My mojo is back

After feeling a bit flat and despondent for the last couple of weeks I have my mojo back and it's all thanks to a boys school down at Southend on Sea.  But before I get to the good bit, let's start with the not so good.....

For the last month or so I have busted my wee guts looking for teaching work, but week after week after week nothing was forthcoming and slowly but surely my mojo packed its bags and headed south.

And then, just when I was at the very depths of my mojo-less despair I got a call - would I like a day's work at the Fitzwimarc School in Rayleigh.   Is the pope catholic?  Of course I would!  This was the start I'd been waiting for, except for one tiny detail - I was to be employed as a "cover supervisor" as opposed to a "supply teacher".

So, off I went to the lovely Fitzwimarc School not really knowing anything about cover supervisors or what they were expected to do.  Well, after a days work that included taking 5 one hour science classes I can quite confidently say I can see no difference whatsoever between the role and responsibilities of a cover supervisor and that of a supply teacher.  For schools however, there are two important distinctions.  One - cover supervisors do not need qualifications, teaching or otherwise which means two - schools can employ them at a fraction of the cost of employing a supply teacher.  It is pretty much two for the price of one, and for my efforts on Friday I was rewarded with all of  £60, roughly £8 an hour.

As you can imagine, this was not quite the introduction to teaching in England that I had hoped for, in fact it didn't even feel like a viable option for me, for despite the benefit of gaining experience within a school and perhaps getting a foot in the door, some part of me just couldn't accept being paid £8 an hour.  And if cover work was to be my main form of "teaching" then things weren't looking good.  And just to rub salt in the wound, we had a leaflet in the mail from someone offering to do cleaning and ironing for £12.50 an hour!

So, even after the long awaited first day's work my mojo remained firmly down south.

But then yesterday along came Southend High School for Boys, this school wasn't after a cover supervisor,  they wanted the real deal, they wanted a supply teacher.  But me, still in a funk, still minus my mojo didn't really want to go and I was feeling so poopy I was even wondering if the whole switch to teaching was proving to be one big mistake.

A happy Penny with mojo restored

(NB - It took all my will power not to photshop out all
 the crows feet, grey hair, frown lines, wrinkles and zits!)

BUT yesterday was fantastic!  Southend High School for Boys is a happy place.  The students are happy, the teachers are happy and pretty much from the moment I walked in I started to feel happy.

I taught 5 lessons - 2 physics, 2 English and 1 history. The boys were so unbelievably well behaved and polite.  They didn't sit down until asked and at the end of the lesson waited to be dismissed.  They all wear uniforms with ties and jackets and look fabulous. It was a world away from my experience at a certain high school in Canberra that shall remain nameless.  I thoroughly enjoyed my day and it has done a lot to dispel my recent reservations about teaching. And the best thing - they've asked me back for two more days.

So, the mojo is well and truly back and things are definitely looking up :)