Mr W’s Blogging Great Thing

A good friend of mine and fellow English Teacher had a class who greeted her with the words “Whit we doin’ the day?” every single lesson… even if she had it written on the board!

After 6 or 7 months, it got to her so she used to come up with more and more imaginative answers: “We’re studying particle physics” was a real favourite, but the full range of answers was as inventive as it was physically and anatomically impossible. However, we knew she’d had enough and finally snapped when we overheard the following exchange:

“Whit we doin’ the day?”
“…ripping your arm off and hitting you about the head with the soggy end!”

In a bid to help prevent a relapse, I thought I’d join the growing list of people who’re posting the sessions they’re attending at this week’s Scottish Learning Festival, so, in chronological order I will be attending:

Wednesday 24th September

09.30 – Let your PC reduce your marking burden (John Haughey)
10.30 – Cabinet Secretary’s Address (Fiona Hyslop)
12.30 – Literacy and English within Curriculum for Excellence (Yasmin Ashby)
14.30 – Reforming the high school curriculum: tools for raising quality of learning and improving equity (Richard Teese)

18.00-21.00 TeachMeet08 (9th Edition)

Thursday 25th September

09.30 – I’m delivering my first seminar at SLF!
10.30 – 21st Century Teacher: Your personal professional development network (Ewan McIntosh)
12.00 – The Shape of things to come: personalisation and collaboration in education (Charles Leadbetter)
13.00 – Curriculum for Excellence: The HMIe perspective (Lachlan MacCallum)
15.00 – Beyond Buddies: mentoring new teachers to instructional excellence (Ellen Moir)

I’ve tried to pick a variety of sessions which I hope will compliment each other. Some (like Yasmin’s session) look as though they’re well within my comfort zone, except I believe she’ll be mainly talking about the great work being done in the Primary sector… at which point I realise I don’t have the patience to work with the really small kids…

The perception of colleagues can often be very negative, so I’d just like to thank my school and department for allowing me to attend for both days. Next year, I’ll only do the one… honest! In the meantime, and by way of recompense have some pie.