Blogs from Bedfordshire, England, United Kingdom, Europe - page 3

Teaching this history class is a NIGHTMARE. They make me almost cry everyday. In fact, I would cry except that I don't want them to have the satisfaction, so I hold it in. I've never been one to hold in tears, because I find it painful. All that negative energy just stores up in your body and it's harmful. This class has thirty-two students, four of whom are girls. The rest are the most wild, immature boys I've ever seen in my life. They enter my classroom running and chasing each other, throwing chairs around and yelling. They refuse to sit in assigned seats; they prefer to sit by their friends and talk for the whole lesson. I'm up there trying to teach, and it's like background music that no one really pays attention to. They're ... read more

To fulfill the government requirement that all high school students in the UK receive Sex and Relationship Education (aka, SRE), my school has hired a lady from the Luton City Council to teach my Year 11 students during our enterprise lessons. Of course, we lay down some ground rules like, "No laughing at other people's questions" and "Don't ask personal questions or share personal information." But....can you imagine a room full of sixteen-year-olds talking about sex and relationships? Yep, that's exactly what it's like. The kind lady from the City Council travels to different schools teaching SRE. Since she doesn't know him, she doesn't realize Mitchell is just trying to be funny when he raises his hand and says, "Miss? I have gonorrhea." Everyone cracks up, trying to cover their smiles casually. "Mitchell," I say in ... read more

Since I moved to England, I've made many great "That's What She Said" jokes, and no one even cracks a smile. They just don't get it! I had to do something. About a week ago, I showed this video to Deanna, Igi, Jodi, and MaryJo: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q-wf2pP7T0Y . It's a compilation of all the That's-What-She-Said moments from the TV show The Office. I had to preface the viewing of the video with, "Keep in mind that it's a sexual innuendo." The first time I ever heard this joke was on the reality show Newly Weds featuring Jessica Simpson and Nick Lachey. (Yes, I'm embarrassed to admitt that I caught an episode or two when it was on.) They were finishing up dinner in a restaurant, and Jessica insisted on having dessert. Nick was saying, "No, honey, you ... read more

"Is that the inspector?" my students loudly ask, pointing at the lady who is surrounded by papers and staring at them from the back of the room. I almost laugh from the bluntness of the question. "Yes, but you shouldn't point at people, and if you have a question about her, you should ask her." Every department gets audited, and since I switched from science to humanities...I'm faced with another audit. However, this time, the inspector will be observing the end of my year 7 foundations class. Foundations is a brand new course this year, and it combines PSHE ("character education") and geography. Unfortunately, my school doesn't have enough actual foundations teachers, so they've grabbed a PE teacher and some other random teacher and forced them to teach a foundations class. Those teachers have no clue ... read more

Police are investigating an incident involving some of my students. Four boys from my school, two of which are my students, came across a cat in their neighborhood and started hurting it. Enjoying the cat's pain, they continued to do one thing to it after another. I won't go into detail about what they did, because I wish I could get those images out of my mind. Upon learning what they did to this innocent cat, my throat closes up, my stomach lurches, and tears spring to my eyes. But not enough tears to actually cry. My students tortured a cat to death. I assume it was in their neighborhood, because a girl (whom I also teach) heard the cat screaming and ran outside. She's a tough cookie, a little on the bitchy side. She can ... read more