Back to School

So tomorrow is my first day in my first placement school. I am both excited and nervous as hell!
For obvious reasons, I cannot reveal the name of the school, but I'm quietly confident that it's going to be a nice environment to work in.
We're in schools on Wednesdays, Thursdays and Fridays, and then in uni on Monday and Tuesday, it's going to be strange not seeing all the lovely people on my course everyday!

Anyway, enough about schools, because I think we all had more than enough of it when we were at school ourself!

So, in my last post I said that Mr. Karen had made it to Canada alive, now I bring the good news that he has made it home - and in one piece too...isn't he clever!! He had a really good time, doing such great things as climbing the CN tower to see nothing but clouds, eating in a jungle themed restaurant and finally playing around with Linux and other such technical stuff that I don't understand. It's nice to have him back anyway : )

In other news, I read a piece in The Independent last week about certain laws in Pakistan. Basically, a chance for the rights of women in the country to move ahead greatly has spectacualrly failed due to the ruling party in Islamabad giving in and sticking to Sharia Law. What this means is that proposed changes to 'rape' law in the country will now not happen. So, when a woman is raped, she must produce four male witnesses who will confirm her account, otherwise, if she reports the rape without these witnesses, she herself risks being charged with adultery.

There is some hope, with the Law Minister Mohammad Wasi Zafar stating that "If there are four witnesses it will be tried under [Islamic Law], if there are not, it will be tried under the penal code"

What worries me more is that the article showed a picture of women belonging to the MMA Party, protesting against the proposed changes to the law.......

WHY?!

It's sad that women should agree that one of their counterparts could go through such an ordeal and then have to face the prospect of jail herself just because the assault upon her was not witnessed by 4 other men......???

I'd link to the article here, but I'm afraid the site does not provide free access to the whole article.

Maybe Bertrand Russell was right when he said that a religious education can hold people back in some ways....

However, I am still on the path to becoming an RE teacher so I have to disagree with some of his points....wish me luck for tomorrow.

Karen x

Avoiding......

...uni work again!!


Yes, I have reached the second week of teacher training! These two weeks have mainly been for admin purposes, sorting out registration and such like, but tomorrow, we have a presentation to do that is related to an area of our chosen subject - RE.

I decided to choose Sikhism as I have some knowledge on this but am not concrete in it, therefore, doing the presentation should help with that. The thing is, the presentation is only 5 minutes long....you may think that this makes it easier, but NO! It just means that we have to make decisions about what should be inluded, what should not and what kind of tasks can be incorporated. Also, we have to do it as if we are in front of a class of Year 7's (11 yr olds), so we have to try and get the pitch of it right too.

I should be preparing it now, but I really can't be bothered....ah well, my friend Emma said it only took her half an hour once she decided what to include.

Well, it seems that all I do is complain about uni, so some good news......
Mum and dad go on holiday tomorrow, so that means I have the house to myself - yippee!!
It also means that I'll probably be bored as hell, but hey, I guess I'll actually do some uni work then!!

Other good news, my better half made it to Canada and is alive and well!! He was last night anyway, but then he was going to have some Jack Daniels so who knows?!! He's back on Monday, so he can provide comfort for me, as we have our first placement in a school starting next week!

Guess I'll have to get used to only being able to go on holiday in the school holidays....you know, when it's more expensive and everywhere is busy busy busy : (

Oh I've also had fun this weekend shopping for 'teacher clothes'! Obviously, we have to dress in an appropriate way, but it's so hard for me to find pants that are short enough for my lil legs!! Why are petite ranges more expensive....when there's less material used?!!

Anyway, best get on with "Why is Langar so important to Sikhism?"

Karen x

ps....joke of the day......

Victoria Wood: He had a sex manual, but was dyslexic. I was lying in bed and he was looking for my vinegar : )

Forms, fifteen year olds, and flying to the moon.

Yesterday was my first day as a trainee teacher *arghhh*...
Well, there's really not a lot I can say about it, as it seems that these first few days are mainly for admin purposes, which means that it has been very boring and I struggle to stay awake!
I'm really not very good at sorting out all this personal admin either, forms for fees, forms for bursaries, forms for registration, forms for records of previous experience...the list goes on. I find it hard to do one of these froms at a time, if I get stuck on one, I move on to the other - only to get stuck on that one too. Therefore, I end up with a lot of half filled in forms lying around when really, they should just be a small five minute task.
Anyway, away from all the admin, it seems like the course is going to be one hell of a year. When I say that, I don't mean it in a good way, I literally mean, a year of hell.
Despite this, one positive of going back to do this course is that I get to see people I have spent the last three years of my degree course with, and also get to meet lots of new people - all coming to teaching for such varied reasons.

Today we looked at "What makes a good RE teacher" and it's made me realise the qualities an RE teacher requires that say a maths teacher doesn't.

Oh dear, when choosing this subject, I chose it simply because I found it very interesting. I neglected to think that a lot of children don't enjoy it, and also that a lot of children will be affected by the sensitive issues discussed within RE. This isn't putting me off the subject, it's just an aspect of it that I never really considered fully. Will I have children comong and asking me for advice, purely because I am an RE teacher? When I talk about bullying in a class, will there be children sat in front of me who are suffering because of bullying at that very point in their lives?
This is just stuff for me to think about really and to take into consideration when I am planning lessons etc..

And in other news.....something has come up which really has left me with a lot to think about!!

I don't want to go into details here, because I'm really not the kind of person to write about very personal stuff on a random web page, and also because I don't really know the full details yet, and nothing may come of it.

All I will say is that whilst keeping in mind certain things that my head tells me, my heart seems to override it, and I know what is important to me.

Erm, that is all for now, I really should fill the other half of these forms in, and go and get my passport type pictures took in one of those stupid booths, and write my profile, and sort the fies into some coherent order...................

and then maybe, just maybe, go the pub for one little drink...


Karen x