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One Hundred Years of Gratitude: 4 old teachers walk into a staffroom
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You're listening to an IOE podcast. Powered by UCL Minds.
Elaine Long
Welcome to the ECF Staffroom. I'm Elaine Long.
Mark Quinn
And I am Mark Quinn.
Elaine Long
We are programme leaders for the UCL Early Career Teacher Development Programme. Why are we in the staff room? We are here because this is where the best professional learning conversations always take place. This is where problems can be aired bluntly and where solutions can be explored.
Mark Quinn
Over the course of this series, we will hear the voices of different colleagues as they come in the ECF Staffroom. We will hear from early career teachers themselves and from the mentors and induction tutors who support them. We will talk about all things ECF, the challenges and the joys. So, why don't you enjoy a coffee with us, perhaps even grab a biscuit and sit down to half an hour of ECF Staffroom chat.
Elaine Long
Welcome to the ECF Staffroom. Annie and Helen, we’re particularly grateful to you for coming in. We know it's your Easter holiday, so we'd like to reward you with a nice drink, but actually there's no need to ask you what your coffee routine is, because I'm aware there are three people in the staffroom that know each other very well.
Mark Quinn
Ah, yes. Okay, so we're going to have to fess up to this aren’t we. So, Annie, do you want to say it or should I say it.
Annie Powell
No, you say it.
Mark Quinn
Okay. So, Annie Powell is my wife, and I know what Annie takes for her coffee. Actually are you going to have decaf coffee, Annie or it If this were your first coffee, would it be a proper, full, fat, caffeinated coffee, or would it be decaf?
Annie Powell
No, not in school, it's always decaf. I get overexcited otherwise.
Mark Quinn
And Helen is one of our oldest nearest friends. Actually, not so old, Helen, but longest serving friends. and you're spoilt when it comes to coffee. Helen's dear husband, Tony, is a bit of an aficionado when it comes to making coffee. So he makes only the finest. How do you manage in school, Helen with coffee?
Helen Lugger
Well, actually, we've just started the coffee cup and we buy bags. So we have all the bags at the very nice coffees and we share them out and yeah, that's our latest thing. So I do get a decent cup of coffee at school because otherwise it'll be the instant stuff and that just doesn't hack it I’m afraid.
Mark Quinn
I am in no way surprised at all. Yeah. Apart from having the time to drink it, but.
Helen Lugger
Well, yeah, that's another issue.
Elaine Long
Helen, I'm not surprised you've managed to perfect your coffee routine because I know that you and Annie have been teaching for 29 years, so I'm sure, along with perfecting your coffee routine, you both have lots of insights about how you perfected your teaching in the classroom as well. And we're really excited about this episode, particularly the opportunity to exploit the wisdom of two teachers who have 58 years combined of teaching between them.
It's not often we get the opportunity to tap into such a rich source of wisdom. So I know our listeners will be really keen to hear about what got you into teaching and what an average day is like for you. So, Annie, can I ask you to start us off with that? What took you into teaching? What was your route and what's an average day like for you now?
Annie Powell
Oh, my words. I took a slightly circuitous route into teaching because I was actually after I did my history degree, I worked in offices for a bit and I got bored. I mean, I was always the one who did every little extra thing. I did a display or I did whatever, but it was, I was really not feeling very challenged and I wanted to do something which involved history as well, and I'd been doing some adult literacy teaching with a friend of mine who was a primary school teacher and she was really good and I really enjoyed it. And I thought, okay, well, maybe it's teaching and but I didn't want to primary. I wanted to sort of do more with history. So I went for secondary teaching and yeah, it's worked out quite well for me, overall, I think.
So, at the moment, as much as I love teaching history, I'm teaching loads of sociology. So, in the last couple of years I've had to retrain myself, you know, and become a sociology specialist, which is quite challenging. I am also in the extended leadership team. So do lots of, you know, duties and things. Basically I spend most of my day just interacting with lots of people, smaller people and bigger people and, you know, just having a lot of fun, really no waste fun, but mostly fun. It's good.
Elaine Long
So, Helen, can I ask you the same question? What took you into teaching and what's an average day like for you now?
Helen Lugger
So, I think part of me always wanted to be a teacher. I mean, I absolutely loved history, had loads of history books, had my picture of Queen Elizabeth first on my wall for many, many years when I was a teenager. I did have a few pop stars as well, I did work a couple years for. I went to uni, just did an office, went to uni, did my history degree and then yeah, decided I really did want to be a teacher.
So, that's the route that took me in. I worked in mainstreams for quite a few years, but the last sixteen years I've been working in a PRU, so although there are typical days, they're always very, very different. Depending on, we have our lessons, structures and stuff, but it depends on how the students are feeling and we've got something different happening on that day.
So, yeah, the days are really quite varied. Typical day, we have a morning school and an afternoon school, so we have students coming in for the morning and then a new look for the afternoon. I'm teaching, I'm head of humanities, I'm teaching humanities to KS3 sometimes GCSE history to people in KS4 or a bit like Annie, I had to retrain, I do health and social care as well, so I could be teaching that too. So yeah, definitely very varied.
Elaine Long
It's interesting over the course of both your careers that your subjects specialisms, it sort of evolved and changed. Is that something you welcomed or is that something you found difficult?
Annie Powell
Oh, I think I think particularly, Helen and I, have both been head of humanities, so you have to kind of really get into the other subjects that you're working with. I kind of, I taught sociology once at GCSE for one year a long time ago. And then when we lost a sociology teacher, my lovely headteacher was like, Well, you're the sociology teacher now, you know, with someone else.
So, it's a kind of a challenge, isn't it? It's always interesting to think, okay, you've got to learn something new and, you know, begin with your bits of cautious thinking, Well, you know, is it going to be, you know, is it going to be as interesting as you hope or is it going to be just lots of work and you're not going to enjoy it.
Helen Lugger
It’s completely from scratch, isn't it? That makes challenging.
Annie Powell
Yes, and particularly this year I'm teaching more of the A-level as well. Just, you know, and it is so much just me at this time. You know, I'm lucky I can ask other colleagues, but there's no one who's just, you know, the sociology specialist in the school.
Mark Quinn
How different is the pedagogy from one subject to another? When you think about back to that day in September 1994, when the three of us sat in a room of 15 others, whatever it was, learning how to be history teachers, we were sort of filled with those notions of what it is to be a history teacher like this.
You know, there's never too many timelines, for example. Right? So but if you're if you're teaching geography or if you're teaching health and social care or if you're teaching sociology, surely they've got sort of different underpinnings, don't they? How did you learn that stuff if you don't come to it from the perspective of a geographer or the perspective of a sociologist.
Helen Lugger
That's your experience, isn't it? Again, I think that of after a while you are a teacher and within reason, I think you can pick up any subject and you can understand the pedagogy behind it and work out, you know, what's needed. But again, that's something that when you go into teaching, you think, I can do my subject, but then how on earth do I know the subject? But after time you can pick up other things.
Annie Powell
Yeah, Yeah. I mean, how children learn is the same, isn't it? So, you're using lots of ideas, but with different content. I'm trying to think of some particular things. Obviously, you know, I'm teaching sociology and I desperately miss those timelines and I can't resist every now and again saying, and it used to be like this and a hundred years ago, you know, and actually, you know, you're just adding to the context on you of their understanding.
So, you know, I think possibly everyone should try and teach some of the subjects and be really familiar with some of the subjects, you know, how they're taught because you gain stuff, don't you? I know obviously we've all done a lot of observing of other teachers, like young teachers, and you always go away thinking, Wow, that's a really good idea, I'm going to try that now or even something where you think; Oh, I haven't done that. I used to do that. I haven't done that for years. You know, I must try and bring that into a history lesson or bring it into a sociology lesson. It's all good ideas, isn't it? It's all learning. It's all young people, you know, their brains growing.
Helen Lugger
It's looking for the links, isn't it, as well, like you say, linking things together and you take something from a subject to use in of the subject. Yeah, definitely. Yeah, definitely do that.
Annie Powell
Definitely. Yeah. And it really helps the kids then because they see the links. Just makes the learning deeper, doesn't it.
Mark Quinn
Okay. So, you might be teaching them sociology, but you're smuggling a bit of history in there as well.
Helen Lugger
Always, always
Mark Quinn
Okay. And do you still have your poster of Elizabeth in your classroom, Helen? Or is that hidden somewhere else?
Annie Powell
Actually, I have absolutely no idea where that is. That No, no, because it's humanities. Now we have to have a few things, you know, globes and stuff like that.
Mark Quinn
You mentioned observation, and I'm going to we're going to get to our first proper question now. And I should say that obviously this is the ECF staffroom, Elaine and I represent the UCL Early Career Framework programme, but you two don't, neither of you use our programme in your schools. I don't know how you betrayed me quite so badly, but you did.
You're not here representing our programme and that's actually part of the reason why you're here, because we think, you’ll completely different perspective for to, you know, people who might be listening to this podcast who are doing our programme and in particular what Elaine and I both spotted on Twitter, there were some questions that are coming in from, from ECTs who clearly wanted an answer from a more experienced teacher.
Maybe they were ECTs in schools where they didn't have a colleague who'd been teaching for 29 years. So, we've got a couple of questions like that for you that we're going to pose to you first. And the first of those is how do you raise your spirits after an observation that you don't think went that well and having to wait until tomorrow morning for the feedback?
Helen Lugger
Well, there's nothing worse, is there? Nothing worse? I think we've probably all have that sinking feeling. We’ve all known those observations. I think it's important to do reflecting and probably, you know, you come out in the observation, you know, it's not going to happen until tomorrow to get the feedback. But I've always sort of thought, right, you know, obviously what happened? Why did it happen?
You've got your you know, your what went well as well? So, I think that's important to try and put that on there. But if you have that discussion with yourself, you're then ready the next day to have the discussion with whoever's done the observation. And I think it's an important, really important to try and park it, which I know is difficult because you're probably still thinking about it, but you can't change anything, it's happened, you've done your reflection. Now you need to just think, right, okay, let's leave that to tomorrow and then hopefully your spirits will be raised and don't think about it too much.
Annie Powell
Yeah, I agree with that. I think if you can talk it over with someone, I think that's really helpful. You know, sort of talk through it and think, you know, reflect, think about what you would do differently, so that when you have that conversation the next day, you're actually going to be really ready for it.
You can actually really take on board any advice that you're given, but also that you've already kind of taken a certain amount of ownership. You know, if there was something that didn't quite work as well, you've already got some sense of how you're going to improve it next time, what it is you're going to do. And so, you're no longer out of control waiting for something awful to be done to you, You know, sort of Damocles of your head, you've actually sort of moved on and taken control and next time it will be better.
Elaine Long
Yeah, I do really agree with that as well, because it's hard because you're sitting there, you know, if only I could go back to that moment. But you've still got the opportunity to do it. And what's not been lost is your ability to show and whoever was observing the lesson, how self-reflective you can be and actually, in many senses, that's a very powerful thing to show somebody.
But it's a really difficult skill to have as a teacher because in so many ways the teachers, your sense of self and vulnerability is so wrapped up in your teaching that sometimes it's hard to separate it and divide the two. If you can separate it and realise that that lesson isn't you, it's just one lesson in a whole series of lessons across your career and that actually it's a real opportunity for you to show the observer that you can learn from your mistakes and be reflective and in many ways that's one way of thinking about it that might help.
Mark Quinn
I guess it's the reason why you might leave it to the following morning. You know why the observer might say, go home, I'll talk to you tomorrow about this because you need to have that distance. And although you’re right, Helen, you might sort of worry about it, you might even is a bit of sleep over it, but actually the point is to, is to separate yourself out that little bit from the incidents or the events that took place during the lesson and think again about what might have done differently or what I did well or create that sort of critical distance, it’s though, isn't it?
And of course, if you're an early an early career teacher or new teacher into the profession, then all feedback is taken as criticism really isn't it/ You know, there's always a feeling that, but it's never as good as it should be. There's always more that I could do better. That’s quite hard, you know, to take that on board when you're a new teacher, isn't it? When you're giving feedback, do you bear that in mind as you're giving feedback to new teachers.
Annie Powell
Oh yeah. I think it's always really good if the teacher can actually tell me, you know, rather than again, having it done to them. So, I might encourage the conversation and I certainly try to encourage them to be reflective. A lot of my feedback, I'm often asking questions. Why did you do it like that? Why was that better? Are there other ways you could have done it? Because actually what I want them to do is not feel bad that, you know, there's something they could have done brilliantly and didn't. But actually, to be thinking about there are different ways I did it this way this time, and it might be worth trying out something different next time, even, you know, that may or may not be better, but, you know, you don't just repeat the same thing every time.
Helen Lugger
The whole point of, you know, feeding back from an observation is to be supportive, isn't it? And it's still this dreaded thing that's going to happen and people worry about it and that is only natural. But hopefully we really want to create a culture when we're feeding back, you know, how can we support and I think Mark mentioned before, we're learning, we from others as well, when we're observing them, we always come out with something we can use ourselves.
So, the fact that you know, we need to try and be as supportive as possible and create that kind of culture rather than maybe the critical culture.
Elaine Long
I was going to say as well, it's funny because when I look back over the course of my career and the different sorts of feedback I've had, actually, if I'm really honest with myself, it's it was the most difficult feedback at the time that probably made me the best teacher I am. At the time I didn't appreciate the feedback and I might even chumped a bit about it with my friends afterwards.
I might even have gone home and cried about the feedback. But actually, when I look back with a distance of 20 years on that, the But I remember getting to see my teacher. I can, I can remember now, but it's probably that that feedback that actually forced me to do better and be better and as harsh as it was at the time, you can normally take something from feedback that helps you grow, but it's very difficult.
So, I think you know of a career which you have an observation where someone looks that intently at what you're doing. I think is quite particular. I would say that to my husband as well, you know, someone to stand on your shoulder and observe and actually it's quite affronting, that that is unique to teaching and that it is, is something quite powerful about it but also quite difficult.
And that brings us on to our next question, because teaching is hard. We know teaching is really, really hard, and particularly in the early years when you're learning and you don't have the benefit of a 20 or 30 years experience to fall back on, it can feel like it might never get any better. So, to the next question, another commonly asked question is that ECTs keep hearing the phrase it will get better when, for example, when you build relationships with the kids, when you complete your first term, after your first parents evening, when the unicorn tap dances across the classroom, I think that answer feels quite frustrating when you're starting out, you just constantly hear it will get better. So, the question is seriously, when does it actually get better?
Annie Powell
That’s a tough one. I was literally just having this conversation with a first year ECT actually, and she was making the joke that, you know, she's got through two thirds of her first year and obviously after the first year, everything gets easy. It's all easy, isn't it? Perfect? Um, not really. I think every year, I mean, your first year of, you know, being an ECT is just it's a lot of survival, isn't it?
It's a lot of you are so surrounded by people, both, you know, grown up people and younger people all wanting things, demanding things and in no other career really are you quite so intensely, you know, sort of surrounded by people who will need something from you. So, you know, there is a certain level in which you get through ones of adrenaline and and survival mode and you are learning so many skills and so much content as well because you might be teaching all sorts of things that you, you know, you might have in our case a history degree, but you're teaching stuff that you, you know, was nothing, no part of your history degree.
And even if it's at KS3, you do have to know something, be a page ahead of the kids in the textbook or something. So, so it's such an intense year and then hopefully the next year you've got a lot of the basic skills and you can have that. Heath a sigh at the end of that first year, go away on your summer holidays, but then you start thinking about what you're going to do even better.
I think, you know, the kind of best young teachers that I see are the ones who then really want to recognise that's when they go to work really hard, that that's when they want to actually get good. You know, that might be pretty all right, but you know, you don't want to stay at that point do you? No you want to sort of really improve and get better.
At every point of your career, you know, and Helen and you guys and I, we've all done this different points in your career. There are different challenges aren’t there? So, it might be that you've taken on a new role in school. It might be that you suddenly got to teach health and social care or sociology when that really wasn't your background or what you had part of your plan.
It could be other commitments. You know, you're going to run in the Boston Marathon and you've got to somehow squeeze a little bit of training in somehow, is what my colleague does. Or, you know, you've got a growing family or something like that. So, every year will have challenges and that's part of what makes it interesting because you're never bored. There's always something new. You're not just going to repeat what you did every year for the last ten years.
Helen Lugger
Yeah, I’d echo what Annie said.
Mark Quinn
Are you never bored?
Helen Lugger
No, never bored, definitely never. I mean, teaching is just this complex multi-tasking career that there's always something new to learn. When I was thinking about, you know, does it get easier? Like Annie said, it does if you know, after the first year, you've obviously got a few tricks up your sleeve that you may well have, you know, you've done some planning, so that makes it a little bit easier the following year because you may only have to tweak and not completely write a whole new scheme of work, but things are thrown at you over different times and then you do have to respond to that. But you evolve as a teacher you without even knowing.
I mean, I couldn't give a magic date, but suddenly you do have this kind of, you develop your emotional resilience. So, you know, you can keep going on stuff. Things don't get you quite so much. Your instinct becomes more honed. You can see what the behaviour of the students is. You can pick up on what's happening without even looking in that direction, you know what's going on.
Same with the lessons you're doing, you instinctively know whether or not it's working and if it's not, you've got something up your sleeve. So, all of that happens over time and that's what the experience is and it's going to happen at different time for different people. So, bits get easier, definitely, but equally there's always challenges, but that's what makes it great, that's what makes it never boring. There's always something else to do that you're challenging yourself, so you're always learning as well alongside the students.
Mark Quinn
You said bits, you know, when you are learning how to do this thing, it just feels like lots and lots and lots of bits, doesn't it? So, you've got bits of the curriculum you've got to teach and the bits about getting the children into the classroom or sitting down or listening to you or answering questions or, you know, those are all bits and of course with a framework like our framework, there's a whole more, whole lot of other bits that they've got to learn about and learn how to do. And it can feel like that, but I suppose once, you used the word instinct Helen, once you start once these was a bit start to become part of your instincts, then they get easier to do.
You start actually maybe start thinking about the bits you're thinking about those you actually start looking at the children themselves and thinking, well, actually how are they learning rather than, What am I doing? But yeah, but, but it doesn't happen all at once. A very, very few teachers I have ever met, I mean, few teachers had it from the beginning. It would take it, it does take, it can take, as you say, it takes different amount of time for different people.
Elaine Long
Yeah. I sense the complexity of the role never changes, as illustrated by both of you having to pick up and learn new subjects, but maybe something in the ability to cope with that and the complexity are a bit like juggling when you get the balls juggling, Once you've got them juggling in the routine, you can keep throwing in more balls and drop them, but you have to get those balls going in the pattern first of all, otherwise you're going to drop all the balls. And that's really hard to get yourself in that initial routine where you're coping with all the bits the this once. But for me, yeah, it was about competence.
I remember all of a sudden I think I spent my first year just thinking, what am I doing and who's going to come through the door and find out about me and say, You've got no business being a teacher because you don't know what you're doing.
So I felt like I was sort of in an episode of Faking it for a whole year. And then I remember gradually as I went on, I came back in my second year and kind of felt like, now I do have a right to be here and I do belong here. And I think that sense of belonging and a feeling more comfortable for me was when it clicked into place. But I think it is different.
Mark Quinn
I think it's important to say that it's okay to feel lacking in confidence. It's okay to feel that this is hard, that it does feel like the bits that, you know, it's okay not to have it as your instinct yet, you know, it will take time and no one should feel no, no new teacher or even not just new teacher, you know, teacher people might be in their second or third year and they're still finding aspects of the job really quite difficult to become, you know, become habitual.
They shouldn't feel you know, you shouldn't feel bad about that. You know, that's just, most people can't do this job. Most people are not cut out for this job. It takes a special few who are good enough to be teachers and thankfully, we got many thousands who still want to be teachers.
Annie Powell
And even if even if you are good as a teacher, you won't be good at absolutely everything. There will be all sorts of things that are not your strength. And as time goes on, you learn ways around it, don't you? So never give me a year seven group where I have to count up the credits because I can't do it.
But I can get a kids do it, you know?
Elaine Long
Yeah, that's very true and also acknowledging you're part of the team and drawing on that team dynamic because like you say, when you get team planning, you might not all be good at certain aspects of the curriculum, but there'll be someone on the team who you can draw on and that doesn't have to be seen as a solo game all the time, although it can feel like it when you close your classroom door and you are on your own with 30 children who sometimes don't always want to learn, what you're teaching them.
Mark Quinn
And talking about team. The next question is about that really. It's about when the team is a bit of a problem for you. So, it's interesting both of you have been heads of department and so you'll have had teachers in your department who maybe didn't like teaching the way you were telling them they had to teach.
So, from the perspective of an early career teacher who doesn't agree with the way their head teacher wants them to teach lessons, what do you do in that situation? How would you advise early career teachers who find themselves in that position today?
Helen Lugger
I would say, communication is key, really. You need to you need to talk to your head of department. I mean, it depends on what the situation is. But if you're being told to teach something in a particular way, what's the reasoning behind it? So, if you can work out what their reasoning is and obviously have some consideration that they have a bit of experience as well.
So, you may want to blend your ideas with their ideas and see if you can talk to them about how you can both work together in that way. I think, I mean, I've always been lucky. My head's my first head of department when I was NQT, she was brilliant. There were two of us who were history NQTs and she just let us go with it.
She was always, you know, try this, do that. What do you want to do? Yeah, that'll work. And I think I was, I was really lucky in my other heads of department have also been of that ilk. So yeah, a personally I haven't actually experienced being told what to do. So, I think it's, it's a difficult position if you're in it, especially if you are an ECT because you know, it's quite a big thing to say to someone. ” I don't like the way you're doing that and challenging that, but there are ways around it. But I think you need to talk and you need to come up with ideas of your own and sort of present those.
Annie Powell
Yeah, I agree. It could be that you're you head of department might be trying to save you from yourself because they've spotted a, you know, a flaw in your logic. So, talking about it, talking it through, maybe compromising, maybe, maybe if you've got a particular thing you want to try out, maybe you do that, you know, with support from them, you know, maybe with a particular class that is particularly malleable.
And obviously if they are your head a department, then, you know, the end of the day, I guess you've got to compromise and listen to what they're saying to you. But also, you know, the whole purpose of a, you know, being in your early career is that you do try things out. So, you should be given opportunities to, you know, take some risks, you know, with support and try some things out and some of them are work and some of them won't. So, you should have the chance to try something. But do listen to your head of department because they may have spotted that that's not the right class to do that with or not the right topic. You know, communicate as Helen says. Find out why it is that they don't really want you to teach it in that way.
Mark Quinn
Yeah, This is one of the questions that came from Twitter and you can only we can only guess what might have been lying behind the question because this is an ECT whether they're on our program or one of the other programs, is obviously learning about the early career framework and that's got a particular set of, you know, there's research behind that and so I can only imagine that she's going into her job and she feels that she's got sort of some of the latest research behind her as she's teaching these particular ways, and maybe she's in a department that's got a different perspective on some of this research or perhaps isn't aware of the same research. So, I can imagine that this is a situation that some of our early career teachers will be in because they'll be teaching in schools or in departments that have their own approaches to pedagogy or to curriculum building or whatever it might be.
You can see that this could be the case. And, you know, we know that there are schools and families of schools out there that have particular centralised curriculums and they think they've worked out what they feel are the best ways of teaching. But a new person joining that school might be coming with, you know, filled with new ideas or different ideas which might come from the framework.
So you're lucky, Helen, if you've never been told how to teach.
Annie Powell
I think if there is another ECT, I mean, Helen was lucky to be with another NQT as you were then and I had the same experience. I mean, I had had a slightly different head of department, which I can't really talk about but it was pretty awful.
But in an odd way, he didn't tell us what to do because he wasn't very interested, shall we say, to put it very politely. But you know, if you've got another ECT to work with you, you might be able to support each other and bounce ideas around. And that's kind of one of the great things about having early career teachers in a department, isn't it? In the school as a whole? in that you bring lots of ideas and lots of enthusiasm and some energy and then we all sort of learn.
Elaine Long
Yeah. I also think, however, sort of you know, one would presume the curriculum is carefully crafted by the head of department because that is their job to think about a well sequenced curriculum for the students. But what I always liked about teaching is your role in the classroom always involves an important part of ownership, which is you thinking about how you contextualise that curriculum for your students and whatever is your teaching, how that works for your students and maybe that's a good way in to the conversation as well.
Which brings us to our next question, which is asked a lot, understandably by ECTs, know it was something I thought a lot about when I was training, and I'm sure we've all had this feeling and I've had this feeling on the way to which is that sense of dread you’ve got because of a certain class you have to teach and it's not going well and the behaviour of the students in that class is not good and you dread it from the moment you wake up and you worry about it constantly to the moment that it happens. How do you manage that? How do you deal with that?
Annie Powell
I think partly it's what Helen was saying about how you build up a certain amount of resilience, because I did have a class like that year 11 group last year who, you know, had that effect on me and, and actually individually, I was talking about, you know, the actual students in that class individually. There were, you know, all interesting, most of them were absolutely great kids. But as a combination of students, it was just the most challenging group that I've taught in a long while and of course, I was absolutely desperate to get them good GCSE grades because every year 11 and it does it so absorbed so much of your time. It is it is exhausting.
But you do you build a certain amount of resilience over the time. I know it's often said but if you can get to know the students individually, you know, maybe away from the classroom setting, it really does help, you know, because they start to see you not as the person sort of the looking really mean and nasty at the front, but you know that you're actually interested in them. So, you build up those relationships and try and if particularly if it's lower down the school whether maybe a form group, try and observe someone else teaching them.
I know if you're in primary school, that might be extremely challenging to do if you've got a particularly difficult group, but it's always good to see someone else how they handle, you know, sort of, you know, a challenging group and do talk about it, don't just feel that you're being overwhelmed and you can't share with people because I think that that's actually quite unhealthy because sometimes people get into a, you know, dig themselves into a real hole. What do you think, Helen? You have the most challenging children don’t you!
Helen Lugger
We do have some challenging children. I definitely echo what you said about a relationship. I mean, teaching at a PRU, we do have individuals that we need to get to learn. We need to sort of get to know them and build up some kind of relationship and look for a way in. I mean, even just a couple of weeks ago, I was struggling with one individual and I was asking my colleagues, What do you think? How do you get this person to even respond to you?
And, you know, everybody comes up with different ideas. But, you know, do you know he really likes cars or do you know, he really likes football? And so that's kind of a way in. But yeah, I think it's what Annie said about, you know, talk to other people. There's going to be other ECTs, there's going to be your mentor, there's going to be other colleagues. And you can guarantee that nine times out of ten, everybody is having problems with similar class. You know, it's not just going to be you. You shouldn't be afraid to ask for help. You are you are learning and I mean, like I said, you know, I'll ask for help sometimes because you just you're at a loss if you really can't work out a way in with a group, think about going, observing, going and seeing how other of the staff deal with them.
I think when you actually teaching, as long as you plan, plan, plan on the teaching as well, think about different ways of, you know, how can I engage this class, how can I get them as they come in, you know, the sort of the, the teaching side of things as well and the relationship side of things and just keep, keep building away. It's not going to happen overnight. It's a slow burn but you know, you can get there with classes. Definitely.
Annie Powell
Very often that's the class. If you're off on a training or something for a day and you missed the lesson, those will be the kids who are the most outraged that you weren’t there.
Mark Quinn
That Is the funniest thing isn't it. How did you manage that Elaine?
Elaine Long
For me well often works, it's actually simplified my lessons quite a lot sometimes when I had challenging classes. But I think that's because I knew that I had to devote quite a lot of attention to behaviour. So, I often, you know, I had a very simple task that they were doing, which they could do on their own, which then allowed me that banking time to walk around the classroom and have the 1 to 1 chat. So, it kind of might bring in the lesson actually for that. So, you know, I was an English teacher, so I'd be doing a writing task or something which allowed me to walk around the room, build those relationships, have those conversations.
The other thing I use to do and again of this translates to other subjects, but the thing I always found in the English classroom was give them a sense of success. So, the hardest class I ever took on, I knew they were not confident at English and quite low prior attainment is that they wrote and again, this is quite labour intensive, but not just they go and do this book, but they wrote stories and I typed them up for them and we spent ages going over these stories and me giving them feedback and I made sure that every single person in the class had a successful story and once had got that and they had the confidence, then I built from there. So, for me is about kind of simplifying the lesson that I mean, I guess, you know, that was adapting the curriculum some what.
But, but I felt I needed it because I just personally felt with that group of kids that until they felt a sense of success and until I could build that relationship based on like we've done that together and we have a sense of success, they kind of me fortunate. They still gave me lots of cheek all year, but lots of funny stories, but we kind of went from there. Yeah. So yeah, I think actually actively planning it in your lesson that kind of time to have this 1 to 1 discussions and, and build relationships and get lots of positive feedback but also reinforce roles because sometimes you do just need to, you know, take, be able to take a step back in the classroom and just watch what's going on and actually make sure that the students that are doing the right thing are being rewarded and the students that aren't doing the right thing are understanding that they're doing the wrong thing and sometimes you have to give yourself time and space to be able to actively do that and build that in I think.
Mark Quinn
I remember being told once by I think it might be my first head of department actually, who said to me, never let them feel that you've given up on them. I was thinking of you, Helen, because obviously you are teaching lots of children that who do feel that they've been given up on. That's, you know, one of the reasons why they've ended up in a, in a referral unit that, you know, the schools they've been in have struggled so hard to keep them in their school, but not it's not succeeded for them.
So they've come to you for another chance and you mustn't give up on them, you know, even if it's as hard as it might be, you must give up on them. And I think that's true of all of us, isn't it? As hard as that is, you know, and as energy sapping as it can be, or as emotional sapping as it can be, never to give the impression of any child that you've dismissed them. That's it, which is why you were typing up those stories.
Elaine Long
It's funny what you said Annie about those kids actually being the ones you like the most. Because I remember I started at a new school and I was quite an experienced teacher. But I think everyone that's an experienced teacher will know that when you start a new school, it feels like starting from day 1, or at least it did to me because, you know, you have no automatic respect in school and I had a disastrous week with my year 8s and I felt, you know, mortified at the lack of effort and I thought, oh, they all hate me because I lost my temper and I shouted out them and all gone badly and then I was out on the weekend and I bumped into one of the students and I thought, Oh, you know, this is all I need in my weekend.
And I'll never forget the brightest smile and he was so pleased to see me and he told me, It's just so I know it sounds really, really silly, but it just made me rethink, I shouldn't take it personally. They don't hate me because I shouted at them. They've forgotten about it. Actually, they have moments in the lesson that they fought were good and it just completely reframed my thinking and that’s probably a really silly example, but it does make you think that often you can take away stuff from the lesson that the students just don't take it away in the same way in terms of behaviour.
And which brings me on to the next question actually, which is you must have I know you're the people that were asking to give advice and also people often go to for advice, but you must have had people pass on advice to you throughout the course of your careers and which, which is good and bad and I'm interested in what's the best piece of advice you've ever been given Annie.
Annie Powell
I've had so much advice and I couldn't think of, it was really hard to narrow down. One of the things which did pop into my head was something which really sustained me in the first couple of years of my career, which was we got during our PGCE training. Chris Husbands sort of was quite clear about, you know, you learn how to plan lessons, you know, with your key stage three class and actually it's exactly the same four key stage four and key stage five.
You're not doing something utterly different. It's still learning and it's still learning about content and our case history. So get the objectives right and just teach them lessons just because they're 18 years old, you know, they're still children learning. So, I still try and when I'm planning lessons, you know, which you don't have to do so much now because you've got lots of things on the system, but you still end up having to do some.
You know, I just think what's a good lesson? How can I do some interesting activities to get, you know, to build their understanding and develop, you know, base it on their prior learning and so on. It shouldn't be different whether it's, you know, like a seven year old or an 18 year old. It's still children learning, isn't it?
Mark Quinn
I remember him giving exactly that same advice and I agree we probably all feel this, but because Helen, you and I were on teacher placement together weren’t we and I remember we were given lots of GCSE and A-level classes. The teacher, we thought we were prepared to do this. We didn't get any tuition from Dr. Chris Husbands and how to teach A-level and I'm going back into this the session at UEA and saying, Chris, Chris, Chris, can you teach us how to teach A-level and he did exactly what you said Annie, he said that, you know, it's the well that taught you how to teach. Key stage three. It's not it's not so very different and he wasn't so very wrong, was he?
Helen Lugger
I remember that feeling of dread when we had those A-level classes, thinking, I have no idea, but I know, it's true, isn't it? You're teaching the children. You're, you know, you're looking at the learning and it's all the same, but it's just the different content. Definitely.
Elaine Long
I think A-level could be more about getting your head around the content as well. This was definitely was in term of English and more complex and more difficult, and it was more about focusing on my subject knowledge as well when I was teaching
Over to you Mark for the next question
Mark Quinn
Well, you know, with nearly 60 years of teaching between you, something funny must have happened. So, you know, there are there are things you can tell us and the things that you can't tell us. But, you know, it's a very serious job and this has been a very serious podcast. We've obviously got a therapy dog in the background there Annie, so any lighter moments you can share with us?
Annie Powell
She's usually really good. I'm sitting at my desk now go to bed and she normally ignores me when I've gone to my desk because she has a big boring and working, but she's a bit puzzled by this. I think a couple of things occurred to me. One is that the only other time she's actually intruded on a meeting, I was in a HoDs and SLT meeting. I was doing it remotely for various reasons and Mark was working in the desk, so I was in the front room and so I had to sit on the sofa and the dog could not get our heads around this and she literally kept joining into my meeting, to the point where that the head was talking about counselling and offered to buy a therapy dog for the kids if it helped.
And the other thing which happened very early on in my career is as a supremo of the history department, head of department I was actually at home and my colleague, my junior colleague accidentally dialled my number while she was teaching not conscious of it and I could hear her teaching and she doing some really nice stuff.
So, I eventually managed to cut the phone line off and I phoned the school switchboard and gave her some notes on her lesson, including asking her to turn her phone off, which she did.
Mark Quinn
Did you grade her lesson as well Annie? What did you give her?
Annie Powell
Oh, it was outstanding.
Mark Quinn
Helen
Helen Lugger
Well, yes, working in a PRU, was probably quite a few things that I'd love to tell you about, but I won't. I was having a think about this and we're going back to mainstream days now. So, a few years ago and it was a sports day and I noticed that all the kids are set on the field and have to sit in their form groups.
But there was a group of year 11 girls that absolutely refused to sit on the field and therefore get up against wall in the shade. So, as head of year, I was sent over, you know, go investigate, see what was going on, and speaking to them, you know, why don’t you go and sit with your form, what was the problem?
“Well, Miss, it's really sunny and we don't want our eyebrows to melt. So, that's why they were sat in the shade. So, not quite a teaching story, but it made me giggle.
Elaine Long
I think that's perfectly reasonable. So sadly, we know you've given up your time in your holidays and we want to let you return to your holiday but it'd be remiss of us to let you go without asking our final question that we ask everybody, which is that we'd like to give you a Post-it note to write some advice on for somebody else.
You can stick this Post-it note, this metaphorical Post-it note anywhere you like, and you can write any piece of advice you want on it. So, for example, it could go on our desk here at UCL, it could go on a desk somewhere else or it could get on the desk of an early career teacher. So, Annie, I'm going to pass you the metaphorical Post-it, and I'd like you to tell us what you're going to write on it and where you'd like to stick it.
Annie Powell
I'm really rubbish at this, but I would like to give it to all the ECTs who might be listening and I would just write on it, you know, really enjoy what you're doing, it’s sometimes when you're under so much pressure, it's really hard to actually do that. But you know, this is a career that can go on, you don't have to burn out. It can go on for quite a long time. So really find the pleasure and flight, find the fun, find the enjoyment in, you know, every day, try and find something that will sustain you and keep you going for those moments when you have the nightmare from hell or something goes wrong, because it is fun actually, for all that. It is really tough, really hard work. You know, if you can crack it at all, it's brilliant. So, enjoy it.
Elaine Long.
Thank you. I'm sure that that's going to be wildly read and wildly appreciated as well and Helen, here is your Post-it note
Helen Lugger
Thank you. I think I've put this up in every staff room and I would say learn to use the expertise of your colleagues. We're a great bunch. Whether that's stuff in the classroom or whether it's having a chat in the staff room, you know, being amongst a supportive staff and knowing, you know, who's got the answer to various things. You can't beat that. You know, it's something that if you know you're all in it together, that makes a huge, huge difference.
Mark Quinn
Yep. That's why we called this the ECF staffroom, you know, we wanted it to replicate this notion of having one space where colleagues, experienced and less experienced come and meet together.
And as it's a staffroom and as the end of our session, I can hear the bell ringing.
Elaine Long
I can hear that bell as well.
Mark Quinn
Which is telling us that the caretaker wants us to go home and make dinner and see our children again and spend our time with our dog.
Helen, lovely to see you again. We'll have to make an arrangement to bump into each other again in the caravan in Norfolk sometime soon. Love to the family as well. Annie I'll see you in a couple of hours, I guess. Thank you for your time, both of you.
Elaine Long
So much for letting us bask in your wisdom.
Annie Powell
Thank you. Thank you.
Helen
Thank you for inviting us. Bye.
Mark Quinn
Our thanks, go to Annie Powell from the Urswick School in Hackney and Helen Lugger from Northeast Essex Co-operative Academy for sharing coffee with us this week in the ECF staffroom.
Elaine Long
We're particularly grateful to them for giving us the benefit of their wisdom of their 58 years experience and in fact we've just worked out if we add Mark and I's experience in the classroom to it, it makes 100 years of teaching experience between us, so hopefully you'll all be able to benefit from those 100 years. As usual please do get in touch with us, if you'd like to talk about your ECF experience, we specially want to hear from a range of different voices and in the meantime, we hope you join us next time for a biscuit and a chat with another colleague in the ECF staffroom.
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