Teacher’s perks

 

There are benefits to teaching that offset the planning and marking time. Meeting authors! My school has been involved in a project to promote reading and the authors of the books that we have been studying are coming in next week to work with the students. I am going to be lucky enough to be in a session with Anthony McGowan whose book, ‘Brock’, I have been reading with Y8 students.

Kiran Millwood Hargrave who won the Waterstones’ Children’s Book Prize 2017 with her book ‘The Girl of Ink and Stars’, and Vanessa Altin, author of ‘The Pomegranate Tree’ will also be visiting next week. I just hope that I can manage to sneak into their sessions too.

 

Are today’s children ignored?

This week I had to stay after school for parents’ evening and yet again I was amazed by the number of absent parents. When I was a child I remember my mother turning up at school for every event and parents’ meeting. I did the same for my son. So why do today’s parents seem to put their children second?

Maybe I am being a bit confrontational and for a change, because this year I am teaching a top set, I was busy all evening. But, I have known parents’ evenings when I have sat for two and a half hours and have spoken to three parents. There have even been children that I have taught for their entire secondary school life without ever meeting their parents. It is so sad. If a child’s parents are not interested in their progress and their achievements, how is that child ever going to develop a sense of self-worth?

All children deserve a chance.