About

Always a late starter, I didn’t get into teaching until my 30s. Having graduated as a mature student in French with Applied Computing, and with 2 small children to raise, I found myself in the secondary classroom – more an accident than a vocation. I lasted about 5 years before the t crossing and the i dotting drove me mad and I left to do a bit of supply work (remember the days) and lots of French boot sales. Well, the kids got bigger, life became more expensive and I went back.

I was covering some English classes in my old school when the Head of Department (currently Learning Leader?!) asked me if I wanted a ‘proper’ job. He must have caught me at a vulnerable moment as I said yes. I thought it would be all about sharing enlightening, emotive fiction with hoards of avid, open minds. Ha! In fact, it wasn’t until the publication of the APP grids that I really understood the objectives of the English Curriculum – prior to that, I’d just been apeing what the other teachers were doing.

This blog is an invitation to join me on the ascent of my own Bloom’s mountain as I try to marry my interests in applied computing with the requirements of the National Curriculum and my currently futile attempts to drag the department I work in to joys beyond the word processor.

I have a long term plan for this site but, like all best plans, they ‘gang aft agley’. But until that point, my first priority is to create a ‘one stop shop’ where I can easily find all the necessities to ensure I’m meeting the NC requirements and students make the progress that is important to the Department of Education.

From there, I want to explore what I think is important: the power of networking and communication facilitated by all those wonderful Web 2.o tools. As an English teacher, I know I should be giving my students the opportunities to explore the voice of others and the tools to express their own voice; opportunities to engage with others has never been so good and will only get better. The world of industry and commerce are adopting these tools at a great rate of knots, and I feel I have a duty to give my students the skills, and the confidence to use them, for that world of work – whatever it may look like in the near future.

Marrying up what I’ve got to do and what I want to do (not saying that I don’t want to do what I’ve got to) is going to be my primary goal. I know there are LOADS of sites out there providing worksheets or reviews of great applications or commentaries on education – I’ve stalked a lot of them – but nowhere have I found all this great information linked to practical use.

Please join me on this journey. Tweet me, Facebook me, leave comments on my blog posts and help me climb my own Bloom’s mountain.

Thanks for reading.