Watch da Road

As a PSHE teacher, I have to teach riveting and important topics like road safety. I'm doing this with my Year 8s and using a teaching pack called 'Street Safe'. It provides all sorts of teaching suggestions, including a rap song to force people to slow down. It gives an example 'to get the creative juices flowing'. I won't type the whole thing - the best bits are as follows:

"I know a guy called Jay and he thinks he's BIG
He liked to drink Glen's down "swig by swig"
Got hit by a Mercedes nearly split his wig
Left the logo on his face, messed his looks up kid

(Shakespeare would be proud with those rhyming couplets, no??)

Listening to loud music crossing the roads is DUMB
As well as being drunk out ya mind now son
So use ya brain, or ya life could be done
Don't be like Jay, stop 'N' look don't Run

Blazin, not payin attention
Run a old man over, who was cashing his pension,
Threw him throught the air with the power
Cos he was driving his Corsa, hundred miles per hour

Cruisin wid ma mate T all around town
He was actin too crazy; I said "turn the sounds down"
But he didn't hear, too late the car spun around,
Crahed into a pick-up truck, it made a crunch sound


- Mercury Music Prize next year - watch this space - thank god Lennon is dead - he'd be turning in his grave if he was alive...

You've gotta laugh - homeboy.

Had quite a good weekend. Lehna came on Friday and we went to 'Ning' - the oddly named but brilliant Thai and Malay restaurant in the Northern Quarter. I had Pad Thai - a traditional dish by all accounts - and it was lovely, really geniune too according to Lehna who knows a thing or two about SE Asian food. The beer which I've heard so much about - Beerlao - didn't come cheap (£3.95 a bottle), but it went down well, especially with this type of food which makes you pretty thirsty.

Saturday morning - up relatively early (no monging until 12 like last week) and off on the train to Edale in the Peak District - did a quick walk halfway up Kinder Scout and it was lovely - will definately be making a few more trips eastwards while I am in Manchester.

Came back, dropped Lehna off at Piccadilly, marked some books then went out for a few drinks with James, Chris, Rach and Heather.

Sunday - more marking (done properly it takes bloody aaaages!), then off to The Waterhouse for Sunday dinner and a reunion with the Jaffa Cakes - friends from my trip to Israel. Conversation naturally revolved around the teaching profession and the Holocaust (riveting) and it was good to see everyone on home turf. Then it was home and - guess what - more marking, and some planning.

A pretty full weekend, much fun was had - I'm doing something every weekend until half term - plenty play will keep me sane as the work keeps rolling in - I've not got Sunday night depression - things must be looking up...

Tory party conference this week.

Definately due another rant!

Not posted since 12th July and my has a lot happened since then! A few days after my last post I took myself of to Berlin for a few days and soaked up the sights, sounds and smells. Then a couple of weeks after that I went to Jerusalem. Had a fantastic time in so many respects. Since then, my life has revolved round one thing: Crompton House School - me and Chris are settled into 'Alan Towers' - the 'Pleasure Palace' - or whatever you want to call it. It certainly was disconcerting to arrive and find that, as a result of our heterosexuality, we were in the minority. In the spirit of equality, we neglected to drape a swastika out of our balcony-cum-pation (it's just not cricket) and are becoming well known amongst 'the boys' (we even had a drink on canal st. this week - I'd been to see Tony Benn but that's a different story) and of course the girls. Their favourite pastime is playing rugby.

Ah, I love the gays. Anyway CHS - as expected, my feet haven't touched the ground. All going reasonably well, a few issues here and there, PSHE lessons are a bugger for managing behaviour and I'm finding that there are so many more things to worry about when you're no longer an NQT. For a start, seeing pupils over an extended period of time, not to mention the quality of the school, means that tracking is a serious issue. I'm chasing up more pupils more than I ever have done before, not because they're crap (they've not got any competition from St. Aidans - RIP) but because I'm trying to be conscientious. Anyway, the main thing is that I'm enjoying it.

I've also enjoyed the politics - my enthusiasm hasn't yet quite rubbed off on the pupils:

AS Student - What lesson have you got now Sir?
Mr Owen - PSHE, Year 9
AS Student - I bet you wish you had us for Government and Politics...?
Mr Owen - Do I??! I could blab on about party systems all day
AS Student (under her breath) - Don't we know it...

So far so good anyway. Politically, I've been pretty active recently - went to some Labour Conference finge meetings recently (IDS, Polly Toynbee, Martin Narey, Liam Byne on Child Poverty and middle England's response and a Socialist Campaign Group Meeting with Tony Benn, John McDonnell, Diane Abbott et al.) and actually finally joined the party for a quid. Not bad! The boss is a Lib Dem councillor - I need to stop making my lessons so overtly partisan and, in particular, stop slating the Liberals for their unelectability!!!!!

So, busy busy...I'm sure it will all settle down, come half term at least!

Ciao!