The Cambridge Primary Review Trust

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Teaching: am I in or out?

In two previous blogs Sadie charted her progress through her PGCE year and into her first teaching post. Here she is again, one year on.

What a year! I’m sure there are other people out there who’ve had a terrible NQT year, but this one has got to be up there with one of the worst.

It started to go downhill from the beginning. September was a blur. There were no lesson plans, no medium term plans, no effective behaviour management system and very low expectations from staff and children alike. Within three days my parallel teacher had literally fled the country, deciding to return to her home country, and I was left to face the music alone.

I worked every waking hour to prepare lessons and resources from scratch, briefing supply teachers daily. I had somehow slipped under management’s radar. Unaware that I was an NQT, support and observations were virtually non-existent. I could have been teaching science and literacy or snakes and ladders for all anyone knew. There were no subject leaders or Key Stage heads that I could recognise. I was a rabbit caught in the headlights, with nowhere to turn.

Thankfully, one of the supply teachers agreed to stay on. This was my saving grace. We became each other’s support network, encouraging each other to keep going, taking it one day at a time. If we didn’t laugh, we’d cry, and so we did both. Eventually, the latter began to happen far too often.

In October, quite unexpectedly, the head resigned and had left by Christmas. A week later, the school’s deputy head had followed suit. I felt utterly at sea, crushed and hopeless, watching idly as staff abandoned the sinking ship in droves – a combination of redundancies, retirements and escapees fleeing to greener pastures.

So desperate was our situation that two ‘super heads’ were deployed and a seismic shift in stress levels began. The academy regime had arrived.

Perhaps naively, I was momentarily motivated by the fresh faces, corporate blue trouser suits and no-nonsense attitudes. They signalled hope, an era of change. Sadly, this was the biggest let-down of all. During one of the new regime’s very first speeches, the word ‘HELL’ was actually emblazoned on a fiery 5m x 3m projection wall in the school hall. An unsustainable work-life balance was regarded as normal and accepted as part of the job. We were run ragged, whilst the running commentary from senior leadership left us feeling worthless and undervalued. Morale in the school had hit an all-time low and I was desperately unhappy. I was constantly stressed, tired and emotionally drained. It was as if we’d made a pact with the devil. Yes, we’ll work from home. Yes, we’ll do so until the job’s done – even if that means working into the early hours. Yes, we’ll work on weekends. Yes, we’ll read your emails and respond to them on Sundays. When I did eventually climb into bed my head was fuzzy, fraught with frantic deadlines and data, scrutinies and stress.

By Christmas, I’d decided that enough was enough. I had been working 14-16 hour days and felt under unbelievable pressure to reach unachievable results. In my PGCE year I was graded ‘outstanding’ by Ofsted. I have an incredible passion for teaching and working with children. I am creative, positive and excited to be part of an invaluable education system. But when I looked in the mirror at the end of autumn term, I saw a panic-stricken shadow of my former NQT self. I applied for a job in the holidays and gave my notice in the new year.

But the pupils aren’t responsible for those two traumatic terms. They (along with my team) were the only reason I stayed as long as I did. It broke my heart to leave them. They made me smile, filled me with pride and, on occasion, flashes of brilliance filled the classroom. They achieved against all odds. They were a pleasure to teach, in spite of the surrounding nonsense. In such a short space of time they had come so far, but they were fragile. A fraying rope that I couldn’t let go, for fear it would unravel completely. All the good work with their behaviour and attitudes, undone in a single moment. Another teacher is leaving us. I couldn’t hold back the tears when I bid my farewells, but I’m glad to say I’ve not shed a single tear since.

By Summer term, Ofsted had put the school into special measures, but I didn’t need that result to know I’d made the right choice. Once I moved to another school, my life improved ten-fold. I’m no longer taking work home in the evenings and I’ve gained my precious weekends back. The biggest highlight has to be the positive working environment, the inspirational leadership and constant support from colleagues. There has been plenty of encouraging feedback throughout the term – from peers, pupils and parents alike – always unexpected, but it’s made me realise that I might actually be good at my job after all. My confidence is slowly returning.

I’ve finally struck a balance that I feared I’d never see again. I used to wonder how teachers managed to get all of their work done by 5pm and spend every weekend and holiday blissfully divorced from school life. I couldn’t quite comprehend how they managed it, assuming it involved some form of time travelling Tardis!

Every now and then, I still feel a pang of guilt about the class I left behind. I will always wonder how my class (the brightest, the keenest and the most apathetic) is getting on. I will always look back fondly on the enthusiasm of that first class and I will always be proud of my most creative lessons but I can’t pretend that those magical moments weren’t outweighed by everything else that we were contending with. The environment had become toxic and we shouldn’t feel like that about a job that is so vitally important for the future of our society. I don’t think I realised the full impact on my mental health at the time, but I can understand now why so many NQTs decide to leave the profession. If only they’d found the right school, I wonder.

As I mentioned in my previous post, sometimes it’s easy to forget what’s important and to become railroaded by politics. Thankfully, the CPRT aims are there to remind us what’s really important – over and above government priorities. My NQT year has been a baptism of fire, but somehow I survived. I’ve learnt more over the past year than I have in any other. I’m certainly not the same teacher I was at the start of the year and I hope I can continue to grow and say the same again next year.

I’ve gained so much from this experience and despite such a challenging and chaotic NQT year, I’m sticking with it.

I’m in.

Is Sadie’s experience of becoming a primary teacher in these difficult times unusual, or is it more common than it should be? What of the extremes of chaos and ruthless corporatism, and of stress and damaged self-esteem, that she suffered before at last encountering the positive and supportive working environment that as an NQT she needed and deserved? We would like to hear from other recently qualified primary teachers, and from school leaders who can reassure those following Sadie into the classroom that she was just exceptionally unlucky in where she landed.

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Reflections from an NQT: surviving or thriving?

Last June, Sadie posted about training for primary teaching and looked forward to becoming an NQT. Here’s the sequel.

Rewind to Sunday 31st August and you would have found me sitting on my sofa staring down the barrel of my first year as a teacher, wondering what the new academic term would bring. My classroom was beautifully decorated, I had planned my first few weeks of teaching and I was armed with plenty of ‘back to school’ activities to get to know my new class. Adrenaline had kicked in and I was looking forward to making a difference to the children of the inner-city academy I had chosen for my first teaching role. I felt well-rested, eager and raring to go.

Flash forward to present day: I’ve survived my first term as an NQT and the metaphorical onion has revealed its layers, the reality of teaching has become apparent and during the past four months I have experienced a rollercoaster of emotions. It has been exhilarating, exhausting and at times overwhelming.

Initially, I felt as though I was treading water, simply keeping afloat. For the first time in a long time I felt insecure and out of my depth, I continually questioned everything I was doing. It quickly became clear that teacher training does not fully prepare you for the challenges encountered during your first post as a fully-fledged teacher. It is an immense learning curve. I learnt more in those first few weeks than I had in my entire training year. Move over PGCE, welcome to the world of full-time teaching.

The deprived school in East London was a stark contrast to the primaries in Cornwall and Devon where I had completed my training. I was dealing with a high proportion of children with English as an Additional Language (EAL) and over half of my class were considered to have Special Educational Needs (SEN). The high volume of SEN and EAL pupils forced me to adapt my teaching and think outside the box. Thankfully, this is where pedagogy came into play and all those research papers I scrutinised during my PGCE began to form the basis of my teaching across this diverse range of pupils.

To make matters worse, I was also tackling extreme behaviour issues and became aware early on that embedding consistent behaviour strategies in the day-to-day routine was key to ensuring Sarah wouldn’t run out of the classroom when she was feeling frustrated or that Fred wouldn’t lash out at other children when he couldn’t keep his temper under control.

Combine all this with the announcement that two executive heads were parachuting in due to the secondary’s ‘catastrophic GCSE results’, the ensuing resignation of the primary head teacher, and you’ve got all the ingredients for a pretty tough start to an NQT year, but I’ve not let it put me off… yet.

My first term was a blur of planning, marking, getting to grips with behaviour management strategies, learning about my pupils, getting to know colleagues and spending more time than expected within the four walls of the classroom. My partner forgot what I looked like and when I did surface at home late into the evening I spent a lot of time drinking coffee, marking, planning, completing paperwork and preparing resources, not to mention compiling evidence towards to the teaching standards for my NQT file and striving to meet weekly targets set by my NQT mentor.

As a full time primary teacher, I expected to teach 80 percent of my 30-hour timetabled week, with only 10 percent of time allocated to completing NQT tasks, observations, reflections and training, and a further 10 percent allocated to the two remaining, yet fundamental, aspects of the role: marking and planning. An incredible burden is placed on this 10 percent and, no matter how hard I tried, I found it impossible to keep up – leaving all outstanding tasks to be completed in my own time.

Those who know me well would describe me as incredibly organised and highly efficient, qualities I pride myself on. Yet I found myself struggling to get everything done – there simply wasn’t enough time in the day. I led a miserable existence for those first seven weeks. I was working 14-16 hour days on a regular basis, which was completely unsustainable of course. Inevitably, I became ill and despite the fear of falling even further behind I took a sick day. Physically and mentally exhausted, I began to question whether I had made the right decision by pursuing a career in teaching. I hate to admit it, but for the first time I had serious doubts about my future within this new profession.

Thankfully after half term something clicked. I realised that I was trying to be a perfectionist – working too hard, ticking every box, exceeding expectations and trying to make every lesson amazing. I took some time to reflect on my teaching and acknowledged that, in education, resilience is a daily necessity. I wanted to be the perfect teacher, but teaching is a lifetime’s craft. I will never perfect it, nor will I ever complete my ‘to do’ list. Once I accepted this, I began to master the art of resilience. Although I still work on Sundays and am yet to fully establish the elusive work-life balance, I’m working on it. I’ve begun to know when to stop, when to let go and when to switch off, I’ve started to look after myself and feel less guilty about meeting friends, pursuing hobbies or having an evening off.

My teaching philosophies and principles are steeped in the work of the Cambridge Primary Review and the Cambridge Primary Review Trust and I have always endeavored to demonstrate these in my day-to-day practice, but when you’re bogged down by bureaucracy it’s easy to forget about the great intentions and aspirations you had at the start of the year.

My first term of teaching has provided so many challenges that I’ve inadvertently discovered so much more about myself. I have become less self-critical, more forgiving of my own mistakes. Whereas I was once left feeling battered and bruised by observation pressures, scrutiny and the persistent need to develop subject knowledge across the curriculum, I now focus on the positives; recognising my own successes, reflecting on mistakes, identifying areas for improvement and developing a reassuring support network. My colleagues and fellow NQTs have been an invaluable source of support through the highs and lows, both in school and online.

Recently, when re-reading the CPR final report, I had my own light-bulb moment (the kind that I love seeing in the children so much). I remembered precisely why I became a teacher in the first place: to make a difference. The key aims and priorities outlined by CPR and CPRT reminded me that being a teacher isn’t simply about teaching the curriculum; it really is about so much more.

I strive for this kind of principled approach not only to the curriculum, but also the whole experience that I offer children in my care. At times I have been a therapist, a mediator, a comedian, a disciplinarian, a motivator, a guardian and a source of comfort. I use the CPRT aims as aspirational tools to remind me what’s important – over and above government priorities. The CPR final report  provides the evidence to remind us that we can (and must!) trust ourselves as professionals to provide for pupils’ development and learning. Great teaching doesn’t have to be complicated, it’s about getting the simple things right.

Despite all its trials and tribulations, teaching truly is one of the most rewarding and fulfilling careers there are and at the beginning of the year I promised myself I would remember this. It’s not always easy to cultivate a positive outlook, especially in the depths of a dark and gloomy January, but it really does make a difference and I feel so much better for it. It reflects in my teaching too. If I’m tired the kids won’t get the best from me. I need to look after myself. We all do. So, once I’ve finished this blog you’ll find me on my sofa relaxing and enjoying the last few moments of the Christmas break, before the New Year – and the new term – begins.

Having completed her PGCE, Sadie Phillips is teaching at a primary school in London. Read her previous CPRT blog and follow her at @SadiePhillips.

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Goodbye PGCE, Hello NQT

For the past 12 months, teaching has taken over my world. I’ve never highlighted, annotated or reflected so much in my entire life, but it’s finally over (for the summer at least). I’ve survived my PGCE year, I’m qualified and I have a job as an NQT in September.

When I started applying for the PGCE, I spent a day at university alongside fresh-faced graduates competing for a place. I seemed to be the oldest person in the room by far (I was 30 at the time) and it was at that moment that I realised I was one of the very few ‘career-changers’. Having worked in marketing and PR for the previous seven years, I’d never worked as a TA, let alone a teacher, and I only had two weeks’ experience in a primary school. It was a big change. Almost everyone else had a foundation degree in education or early childhood studies. They spoke a different language: not only were they fluent in pedagogic jargon and educational acronyms, but they also had an envious familiarity with day-to-day school life. Despite the odds, I was accepted and last September I began my perilous PGCE journey.

I can’t look back at myself during that first school placement – and all of the things I was utterly clueless about – without wincing. I suppose I spent most of my first week at school in a state of shock. Culture shock. Bombarded with information, I experienced generational language barriers, knowledge and technology gaps. Aside from a fortnight’s voluntary work, the last time I’d set foot in a primary school was during my own childhood. Back then we had blackboards. We didn’t even have whiteboards, let alone the interactive kind. We had landlines which weren’t wireless and we used encyclopedias for our homework. We learned about ‘magic e’ and Letterland, Clever Cat and Hairy Hat Man. Split digraphs and nonsense words were nowhere to be seen. Oh, how times have changed. There have been some amazing advances in the last two decades – so much so that the above description seems quite nostalgic.

The biggest challenge I faced was something I like to call ‘plate spinning’; the juggling act required to achieve everything expected of me. Academic assignments, practice-based research, planning, teaching, reflecting upon and evaluating lessons, getting to grips with formative and summative assessment, progress, evidencing teaching standards, ensuring that each and every one of the 30 children in my class felt supported, challenged and praised … not to mention finding time to enjoy some sort of work-life balance. I suppose I never really did get the hang of the latter.

Initially, planning took an eternity. I probably spent three hours preparing each hour-long lesson. At times, I would spend half an hour simply staring at a blank lesson proforma in horror – physically and mentally exhausted – with what can only be described as writers’ block. I would scour TES, Twinkl and Pinterest for hours on end in search of fun, engaging activities – none of which would ever quite fit the Learning Objective I had in mind.

I was working much harder than I had done in the world of marketing. It was all consuming: all day, every day, evenings and weekends. Every waking hour – and each restless night – was spent thinking about lesson plans and learning. Yes, there are decent holidays for teachers, but believe me they are well needed and truly deserved. By the time each half term rolled around I was begging for a break. I began to understand why so many teachers leave the profession within their first five years. Sadly, many are increasingly put off by the excessive workload, the bureaucratic hoop jumping, the pressures of inspection and the relentless pace of change. I’d only been in the profession six months and I couldn’t see myself keeping it up for much longer without it affecting my health.

It seems that the pressure on new teachers to be instantly ‘outstanding’ is huge and that those who struggle initially are all too often chewed up and spat out rather than nurtured and supported. Almost every cause of stress I’ve had in the classroom over the past 12 months seems somewhat irrelevant now. It’s all about perspective. Luckily for me, I had inspirational leadership and a wonderful mentor to remind me of this and to build me back up whenever I felt things were falling apart.

As teachers, it’s our job to navigate our way through successive fads and fashions and this is no easy task – especially when school curriculums, strategies and requirements appear to change at the impulsive whim of politicians and policy makers. I began to realise that the best teachers are those who make decisions about pedagogy and resources according to their own professional knowledge and experience and match that to the needs of the children with which they are currently working. If I’ve learned anything this year, it is that one approach does not suit all.

Discovering the Cambridge Primary Review during my first academic assignment was a real turning point. For me it brought together all of the professional knowledge and experience of teachers all over the UK. CPR and CPRT call for the abandoning of quick fixes and snap reforms, instead outlining key priorities for primary education and offering a long-term, sustainable vision for primary schools, grounded in evidence from real-life interviews, written submissions and extensive practice-based research.

CPR’s 12 inspirational aims are intended to shape curriculum, pedagogy and school life as a whole and, like many others, I have now adopted these in my own practice. I truly intend to inspire and excite imaginations, teaching children how to collaborate and advance their knowledge through dialogue with others. Not only do I want to help them foster skills in academic subjects, but also in communication, invention, problem-solving and human relationships. I hope to open their eyes to the different ways through which we can make sense of our world and how we each have the power to make a positive impact upon it. I want to create a classroom culture that celebrates diversity and community, sustainability and equality, embracing a philosophy that places the child at the heart of education, and where creativity is valued just as much as numeracy and literacy. Children appreciate creativity and challenge. Doing something different in lessons can make them much more exciting and engaging and I’ve learned that taking a small risk can go a long way.

‘Miss, that lesson was the best!’ beamed one of the 7-year-olds after our experiential introduction to the new Digital Gamers topic. Now, it may have been the significant amount of time playing Just Dance on the Wii, exploring BBC games on the desktop computers or navigating the Big Buzz Wire that I had allowed during this particular lesson, but I am still trying to persuade myself that it could have been the research, planning and careful-crafting of resources (not to mention the hours spent printing, sticking, cutting and laminating computer game characters for our exciting new wall display) which had made my last lesson so enjoyable.

Thankfully, it’s all becoming a bit easier now. I’ve had a whole year to try things out; keeping those that worked, letting go of those that didn’t. I’m starting to find my own style, my own voice. Even though each class is temporarily ‘on loan’, I’m developing increasing awareness of how children learn and what they need to progress. Maslow, Piaget and Vygotsky’s theories are finally becoming more tangible and meaningful.

When it came to writing our end of year reports, I derived so much pleasure from seeing the progress children had made that I knew, without doubt, that teaching was the job for me. I’m finally starting to feel like a real teacher and – with the responsibility of my own class looming in September – it’s a good job too. Next year promises to be a busy, challenging and stressful one, but if all goes to plan it’s going to be one of the most satisfying, varied and exciting ones too. As a primary school teacher, I am rewarded more every single day than I ever was as a marketing manager and as I navigate my way through my NQT year, I’ve promised myself I’ll remember this.

Sadie Phillips is a trainee teacher at the University of Plymouth. Follow her @SadiePhillips.

Contact

Cambridge Primary Review Trust - Email: administrator@cprtrust.org.uk