rantingteacher.co.uk

Sleepworking

For a couple of weekends now, I have attempted to lift a weary hand to the keyboard to update this website, but the extra exertion has been too much. I have, quite frankly, been exhausted. The reasons, in no particular order:

a new exam syllabus to digest;
new exam groups needing much differentiated work;
research on the internet because we can’t afford a set of relevant text books and instead have to create our own resources;
a new term’s resolution to keep on top of my marking even when groups are obscenely enormous, of up to 36 pupils crammed around the 30 desk places I can just about fit in my room, so that children have no elbow room and end up balancing books on their laps;
having to invent bland and meaningless comments for the school’s updated computerised reporting system;
meetings that eat into my precious time when nothing that couldn’t be condensed into ten minutes of breaktime chat comes out of it.

As a result, in just four weeks I have bags under my eyes that are big enough to carry sets of 36 coursework folders. My eyes themselves have shrunk to small squinty pinpricks in a face that desperately needs to see the light of day rather than the familiar glow of my computer screen every weekend. I have stoically seen off the cold that’s doing its rounds amongst snotty sneezy children, because I just don’t have time for the sore throat and earache that tried to take hold of me, although the sore throat thing is still trying to strangle me. I have accumulated an interesting collection of bruises and cuts from bumping into things as I stumble around my crowded classroom in an attempt to help the pupils at the back, tripping over bags big enough to double up as sleeping bags.

Having a headache just seems to be a default, as does falling asleep at a ridiculously early hour each evening, usually about thirty minutes after I’ve finished preparing for school the next day. Last week at school I was finding it difficult to juggle and multi-task with my usual panache. One child had handed me their homework diary with a message in it from their mother, which I looked at without seeing what was there, because my wavering concentration was on the two other children who were telling me things simultaneously. Imagine my horror, then, when I glanced down at the diary to find that I’d absent-mindedly corrected the spellings on the note from the mother instead of just initialling it! I then tried to fudge the corrections to look like I’d ticked the note, but it was too late: the damage was done and I shudder to think what I’m going to be known as from now on in that particular household.

Over the summer I remembered I had hobbies that weren’t curriculum-related, and had the time to do interesting things or not; it was my choice. A month later and I’ve only just remembered that they ever existed, and even if the mind is willing, the body is just so weak. Do you ever catch up on the sleep you miss? Maybe I should build a nest, hibernate for the weekend, and see if that works. But then how would the coursework get marked? I might experiment with training squirrels, but I’m sure even they have more interesting ways to spend their time right now.

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added 3/10/04