Tag: Teaching

Guest Post: 7 Reasons To Pick Teaching As A Career

Teaching is never easy and it can seem like a thankless task when you spend the whole weekend marking, only to be mocked by friends who joke that you get too many holidays. However, there are many reasons why you should pick teaching as a career and undertake a teaching qualification such as Middlesex University PGCE courses.

1. Holidays. Let’s get that one out the way first. We know you didn’t choose to be a teacher just because of the holidays. We also know that, despite what your friends and family think, you will spend a large chunk of your holiday marking papers and writing lesson plans. But all those holidays are nice and even when you are working, it is a luxury to be able to work from home.

2. Rewarding. There’s nothing like seeing your class finish a long and complicated project or put on a play. You will watch your pupils learn and grow as people as they get older. You will feel almost as proud as the parents when the day comes for them to leave your school and take their next step in the world.

3. Changing Lives. Not many careers will give you the opportunity to have a positive influence on children and shape their future for the better. You may spot a creative talent in a pupil and give them the confidence to pursue their dream when they would have otherwise decided to opt for a safer career instead.

4. Getting To Teach A Subject You Love. Whether it’s art, English, science or maths that is your passion, nothing will give you more joy than being able to work in this field everyday. You will also be able to share your love for a subject with others and have the reward of watching them enjoy learning about it too.

5. Job Security. Not many careers provide jobs for life these days, but a good teacher will always be able to find work in their chosen area. There are also a number career progression opportunities available and you can choose to move up to be the head of department, head of year or even head teacher.

6. Job Opportunities Away From The Main Cities. This can enable you to find work away from busy cities and avoid the high house prices and traffic hell that city dwellers have to endure.

7. Work Around Your Family. Even if you don’t have a family now, you may consider starting one in the future. As a teacher, you will be off school at the same time that your children are so you could save a fortune in child care costs and spend more time with your children too. You also won’t have to worry about asking a nagging boss for time off because your holidays are set out for you each year. You can’t grumble about that!

June 10, 2012
Guest Post: 7 Reasons ‘Red Light Spells Danger’ By Billy Ocean Should Be Used As An Educational Tool

Today sees the sofa experiencing something it would rather not. A Babylon5 marathon. But that is the price we pay for guest posts and at least we know it will come back in a good condition. Last week I had to scrub it clean with my Aston Villa shammy leather cloth after it had been infected by a Birmingham City supporter. Anyway, viewing Babylon5 – until the rugby starts – is Rob Lee. Or, if you prefer, Wobbly. I, incidentally, am Jelly. I often feel our double act days could have been so much more. Right, enough reminiscing, here’s my brother who ain’t heavy.

Billy Ocean

1. ‘Red light spells danger’. This says it all really. The red light that says don’t drive when stopped at traffic lights, the red light that tells you not to cross the road at inappropriate moments, the red light that warns you not to press the large, round flashing button attached to all that sophisticated computing equipment and large missile. It teaches children to fear red lights, and this is good, because red lights spell danger.

2. ‘Red light means warning’. Teaching young children is quite often based on repetition – clearly Mr Ocean was in touch with such modern teaching methods when he wrote this in the 1970s, as not only does he teach that a red light spells danger, but also that it means warning. This is very effective teaching – the children believe that they have been taught two different pieces of information, thereby preventing them from becoming bored, whilst they have in fact had the same important message twice drilled into them. Red lights mean danger. And Warning. Which are sort of the same thing. Sometimes.

3. ‘You got me on a ball and chain, doin’ things I don’t wanta’. Despite his lack of grasp of the correct grammatical use of the English language, which is not setting a good example I’ll admit, our education-minded singer is in this instance warning of the uncomfortable experience going to prison would result in. Not only being tied to a ball and chain, but also having to do things you don’t want to; traditionally this might be breaking large rocks into smaller rocks – this is of course bad for your teeth, so the lyric contains a valuable lesson about not eating too many sweets as well.

4. ‘Hold on, heaven guide me’. This is clearly a teaching about the importance of having faith. If you believe in that sort of thing, if you don’t, well, holding onto things is usually a useful practice too. Especially eggs, not holding on to eggs means you drop them, causing a mess, and then you’ll have to clean them up. Cleaning up a mess is probably something you don’t want to do, and as the previous point, erm, pointed out, doing things you don’t want to do isn’t much fun, and can be bad for your teeth. Anyway, if you do believe in heaven, then letting it guide you is a good thing to do, and if you don’t, holding onto things will suffice.

5. ‘I always used to kiss and run’. Having given it much thought, Billy also decided to include the rules to a common playground game in his song. Although, on reflection, the objective of kiss-chase was always to run after someone and then kiss them, not kiss them and then run away. Mind you, that might depend on whom you kissed. After all, running up to Big Ron, the class bully, and giving him a quick peck on the cheek might not be a clever idea, so, in fact, Mr Ocean is providing useful instruction on what to do should you run after the wrong person and kiss them. (N.B. this also applies in adult life, not just the school playground. Besides, kissing probably isn’t allowed in the school playground any more, for health and safety reasons.)

6. ‘I can feel the heat is on’. here we move to the significant element of home economics (that’s cooking lessons to the uninitiated). Checking that the heat is on in your oven is sound advice, since otherwise that cake you’ve just made won’t cook. It will sit in the oven, but without heat it will remain a mass of uncooked cake mixture. If you check first whether the heat is on, you’ll know when to put your mixture in the oven, and, therefore, end up with a delicious treat rather than a sickly pile of goo. However, as with all electrical or gas based equipment, you must naturally check that the red light is not on. Because red light spells danger. And warning. Just in case you weren’t sure the first time.

7. ‘Can’t hold out, I’m burning’. Many people believe that they should suffer in silence and not inflict their problems on other people, especially in these trying times. This is why they don’t walk around with a red light displayed on their head. In certain areas of the city there is another reason why they don’t wear a red light but we won’t go into that. Anyway, the point is, Mr Ocean is telling pupils not to remain silent if they are, in fact, burning, but that they should tell someone. Preferably a teacher. Lesson 7 – If you find yourself on fire, always tell the teacher. If you can’t find a teacher, display a red light. Because red light spells danger, and fire is quite dangerous.

March 12, 2011
Guest Post: 7 Reasons Why Teaching Is (Mostly) The Best Job In The World

A few weeks ago, you may remember Liz Gregory telling us why Summer was great. There was so much agreement with her in the 7 Reasons HQ that we just had to get her back on the sofa. Thankfully, Liz was only too keen to make a reappearance. And this time she’s bought along her box of chalks. Or are they marker pens? I can never tell when I’m sans contact lenses. If you didn’t check out Liz’s blog – Things To Do In Manchester – last time, then you better do it today. Unless you want detention. Right, enough of the stupid school quips, I’m off to the bike sheds.

1. Holidays (Part One). We may as well deal with any resentment up front, so we’ll start with holidays. I get 11 weeks per year. Teachers in schools get more. I understand that people in the real world get insultingly poor amounts of annual leave, and I feel bad about this. But no-one, anywhere (that includes you, Cameron) will take my glorious six-week summer off me.

2. Holidays (Part Two). Last year the afore-mentioned six week summer break began on July 7^th. The Ashes series started on July 8^th. This point needs no further expansion.

3. The Students. Yes, I know this one is hard to believe; even a cursory glance at The Daily Mail will indicate that the youth of today are a snarling, feral mass, pausing from their casual sex and drug-taking only to mug passing old ladies and commit knife crimes. You may be disappointed to learn that actually, today’s teenagers are pretty much the same as any other generation of teenagers: moody, unpredictable, funny, witty, charming…in short, they are good company. Although I do query some of their musical taste, and the overall aesthetics of wearing one’s jeans halfway down one’s backside.

4. Talking About What You Love, All Day Every Day. I teach English, which means that rather than answer telephones and push bits of paper around a desk all day, a typical Monday might include reading Wuthering Heights (and indeed performing the Kate Bush caterwauling classic as a Christmas treat), acting out bits of Streetcar Named Desire (Stellllaaaaaaa!), and teaching how to write scripts, articles or short stories….it’s amazing.

5. Seasonal Celebrations. Christmas is fun, sure. Christmas in a college with hundreds of sixteen-year-olds who are desperately excited but are trying equally desperately not to show it is even better. Students are also very keen on the confectionary that tends to accompany such seasonal celebrations, and bring it in by the bucket load; there is surely not a teacher in existence who has not felt their waistband constrict at Easter or Christmas due to a surfeit of Quality Street.

6. Stationery. This may actually be specific to English teachers, but every September the pain of a new academic year is soothed by an almighty trip to Paperchase to stock up on novelty pens and notebooks with monkeys on. This is an essential part of teaching, and its impact on the economic stability of Britain must not be overlooked.

7. Students Suddenly Realising You’re Not Ninety. I am not particularly advanced in years, but to my youthful charges I may as well be approaching my hundred and twelfth birthday. Until, of course, you are spotted outside of work, wearing jeans, talking to friends, and maybe (gasp) drinking wine. This prompts much admiration, as students recognise you for what you truly are – a plucky old person with a life outside college. This will raise your kudos above every member of the maths and science departments almost instantly.

July 10, 2010