...I find it hard to believe that we're only at the end of our first week of the new term. And chaos reigns supreme...January is the month of exams. In my now far-distant youth, the month of November was for "re-sits"... a shameful and rare occurrence, and not spoken about in polite society. Now, there are modules to be taken. The Year 13 students are busy doing their A level module exams, and are trying to re-sit the AS modules which they didn't do so well in from last June (or even the previous January, depending on how badly they flunked!) Year 12 are getting stressed out because the AS level exams are much harder than the GCSE ones they did back in June, and it's a heck of a shock to the system. Year 11 are trying to take GCSE modules for the stuff they've been studying this academic year and the re-sits from the June exams (and possibly last January as well, depending on how badly they did...) And Year 10 are facing their first set of GCSE exams... and are stunned to discover that they are real exams, not just tests the teachers have cooked up to avoid teaching any lessons in January while they recover from their Christmas and New Year hangovers...
Trying to keep track of which child is doing which module on which date at which time is a little tricky... especially as the teenager invariably expects you to know exactly who they are when they accost you in the corridor, and is surprised when you demand to know what Year they are in.
I also have reports to write and Parents' Evenings to attend...
...Blogging may be light for the next week or two...
Parents' Evenings? Oh my, I shall return the favor and pray for you to make it through in one piece as well.
ReplyDeleteYou've forgotten coursework - drafts and the full things to mark. (Admittedly, I teach English, which has the foul thing at every level.)
ReplyDeleteAhhhhhh... coursework!... but not this month. I have that joy to come!!
ReplyDeleteEvery time I see something to do with study or exams, I think how glad I am that I did so badly in school.
ReplyDeleteNever studied, never took a course I thought might be difficult if I could help it, never did homework and was content with being a C or sometimes Bish student. Every now and then I would take something I was really interested in and get some ridiculously high grade and then I would have months of strenuous loafing, procrastinating and shirking to get myself back down to a placement where nothing much would be expected of me.
All...I mean all my reports through my entire mercifully short school career said the same thing: "Hilary could do so much better if only she would apply herself."
They had no idea how much forethought and effort it took to be so mediocre.
Oh yes.
HATED school.
Hated it so much.
SOOooooo much.
It just seemed like so much precious time thrown away in a stuffy ugly room with a lot of people I didn't want to talk to. Time that could so much better have been spent at the beach, reading my book, hanging around with my grandmother and learning to paint.
Ugh.
GrownupWorld.
(hate that too!)
I read your remarks about exams with interest. Please spare a thought (and a prayer) for people like me who have to organise the things! Tomorrow, Monday, I shall be running exams (January series), dealing with results (November series) and starting to gather entries for the Summer series - as well as invigilating and doing 101 other jobs in between. It certainly concentrtes the mind!
ReplyDeleteEvery student seems to expect that I know - in the corridor and without the help of any documentation - everything about them and what thet are doing! Every teacher assumes that I know everything about everything in the entire world!!!!!
As they say. the impossible I can do (well, almost), miracles take a little longer!!!!