Day one of fishtanks is over! Surprisingly, no blood involved so far!!! :-)
I did get across the point of keeping thumbs out of the way and cutting carefully by dramatically (deliberately) letting out a blood-curdling scream and clutching my finger to chest when demonstrating using a junior hacksaw. My class were horrified and were then most relieved when I revealed that it was fake, a memory-jogger for them when cutting, to KEEP THUMBS OUT of the way! Nothing like a bit of cross-curricular drama eh!
They've all cut their wood now (phew!) and made their 2 frames. Nearly all have cut, sewn, stuffed and decorated their fish. All that remains is to stick the frames together with their uprights, attach their fish, add the walls to the frame, decorate the base with fish tank accessories and complete their evaluation! Yay!
I was quite cruel in that I said I would not thread their needles (with a few mercy exceptions), as that was a skill in itself that they needed to practice and master, and the majority worked very independently.
Only a few occasions of having to get cross, e.g. when sequins were littered on the floor, when tidying up didn't commence, when someone put their template in the middle of the felt rather than the edge (environment, environment...) Very little arguments ensued miraculously considering my class are irritatingly EXPERTS at petty disputes.
They've even kept up with their process diaries as they are going along (evaluation is an essential part of DT component of the National Curriculum!)
One day!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Friday, May 28, 2010
Monday, May 24, 2010
Mirage?
Hello there!
Half-term tantalises me just on the horizon like an oasis in a desert. So near, yet so far! I have a delightful 2.5 days of D&T project to get through. D&T is HELL to teach!!!! It should be fun! It is painful and frustrating!!! And the problem is self-inflicted since I stupidly devised a unit of work where the children are making 'model fishtanks' and 'felt fish'. 30 children, Junior Hacksaws, Scissors, glue, needles, thread, gluing. Need I say more.
Roll on Half-term! The joy of Somerset escapades to look forward to!
On the plus-side, after watching some Dogtanian last night, we have discovered an exciting website where you can reminisce over the fact that children's TV is not what it used to be! Episode synopses and more! How exciting!!!!
Visit: http://www.muskehounds.com
The books are still slow and likely to reach snail pace over half-term. This is known as the 'Misery half-term' as most of it is spent agonising over reports. This time the pain is compounded with APP (evil teacher torture assessments to do), marking assessments, music reports, Year 1,2, Nursery music plans, as well as packing up things in boxes as I may have to move.
19. George Elliott The Lifted Veil and Brother Jacob
20. Alan Titchmarsh Love and Dr Devon.
Both books, exciting and intriguing. The Elliott stories contrasted beautifully with each other. The Titchmarsh was forced upon me by my mother and I am glad she did. It was full of heart and fun as well as intrigue.
Half-term tantalises me just on the horizon like an oasis in a desert. So near, yet so far! I have a delightful 2.5 days of D&T project to get through. D&T is HELL to teach!!!! It should be fun! It is painful and frustrating!!! And the problem is self-inflicted since I stupidly devised a unit of work where the children are making 'model fishtanks' and 'felt fish'. 30 children, Junior Hacksaws, Scissors, glue, needles, thread, gluing. Need I say more.
Roll on Half-term! The joy of Somerset escapades to look forward to!
On the plus-side, after watching some Dogtanian last night, we have discovered an exciting website where you can reminisce over the fact that children's TV is not what it used to be! Episode synopses and more! How exciting!!!!
Visit: http://www.muskehounds.com
The books are still slow and likely to reach snail pace over half-term. This is known as the 'Misery half-term' as most of it is spent agonising over reports. This time the pain is compounded with APP (evil teacher torture assessments to do), marking assessments, music reports, Year 1,2, Nursery music plans, as well as packing up things in boxes as I may have to move.
19. George Elliott The Lifted Veil and Brother Jacob
20. Alan Titchmarsh Love and Dr Devon.
Both books, exciting and intriguing. The Elliott stories contrasted beautifully with each other. The Titchmarsh was forced upon me by my mother and I am glad she did. It was full of heart and fun as well as intrigue.
Tuesday, May 11, 2010
52 + 100!
Books:slow slow slow
14 Umberto Eco The Name of the Rose.
It has taken me rather a while to read this hefty tome, things being busy etc, but it was a most intriguing book. It is set in an Italian monastery in around the 13-14th Century where there are different envoys from different courts, some from the Pope, some from the Emperor to sort out the issue of Christ's poverty, inquisitors, learned individuals. Our narrator, Adso, is a curious young Novice who is travelling with William, a learned, ex-inquisitor, mystery-solver (user of ze little grey cells to use the Agatha Christie vernacular). A series of monks are murdered over successive days and it is up to our 2 monks to find out and stop it and discover why they have been attacked. Intriguing to the last, it offers a wonderful description of the time and monastery-life, if full of rather an alarming amount of corruption. Umberto Eco is a respected expert at that period of history I do believe, and you do feel really drawn into the time. It also has an intriguing labyrinthine library, full of all sorts of amazing books, secret passages so it appeals to my tastes. A pity that wonderful libraries like these tend to come to sticky ends in books. I recommend reading it!
15. Dodie Smith The Starlight Barking.
This is a rather silly book, sequel to 101 Dalmatians, but it has some lovely imaginative ideas in it, swooshing for example. Having enjoyed the original in my 2009 list, I wanted to find out what happened to Pongo and Missus! I love the idea of there being dog prime-ministers and Foreign secretary dogs, very appropriate at this time of political turmoil and change! Sweet for younger readers who like a gentle look at life! (and C-B-C it does count as it was over 160 pages!)
I am just about on target for my 52 books for 2010, if slightly behind so I really need to try and get a move on. The author count, obviously is behind.
Challenge 2:
As a delightful birthday present, I recently went to see an event which was part of the London Word Festival entitled '100 days to make me a better person'. It took place in a warehouse in Dalston. Some carpets were laid on the floor of the austere room for us to recline on, and with packets of monstermunch, chewits, lollypops and other snackettes liberally sprinkled on surfaces, with vintage looking lamps creating mood lighting and a couple of sofas (unlucky people at the back had to stand), it already set up a quirky but very friendly atmosphere. It was headed up by Josie Long, a comedienne. She, some of her friends and followers set themselves challenges to do one or several different things over 100 days to essentially make themselves better people or meet a challenge. The event was their sharing of their experiences at the close of the challenge, edited highlights usually. Josie herself aimed to write a joke every day and also to talk to a stranger every day. Her experiences were both hilarious, sweet, wonderful and at times rather crazy. The whole evening gained a whole other dimension by the fact that she was heckled by a 10 year-old in the audience to whom she gave as good as she got, sometimes very close to the mark!
Some of her friends shared their experiences including a very sweet singer who wrote a song every day, someone who drew a picture every day, another who wrote a letter to someone every day and I am quite sure there were more, but we had to go and catch a train- Dalston being delightfully uneasy place to get to and escape from!
Adding to my book-list made me think of this event, meeting a challenge. I think it is so important to continue to challenge ourselves through our life. I think the reason there are a lot of jaded workers out there, including some teachers (and I am aware that I whinge about the amount of work I have to do like anyone so I am not being self-righteous or saying that I am not doing things) is that they are not trying to challenge themselves to do new things, meet challenges, try something new, get out the comfort-zone. Those people who retire and keep active, doing new things seem to have a zest, a vitality that is refreshing and makes a sore difference to those that don't do new things. I have really enjoyed learning to use new software for school this year for ICT teaching, trying difference approaches, teaching my science in a different way for example...
Anyway, to cut all that waffle short, I liked the idea of another challenge, like the book one, because I enjoyed that challenge last year, though it was hard, and this year I wanted to do it again (albeit an easier task). However, the 100 days person who wrote a letter a day inspired me. I still think that the postal system, though not so enviromentally conscious, is vastly underrated in comparison to e-mail, facebook etc (the latter being something I have not subscribed to). I get such joy from receiving someone's hand-written missive through the post, it's like an unexpected un-birthday present. Likewise, I am quite a generally good correspondent. I enjoy writing letters and the recipients seem, from feedback to appreciate them, I love anticipating their joy and thinking of them even though they may be far away! Therefore, though my work-schedule prevents me from meeting the 100 days challenge, I would like to modify it to a manageable task and I intend to write 100 letters over 100 weeks if that is possible, or at least reach 100 letters. Now, I started thinking about this just after I went to the event (March the 10th to be precise) and so I intend to try and keep a record of this to keep myself on track. I have decided that postcards, since I tend to write very small and include a lot of detail (I am the official wafflemeister!), count in this and notecards which catch-up and essentially achieve what a letter does, but in card form!
So, so far here are my recipients:
1. Nikki
2. Chris & Jane
3. Ruth
4. Chris
5. Chris
6. Chris
7. Alex
8. Dad
9. Dad
10. Mum & Ed
11. Chris and Jane
Onwards...!!!
14 Umberto Eco The Name of the Rose.
It has taken me rather a while to read this hefty tome, things being busy etc, but it was a most intriguing book. It is set in an Italian monastery in around the 13-14th Century where there are different envoys from different courts, some from the Pope, some from the Emperor to sort out the issue of Christ's poverty, inquisitors, learned individuals. Our narrator, Adso, is a curious young Novice who is travelling with William, a learned, ex-inquisitor, mystery-solver (user of ze little grey cells to use the Agatha Christie vernacular). A series of monks are murdered over successive days and it is up to our 2 monks to find out and stop it and discover why they have been attacked. Intriguing to the last, it offers a wonderful description of the time and monastery-life, if full of rather an alarming amount of corruption. Umberto Eco is a respected expert at that period of history I do believe, and you do feel really drawn into the time. It also has an intriguing labyrinthine library, full of all sorts of amazing books, secret passages so it appeals to my tastes. A pity that wonderful libraries like these tend to come to sticky ends in books. I recommend reading it!
15. Dodie Smith The Starlight Barking.
This is a rather silly book, sequel to 101 Dalmatians, but it has some lovely imaginative ideas in it, swooshing for example. Having enjoyed the original in my 2009 list, I wanted to find out what happened to Pongo and Missus! I love the idea of there being dog prime-ministers and Foreign secretary dogs, very appropriate at this time of political turmoil and change! Sweet for younger readers who like a gentle look at life! (and C-B-C it does count as it was over 160 pages!)
I am just about on target for my 52 books for 2010, if slightly behind so I really need to try and get a move on. The author count, obviously is behind.
Challenge 2:
As a delightful birthday present, I recently went to see an event which was part of the London Word Festival entitled '100 days to make me a better person'. It took place in a warehouse in Dalston. Some carpets were laid on the floor of the austere room for us to recline on, and with packets of monstermunch, chewits, lollypops and other snackettes liberally sprinkled on surfaces, with vintage looking lamps creating mood lighting and a couple of sofas (unlucky people at the back had to stand), it already set up a quirky but very friendly atmosphere. It was headed up by Josie Long, a comedienne. She, some of her friends and followers set themselves challenges to do one or several different things over 100 days to essentially make themselves better people or meet a challenge. The event was their sharing of their experiences at the close of the challenge, edited highlights usually. Josie herself aimed to write a joke every day and also to talk to a stranger every day. Her experiences were both hilarious, sweet, wonderful and at times rather crazy. The whole evening gained a whole other dimension by the fact that she was heckled by a 10 year-old in the audience to whom she gave as good as she got, sometimes very close to the mark!
Some of her friends shared their experiences including a very sweet singer who wrote a song every day, someone who drew a picture every day, another who wrote a letter to someone every day and I am quite sure there were more, but we had to go and catch a train- Dalston being delightfully uneasy place to get to and escape from!
Adding to my book-list made me think of this event, meeting a challenge. I think it is so important to continue to challenge ourselves through our life. I think the reason there are a lot of jaded workers out there, including some teachers (and I am aware that I whinge about the amount of work I have to do like anyone so I am not being self-righteous or saying that I am not doing things) is that they are not trying to challenge themselves to do new things, meet challenges, try something new, get out the comfort-zone. Those people who retire and keep active, doing new things seem to have a zest, a vitality that is refreshing and makes a sore difference to those that don't do new things. I have really enjoyed learning to use new software for school this year for ICT teaching, trying difference approaches, teaching my science in a different way for example...
Anyway, to cut all that waffle short, I liked the idea of another challenge, like the book one, because I enjoyed that challenge last year, though it was hard, and this year I wanted to do it again (albeit an easier task). However, the 100 days person who wrote a letter a day inspired me. I still think that the postal system, though not so enviromentally conscious, is vastly underrated in comparison to e-mail, facebook etc (the latter being something I have not subscribed to). I get such joy from receiving someone's hand-written missive through the post, it's like an unexpected un-birthday present. Likewise, I am quite a generally good correspondent. I enjoy writing letters and the recipients seem, from feedback to appreciate them, I love anticipating their joy and thinking of them even though they may be far away! Therefore, though my work-schedule prevents me from meeting the 100 days challenge, I would like to modify it to a manageable task and I intend to write 100 letters over 100 weeks if that is possible, or at least reach 100 letters. Now, I started thinking about this just after I went to the event (March the 10th to be precise) and so I intend to try and keep a record of this to keep myself on track. I have decided that postcards, since I tend to write very small and include a lot of detail (I am the official wafflemeister!), count in this and notecards which catch-up and essentially achieve what a letter does, but in card form!
So, so far here are my recipients:
1. Nikki
2. Chris & Jane
3. Ruth
4. Chris
5. Chris
6. Chris
7. Alex
8. Dad
9. Dad
10. Mum & Ed
11. Chris and Jane
Onwards...!!!
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