A year has passed since I completed my Degree and gained QTS (Qualified Teacher Status). I often come back to this blog and look back through the posts fondly, and reflect on what a delightful whirlwind the whole experience was. This year, I have just been a teacher completing the NQT (Newly Qualified Teacher) program. I use the word ‘just’ as I do feel that it is quite a step down from the pressures and progress made last year. None the less, teaching is not easy, and when thrust into the absolute thick of it with no other distractions, it is rather daunting! Anyway, all is well and I continuously reflect back to last year and think I will always see it as being one of my life’s greatest achievements.
I have to confess, as much as I enjoyed my degree and all that I gained from it, there was always a greater goal. A three year journey now comes to a complete close with the above certificate. I never shared the fact that I was doing my GTP (Graduate Teacher Program) with my fellow cohort for fear of counting my chickens before they had hatched. I undertook my GTP in January of this year once I was as close enough to a graduate within the academic year and embarked on six months of absolute epic amounts of work and stress from holding a full time teaching position (as I had done all throughout my degree), undertaking my GTP training (2x 3000 assignments, three school placements, three hours of lectures a week, collection of 100 pieces of evidence against the 33 QTS standards and 20 formal lesson observations) and of course finishing my degree (10,000 word dissertation and 6,000 word supplementary module).
Now at the end of it, I am a qualified ICT teacher, something I have aimed for every single day for the last three years. Any school in the country (and in fact most of the world) is now available to me and I have already had two job offers. I will be staying put for now, but never loosing my drive throughout this process, the next mile stone is not that far away.
So here I am, three years from the crisis that was my dilemma about higher education and I am now at the end of a very successful degree course of study. I have submitted over 70,000 words (or equivalent with alternative medias) and very likley to graduate with Upper second-class Honours this Autumn.
It has been one of the best journeys of my life and I have probably learnt more about myself and my own capabilities than the course content itself. That is not to say I have not learnt much, its just the personal gains have been so great, I feel that I could conquer the world! It may be about 30 working days until I get my marks back, but I remain confident – one such attribute I have developed in this course.
From here, it is onwards to a career in teaching, knowing full well that I have the transferable skills needed to do anything I set my mind to.
P.S, My gift to those still on the course and fellow students joining me in crossing the finishing line, a spreadsheet programmed to work out your final grade, given the weighting of the modules and so on: Mark Calculator(This spreadsheet has nothing to do with Anglia Ruskin University, I made it myself and I cannot guarantee its accuracy. Use as a guide only)
The Work Based Major Project is coming along and is almost complete. I daren’t post it here in full until it is marked and when it is, you will be able to see it here.
What I can do though is to pass it through Wordle and the result is above. Looks like the themes of the project are clear from this simple analysis! (Click the image for a better look)
So, the first of the dashes went well. The Work Based Major Project is indeed 90% complete and the supplementary module is almost there too. I was very pleased how the ‘two week dash‘ went with objectives set out for myself at the beginning and seeing them met at the end was a good feeling.
Only to do now is making sure the behemoth that is the Work Based Major Project is hitting the mark criteria!
Another two week dash on my hands now before the submission date of the 3rd of May.
Not quite the Easter holidays as my School has strange yearly timetables, but it is still two weeks off none the less. Two weeks I have with nothing socially significant planned where I basically aim to finish off the majority of the semester. The extended possibility is to have it all finished, in draft form at least, by the end of the two weeks. More realistically, however, is to have the Work Based Major Project 90% complete and Impact Review and Career Progression almost there too.
That is the aspirational target however, other members of the cohort have commented that about 40% of the work gets done in the last two weeks of the semester, we shall see just how true that turns out to be this time!
Like the fanboy that I am, last night I queued for just over 2 hours to pick up a shiny new iPad 2, 32 GB, Wi-Fi model. I had never owned an iPad before and the feature bumps and quicker processor in the second incarnation of the device managed to persuade me to part with my cash.
So why am I putting this rather un-interesting news on a degree blog? Well, many people are calling the iPad a post-pc device, inferring that the device is like the next version of the personal computer to be used by the masses. Being an ICT teacher by trade, I obviously am wanting to get in on the action and see the devices application in the workplace / classroom. What I am proposing to do is to spend as much time on the iPad as I can and detach from my laptop. Is this possible with the current feature set and notable limitations of the device? That’s what I want to find out. Are the limitations of the device actually a new framework for using a device like this? These are all things I want to look into.
Now, I might be absolutely mad doing this now at the stage where there is only about a month to go until the work based major project is handed in, but that fits in nicely with the experiment, can I finish my work based major project on an iPad? That will be something to tell the grandkids…
The experiment has already begun, I am writing this post on the aforementioned device and I have already noticed how quickly I can type and also just how few mistakes I make on this keyboard!
So here we go, into the unknown, but the very exciting!
I am now at the stage of refining and expanding my Work Based Major Project (dissertation) in line with exactly what is required. This process has been heavily facilitated by a supervisory meeting with my project supervisor. This was a 7:30am start over Skype that got a few key points down. The key things raised were that of both Research and Evidence themes throughout the project. These were two key points that came up most, allowing me to understand the underpinning premises of the project and what the aim really is.
Another key phrase that came up was “Not that the dog is walking on its hind legs, its how well its doing it.” This means basically that its not just the fact thaqt you are doing something good, its that you are doing something good that is fit for purpose.
Woah, almost let February slip by without posting here!
So where am I now? I have successfully (I think) completed my Action Inquiry for my Work Based Major Project and I am now going through my Dissemination schedule. Not quite as it was planned exactly, but expect to see the on-line stage of that dissemination on here soon.
There are a whole 68 days to go and although that seems a fair way off, past experiences have shown that it creeps round fast! Left to do is basically write the whole thing up in a way that makes sense and demonstrates that all important graduate skill. There is a supplementary module going on at the moment named ‘Impact Review and Career Progression’ This offers a great opportunity to look at the next steps after graduation, and although I am sitting pretty with a permanent contract, it never hurts to think of other possibilities and of course the next steps…
So the inevitable final push is here. For me, this push is in the form of an Action Inquiry, focussed around the development of behaviour management. Preparation has been made for this to start this coming Monday where the first action will be to implement the ‘4 point plan’ developed by Bill Rogers.
Bill Rogers (2007)
This plan will be used in a series of lessons and observations will be made by colleagues to determine just how effective the use of the model has been within the lesson. I hope to initiate discussions with colleagues regarding the observations to help inform subsequent cycles of the inquiry, leading to a better utilisation of behaviour management in my classroom.
The aim is to complete three cycles over three weeks, I feel that this is enough time as collation of data and analysis will occur over the latter part of the week and the weekend and not let the process become too long winded. I also feel that conducting the inquiry over a three week period allows for a greater incident for reflection afterwards as if the inquiry were to be longer, it may not be as simple to look at the proceedings overall. Life has its ways of throwing curve balls and I am hoping that there shall be few of these over the three week period.
The stats helper monkeys at WordPress.com mulled over how this blog did in 2010, and here’s a high level summary of its overall blog health:
The Blog-Health-o-Meter™ reads This blog is doing awesome!.
Crunchy numbers
The Leaning Tower of Pisa has 296 steps to reach the top. This blog was viewed about 1,000 times in 2010. If those were steps, it would have climbed the Leaning Tower of Pisa 3 times
In 2010, there were 24 new posts, growing the total archive of this blog to 72 posts. There were 17 pictures uploaded, taking up a total of 9mb. That’s about a picture per month.
The busiest day of the year was October 9th with 19 views. The most popular post that day was The four stages of learning.
Where did they come from?
The top referring sites in 2010 were researchers.ultraversity.net, bigextracash.com, ultraversitybloggers.blogspot.com, samuelsbay.wordpress.com, and firstclass.ultraversity.net.
Some visitors came searching, mostly for swot analysis sample, swot analysis nursing, swot analysis, sample swot analysis, and my swot analysis.
Attractions in 2010
These are the posts and pages that got the most views in 2010.
My favorite Christmas film, A Muppets Christmas Carol
After a good long slog this semester, it’s done. This semester I feel I have almost started from scratch as I moved into a new house with my better half and it took a good while to get into my stride, as pervious ways of studying did not suit my new life. I think / hope it came together in the end and what was produced is of a high quality.
It’s onwards now to the Work Based Major Project that will let me complete the honors degree. When the Semester starts in late January, there will only be about three months until the final submission… scary.
For now though, until the new year; MERRY CHRISTMASANDA HAPPY NEWYEAR!!!
Posted by Toby 
Toby's BA 