tutor and advanced skills teacher at St Edward’s Comprehensive School in Essex. He is the London Secondary School Teacher of the Year 2007 and is passionate that the purpose of education is to change lives. He returns after half-term.

have warmed me by falling into the first category this year, this week saw a return of the latter. Wherever you are reading this, I’m sure you felt

some shifting of the earth this week as I rolled about laughing at one such faux pas. I can think of many reasons to visit

New York, but it turns out I had never considered that it was such a tourist hot spot for the reasons one girl suggested in her travel writing assessment. “It’s no wonder New York is so

popular with tourists; they come for the brilliant skyscrapers, designer shopping and hot dog stools.” I wonder just how big they are

on street cleanliness in the land of opportunity? Elsewhere, with television advertising going mad over the impending World Cup, I thought it would be good fun to join in on the excitement with my year 9 boys this week. At the end of every lesson we’ve

been putting together our own England world cup squad. On the flimsy notion that we are

learning to argue, persuade and advise, lessons have been finishing late as we become locked in heated discussion as to who should make the squad. Nothing compared to the banter one poor boy became the butt of after he suggested we should take the Irishman Shay Given as the England goalkeeper – think I need to have a word with his geography teacher about that one. Hope it’s not that nice Mr Davies!

• Matt Connett is a newly qualified teacher of English at Shenfield High, a training school in Brentwood in Essex. He returns after half-term

Encourag

Former English

teacher Susan

Elkin looks at how it is the

responsibility of all teachers, no matter what their subject, to encourage their charges to love reading

on the page, screen, paper or noticeboard into words – which nearly all children eventually learn to do. They may not be very quick or fluent, but when they see “Danger” or “Menu” they know what it means. Very few children in the modern, developed world reach adulthood in a state of total illiteracy. By age seven most can stumble through a passage

E

from a book while an adult listens. But that is just decoding. Real reading is what you learn to do once you have cracked the code. It is like swimming. Getting your 10-metre

certificate is not the end of your swimming career. It is the beginning. Now that you can stay afloat and use a stroke or two to propel yourself along you can strike out, build up your swimming stamina and enjoy the water. It is just the same with reading. Children need to grow into strong, confident, deep-end readers – and that is where we enlightened secondary school teachers can do so much. Bridge Academy in Hackney, for example,

has large, cheerful photographs of staff (teaching, support, administrative, technical and so on) displayed with reading books around the building. The caption below each simply states the adult’s name and the title of the book. It is a simple example of how reading can be role-modelled quietly but positively in school. When I was responsible for school assemblies

in a secondary school I regularly asked colleagues – especially those who were not keen on leading “issues” or religious assemblies – if they would simply do a five or 10-minute presentation on a book they had read and liked. In practice, we had five or six of these each term and it conveyed to the students a very positive message that PE teachers, science teachers, administrative staff and so on read books too. If your school does not already do it, campaign for a

block of time – preferably daily – but certainly several times a week when everyone reads (Everyone Reading in Class – ERIC?).

Some recent titles which might grab them

• Saving Rafael by Leslie Wilson (teenage Romeo and Juliet set in Nazi Berlin). For 12-plus.

• My sister Jodie by Jacqueline Wilson (sibling rivalry between children of boarding school staff). For nine-plus.

• Keeper by Mal Peet (football thriller set in South America, first of a trilogy). For 12-plus.

• Chains by Laurie Halse Anderson (slavery escape set in 18th century revolutionary New York). For 10-plus.

• Burn my Heart by Beverley Naidoo (Mau-Mau period friendship of Black and White boy in Kenya). For nine-plus.

Remember that many fiction books have cross-curricular link potential. Plenty of history, geography, and PSHE here!

Students need to see you and other teachers reading

for pleasure. So if the class or group is reading silently then you read too. If you undertake any other activity (such as marking) you are suggesting that it is more important than reading. It isn’t, except in the direst of emergencies. I always conveyed the reading-is-more-important-

than-anything message by over-acting the “book nut” role and making fun of myself. Try it. Be someone who never leaves home bookless, who has sold your television set, who sometimes forgets to wash up because you are so deep in your book, who often cannot remember whether you have read the book or seen the film, and so on. The students will laugh at, and with, you – but they will also admire your respect for the printed word and some will copy it. All this is particularly important for boys, of course.

A recent ChildWise survey found that 42 per cent of boys aged 11 to 16 never read books for pleasure. And last year’s government figures showed that nearly a 10th of 14-year-old boys have a reading age of just nine. “Too many boys simply aren’t aware of the concept

that reading can be for pleasure’s sake alone,” says the Football Association’s editor-in-chief, Dan Freedman, who also writes the Jamie Johnson novels about a football prodigy. Mr Freedman is a frequent visitor to schools and a proactive promoter of reading. Mr Freedman, who claims to have been a reluctant

reader in boyhood, continued: “I can see boys’ attitude to reading thaw as I tell them how similar I was to them, how I started off thinking reading was boring but now I read and write for pleasure – an entirely new concept for many boys.” That is why the National Reading Campaign (NRC)

has set up its Reading Champions project. “Its purpose is to celebrate men and boys who enjoy

and promote reading in order to encourage others to do likewise,” explained Julia Strong, NRC’s director.

8

SecEd • May 27 2010

VERY TEACHER is a teacher of reading. And learning to read is a lifelong, over-arching project. It does not stop at age seven. Neither does responsibility for it lie solely with teachers who have “literacy” or “English” in their job title.

And it is not merely about turning the squiggles

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