London - post Dave
Trip Start
Apr 20, 2008
1
56
69
Trip End
Ongoing
London,
England,
United Kingdom
Thursday, October 16, 2008
I received a call from one company asking me if I could go in to a school called Burntwood for a trial day and interview the very next day. Thursday morning I was up bright and early and on the tube at 6.50am. Arrived way too early and sat waiting in reception for a man called Richard who I thought was interviewing me but turns out he is in charge of supply (or relief lessons) and gave me a timetable and a map of the school. Turns out I was to do a whole day of supply teaching and had a brief chat with the head of humanities at lunchtime.
The school is an all girls school in Earlsfield, about an hours trip away from where I m staying taking two tubes and the overground. Around 50% of the students are of African decent and at least 10% wear head-scarves. They all speak fluent English though and I think they're all second or third generation immigrants unlike the newly arrived that Jo is teaching.
I taught a full day of history and geography and one hideous drama lesson.... My first class was with year 7's who were fine. Very demanding as year 7's tend to be, they still lack the ability to think for themselves and one is confronted with a constant stream of questions.. Miss! What date is it? Miss, how do I spell this? Miss, should I write in blue or black pen? Miss, do I need to rule a margin? How wide should it be? What page are we on? What's the answer to this question? What are we supposed to be doing anyway? But they were nice nonetheless.
The next lesson was year 9's, these girls had some serious attitude. Walked in, stopped and sneered... 'Well ooo are you ven?' and asked me 'what my problem was' when I asked them to please not yell and to stay seated. I then had another nice year 7 class, a not so bad year 9 class, a year 8 drama lesson in a huge echoey studio and then the last class, a bunch of completely uncontrollable year 8's. I could not get them to be quiet... at all... it was awful!
But I survived the day and they asked me back tomorrow to which I accepted. There is the potential for a permanent position (until Christmas) teaching history geography starting after half term (in two weeks) so I will have to wait and see if they offer it to me. Having not worked in any sort of job for over 6 months it was a bit of a shock to the system. The school has over 1000 students and the corridors are utter mayhem! I felt quite overwhelmed and am now exhausted!
Friday seemed a little better, although I'm not sure if it was just that I knew what to expect. We had a conversation about London schools in the staffroom, an English prac. teacher was asking why everyone said London schools are so bad compared to basically anywhere else. Most people thought it was just the big city thing, the annonymity and the 'not enough space' issue. London students have the ability to blank you out, more so than other other students I have come across, they treat you like another inanimate object in the room, you might as well be a fridge talking to them and whilst you get bad kids in every school it's the amount of bad kids that is so much greater here. Another teacher had a theory that it's because the police don't carry guns therefore noone has respect for authority.
I'm not sure what it is but these girls are SO rude to each other and to staff, it's ridiculous. They are so defensive, you can't say anything without them arking up and they argue back about eveything! Being a supply teacher is also really really hard as one doesn't know the school very well, doesn't know the rules and the accepted standard of behaviour and oen doesn't know anyone's names which is a huge factor in behaviour management. Not that learning names would be an easy task, here's a selection; Thurika, Reija, Fahmia, Malaika, Sumera, Zayna and Kyaman. I along with all the other female teachers are simply referred to as 'Miss' even by other teachers, I find that really strange, the men are just called sir, as least that seems a bit more respectful...
I don't know if it's being in an all girls school but these girls are obssesed with their appearance, they are constantly brushing their hair, doing makeup and painting their nails in class as well as constantly talking about their hair and what they're going to do with it. As I mentioned a big proportion of the students are of African decent and therefor have the afro, uncontrollable hair which they do some pretty funky things to. I haven't yet figured out if they get up really early to do their hair every morning or whether they just sleep like that. There's this one girl who has her hair all spiked up and gelled so it's like a big fan around her head. And the way that they talk! I can barely understand what they're saying sometimes, if anyone has ever seen Little Britain they'll know what I'm talking about. They talk exactly like the schoolgirl, I think her name is Vikky!
So the weekend finally arrived. I went to Hammersmith to meet up with Jo and a girl called Betty. Betty was one of the gappys (meaning she spent her gap year) at Pembroke the year that I left. We went with her and her sister Tommy to their friends place to have some drinks and take-away Chinese. It was really nice before a whole lot more people turned up and I felt like I was at a high school party. I stayed at Jo's and the next day we went to Wimbledon with her housemate Daniel. We walked around and looked in some shops etc. Daniel stood outside and read his lecture notes every time we entered a shop! We had some lunch before heading home to lie on the couch and watch movies for the rest of the afternoon. In the evening we went to a bar called Waxy O'Connels which is an Irish bar and was like every other Irish bar I have ever been to. Packed with drunk people singing Bon Jovi at the top of their lungs and an Irish jig played every hour or so. I caught the night bus home to Rebecca's which took me FOREVER!!! The tube stop running at 12.30 which is frustrating.
Sunday I was feeling a bit crappy and ending up going to the movies by myself. There's a cinema on Leister square that's really cheap, 3.50 on weekends and 1.50 during the week. Not that many movies to chose from though. Afterwards I met Jo and we walked down Carnaby street and Oxford street, the main shopping street. Went to the ultra cheap shop, primark and bought some pyjamas and slippers to cheer myself up!
I was asked back to the school to do more supply for Monday to Thurday. Pretty much same story although I don't think these girls have seen many people with green eyes before as I get so many comments. One girl turned around as I asked her to sit in her seat and she looked around at me and said ARGH! your eyes are so green!! It's really bizarre. But nearly all of them do have black hair and brown eyes.
One of the things that gets me about some Londoner's, my students included is the awful grammar and the things they say. 'No I never', 'you alright?, I aint done nothing' and the worst 'innit' at the end of every sentence. 'We had that due for hoemwork, innit?' Did she really say that, innit?' IT JUST DOES NOT MAKE SENSE!!! You can't say that!! The fact that it takes so long to get anywhere is also quite frustrating. If I leave for school 10 minutes later the tube is jam packed full of people. The other day it was really cold so I was all rugged up, got on the tube which was a million degrees and had no room to take my coat off. I started getting really really hot and claustrophobic and feeling like I was going to pass out. Luckily there was a mass exodus at Kings Cross so I could take off a few layers. Then I had to get off and walked out onto the platform and was freezing and shivering. It's a nightmare!! Shopping is just as bad and food shopping is a pain in the neck because you have to get all your stuff home and can therefor never buy too much in one go.
