This made me laugh. A school consultant went into a school and asked the staff to list the schools rules. Not one of them could. This was partly because there were nearly 40 of them. It was also because everyone knows that there are two types of school rules. The ones written down in the school handbook. And the ones you personally make up for your classroom (and own personal survival).

For instance:

• All girls called Amber are brats; do not ever give them homework extensions, because they’ll take advantage and you’ll have to fail them. And then their mothers will come in and tell you you know nothing about teaching. (This has happened a total of three times now).
• Also be wary of Vickis, Dillons, Leons and Louises….
• Opening all the windows in the middle of winter is the only way to get the attention of the tramps girls who sit at the back of the class, ignoring you and painting their nails.
• Trying to discuss football with your class will only make you look stupid. Colin Firth might have managed it in Fever Pitch. But he’s not real.
• If you have spent a lot of time putting together a great whiteboard presentation, it will break and die at the crucial moment. Always have paper back ups. Always.

In a school somewhere in the world, right now, there is a teenage boy drawing a penis on his desk or the wall of his classroom. Whether it’s a long one, short one, thick one, or thin one, this universal urge for teenage lads to decorate empty spaces with pictures of willies is only matched by the universal suffering of the caretakers who have to get rid of the drawings at the end of the day.

I can just imagine the scene in Cerne Secondary School a few hundred years ago:

“OK, everyone. The interactive whiteboard hasn’t arrived, yet. Actually, blackboards haven’t even been invented yet, so we’re going to carve today’s diagram into the side of that hill over there. Let’s work as a group on a big picture of a man then label all the body parts in French”.

Three weeks later:

“Well done, everyone. That looks great. Hang on a minute, who added the massive phallus?”.

Now, I’m not a maths teacher, but I’ve covered enough statistics classes for sick teachers to know that roughly 78.2 per cent of people are unable to tell the difference between real statistics and those made up on the spot.

Based on this expert knowledge, I can safely estimate that with ‘desk dongs’ being added to the world at a rate of one every minute and being cleaned up at a rate of one every three minutes (because of underfunding), were heading for a global glut of genital graffiti. So, what can we do about it?

I saw something on Angela Maiers’ blog the other day that might help. Idea Paint is a kind of paint that can turn anything into a whiteboard. I’m not going to suggest painting the whole class with it so the students can put wipe-off willies wherever they want, but having a large space where students could write on the walls (in boardmarker) could provide some scope for really interesting activities in class.

Letting students write on the walls, albeit under controlled circumstances might also reduce the ‘cool’ factor of graffiti. If it’s no longer an act of rebellion to write on the walls, maybe students wont feel the need to do it so much and can focus on really cool, ‘harmful’ activities, like learning languages.

Today’s image is by Induo.

thanks flickosopher.com

Monday:A massive headache onset, followed by a twisted ankle as I managed the rampaging bus queue, topped off with a massive case of sneezing as I drove home, subsequently almost hitting a wall.

Tuesday: To be or not to be – Hamlet with Year 11 and a SEAL co-ordinator turned into an amazing lesson on revenge and honour…working with at least five kids who had gang-related allengiances made for a pretty intetresting hour.

Wednesday: That lull of awfulness that hits midweek was further exacerbated by a looming parents evening.

Thursday: Meeting with my newest recruit who used words like ‘inspired’ and ‘motivated to lead the learning’. Christ help us all.

Friday: Ducking out of a staff meeting to write this, and enjoying the free doughnuts and cup of real coffee, provided by my new recruit, trying to curry favour. It’s totally working.

I attempted to enter civilisation last week. I joined Facebook with a private account. It’s taken six days and already ten of my pupils have tried to befriend me.

This is most alarming. They already think i’m a loser, what happens when I fail to post lots of pictures of my *raging* nights out and they discover that i do infact spend most of my nights sitting at home with Horlicks and  episodes of Silent Witness?

And, equally, I really don’t want to see pictures of three of my female students drunk off their faces with their tongues out. It creates all sort of unnerving visual flashbacks in the class the next day when I’m trying to get them to talk about iambic pentameter and I realise how much they must pity me and my tragic life.

On a more serious level though, I do wonder about the proliferation of Facebook at schools; i’ve heard of at least three teachers who have been ‘victims’ of pretty serious hate groups about them on the Facebook; that’s gotta be hard to take…

Whether it’s wedgies, nipple cripples or towel whipping, school pranks all over the world seem to contain a certain element of violence. In all my time as a teacher, however, the cruellest, most unusual prank I’ve ever seen has to be the Japanese kancho.

The kancho beats the competition hands down in two respects: Firstly, in the manner of Japanese game shows, it’s a lot more extreme than any of its western counterparts. Secondly, unlike most school pranks which are usually pupil-on-pupil, the kancho is regularly inflicted on teachers in Japan.

The kancho is a simple move that sees the kancho-er clasps his hands together so his index and middle fingers are pointing out then jabs them into the kancho-ee’s bottom whilst shouting “kan-CHO!” (“Cho” being on the point of impact). I’m not sure what the traditional response of the kancho-ee should be, but in my experience when the kancho-ee is a foreign teacher, it’s usually “OMG! What on earth was that?”.

And it’s not just in Japan; increasingly violent pranks are creeping into schools worldwide.

Of course, the tough teacher amongst you, could become a stealth ninja by attending a course on restraining violent pupils. As Frank Chalk mentioned recently, though, it takes a long time to get competent enough at any of those techniques to actually get them right without hurting someone or getting yourself into trouble.

The truth is, while a wedgie-free world or a no-nipple-cripple nation may be a great dream for teachers, it is just that – a dream. We can try to keep the kanchos out of class with effective classroom management, but what about the playground? Given the universal nature of these pranks and the fact that teachers in every country I have worked in have complained about them, I think we’re stuck with them.

Today’s image is by Phil Berndt.

Yesterday I was faced with classic CLSS (Clever Little Shit Syndrome). My class was working away drawing pictures of their dreams (quite illuminating really), and had been instructred to talk quietly to each other about what the dream meant. Sadly, ‘quietly’ is a word they all don’t seem to have learnt yet, so the volume got way too loud, way too fast.

Asking nicely -  not really an option (is it ever?). Bellowing at them seemed to work for about five minutes (but is also rather counter productive, yelling at someone to be quiet just doesn’t seem to hold any weight). Standing at the front of the class with my arms folded and glaring was also pointless, they just ignored me. So then I attempted to stop the lesson ask them to talk more quietly. At which point CLS Tommy muttered (loud enough for me to hear): “How are we supposed to know what’s too loud?”

 How do you respond to that? I mean honestly? There I was, floored by a seven year old, with absolutely no come back whatsoever.

Read this in the TES forum the other day. An article about a troubled and troublesome child – Little Tommy – who used to be a perpetual truant but is now (thanks to Ofsted targets) attending school regularly – much to the chagrin of his teachers. Basically, it’s better for everyone if difficult children truant, because they don’t then disrupt the rest of the class.

This is such a complicated and confusing argument. On the one hand there is the idea that ’inclusion’ for the most challenging minority means ‘exclusion’ for the well-behaved, less difficult kids whose education is usually sacrificed for the sake of a bit of peace and quiet. Keeping a disruptive child in check takes all of your time, and the other 19 children in your class are basically left with no teacher. It doesn’t seem ‘fair’ – but then if you bring fairness into it, you’re looking at the fact that some of these truants have such a hard home life, and deserve all our support and love.  What is fair is ensuring that their awful homelife doesn’t determine their future. But is it fair that this is at the expense of other children who don’t cause trouble?

I don’t know the exact answer; but I do know, and I don’t meant to sound overly idealistic, that opting to have children not in school because it makes our lives easier isn’t what I got into teaching for. It’s just another sticking plaster for a bigger problem.

 An article in The Telegraph  a month or so ago (I only got through the papers from the last two months at about 4pm on Boxing Day, made a great distraction from the horror of listening my aunt talk about her hernia).

Anyway – this article says that children are getting more aggressive at primary school, and have too much power over teachers. Did they not read my post on ‘compostation’; or read about ScissorGate? But seriously people, some rationality please. These are CHILDREN.

The teachers interviewed in this asrticle have spent far to long living in their heads; making out the little monsters, to actually be very big monsters. I know kids are hard, I find them difficult sometimes, and they can be aggressive – but it’s up to us give them a sense of authority and help them with behaviour. Not run to the papers about it again, and whine about – again.

We have decided on a vaguely traditional nativity – usual No-Room-at-the-Inn, shepherds, kings and the Virgin Mary story (as we are a technically Christian school), interspersed with songs and readings from other religions, some classic carols sung by our small but sweet choir, and a whole school rendition of Jingle Bells in several different languages. I predict a large amount of carnage.

I have also chosen a Mary, after a short audition process that mainly revolved around which child would be most likely to a) not cry throughout the performance b) not stamp her foot throughout the performance c) not  shout ‘hello granny’ throughout the performance. And my Mary of choice, Little Lucy, was doing rather well, she’s definitely got that sweet, innocent smile down, and looks good in blue; but then disaster struck this morning, as she apparently ‘tripped over’ in the playground and has grazed her left cheek – not a good look for the Mother of Christ. Her role as Mary is in peril, will it heal in time? Will she able to rehearse? Can we replace her? Will she ever stop crying?

However, what is perplexing me the most is how she ‘tripped’ over in a playground that is virtually new, and has no holes, bumps or anything trip worthy. With the raft of health and safety these days we basically like our children to play sitting down, on cotton wool.

So, I suspect foul play – and am wondering if the girl who is to potentially take her place  – Little Rosie – might be the culprit. She seems far to pleased about becoming the Virgin Mary.

Good Lord. I’ve been put in charge of the Christmas nativity this year, which is a terrifying and alarming prospect. With over seven different religions and 15 ethnic groups at the school, the traditional Bible story is usually adapted to ensure we’re inclusive. I’m still not exactly sure how to adapt one sacred religious story, to turn it into a mishmash of seven different religious stories, five of which don’t recognise Christmas at all.

And then I’ve got to pick a girl to play the Virgin Mary, a process that I am sure will produce scarier scenes that those on America’s Next Top Model. I mean seven year old actually really know how to pull each other’s hair.