Dealing with a difficult parent.

I dutifully returned the call of a parent concerned about her fourteen year old son’s progress in Year 8 English. The previous week, parents had received their child's ‘interim’ reports. Every six weeks, in addition to parent teacher interviews and formal reporting, our school prepares these reports for close to a thousand students. (That's a lot of reporting.)

After telling me she was concerned about her son’s unsatisfactory progress, the call proceeded thus:

Her: My son is only getting Ns in your class.

Me: What are you implying?

At this stage of my career, I’m sick of parents ringing up and thinking they can malign my teaching competence in this way. It’s something I have never done when addressing the teachers of my own kids. It’s simply rude. It’s even more rude given my status within my school and my excellent reputation - no false modesty. But I suppose she’s not to know me from a bar of soap.

Now of course I understand just about the entire psychology of parental investment in their children. Yes, it’s probably an unfathomable body of work, but I’m getting a bit long in the tooth and I know what I know, based on protracted, sometimes excruciating years of experience as a moderately intelligent teacher, and parent of a couple of occasionally ‘ne’er do well’ children to boot. I know how terrible it feels when you know you’ve put in so much as a parent and your kids won’t come to the party and satisfy your parental needs with 'braggable' ENTER scores and virtuosity in the performing arts or rocket science.

I take umbrage at the implication that it is my teaching that is making her boy fail.

This mother assured me that she wasn’t implying anything; she just couldn’t understand why her son was passing in every other teachers’ classes and failing in mine. Again, the castigations.

She wanted more from me, more than the blood I’m already giving.

She was demanding time that I don’t have to spare, given the fact that I’m just about always in the classroom, either teaching, or counselling and consoling year 12 students, or dealing with the occasional recalcitrant who needs a bit of a talking to at the end of a lesson, away from an audience. If I’m not in the classroom, or guarding the yard, I’m in a bleeding hour long meeting after school three afternoons a week. Or on the phone taking shit from caustic parents. I suppose she and her ne’er do well son could catch me for a spot of private tuition after I’ve done my weekly five hours of assessment and correction in bed on a Sunday morning.

The conversation became quite terse:

Her: Well, if you haven’t got the capacity to assist my son…

Me: I beg your pardon. Have you any idea how rude you sound?

But ultimately, despite twenty minutes on the phone, generally biting my tongue and being my political best, I was unable to ameliorate the situation.

And unfortunately, after I hung up the phone I burst into tears of frustration at the unfairness of it all, in front of two of my colleagues, one of whom is only twenty four, a new teacher in the area I coordinate and just embarking on her career. I felt pathetic.

Next day, the parent has followed through with a facetious open email, which borders on harassment, to the school office, which was then forwarded to me and the head of the junior school.

Fortunately, the junior school and year 8 coordinators are well apprised of my abilities as a teacher and have assured me I will not have to communicate with this parent again.

The irony is that it doesn’t matter how many successes I have, it’s these incidents that have the power to overwhelm me; hence the need to vent on a blog that is rarely read, to put it out there to float around unnoticed in the ether forever. But it has more chance of surviving than my volumes of self-absorbed journals, which my daughter, a writer herself, has assured me she will compost as soon as I’m in the nursing home, if not before.

Time for a chardonnay.

Sometimes it all falls into place

Today has been a magic day at school. It's good to acknowledge these days. My plans came to fruition.

Since December last year, as I'm sure have many of my colleagues around Melbourne, I've been planning for our VCE students to see a performance of Eagle's Nest Theatre's production of The Crucible.

Big deal, some may say. But I hate organising such events - or 'incursions' as it says on our school's official forward planning form. (Nothing like a raid to get the heart started. ) And I always feel responsible for the success of such ventures. A couple of years ago, I took a group of students to see a performance of Stolen at the Malthouse. Our team of Year 12 English teachers had spent a good six weeks or so battling against our students' racist attitudes prior to the performance. The performance in itself was excellent, but the ensuing Q and A was a disaster. One of the performers 'paid out' somewhat on the non-indigenous audience and it was just the spark our students needed to reignite their racist flames. That young performer perhaps undid in a couple of angry comments - and fair enough - all the effort we'd put in to quell the endemic racism of many of our kids back then. It was really disheartening, and I, as the organiser of the excursion, felt that somehow I'd let the side down.

But today, everything worked, despite the limitations of the space we were able to offer the performers. They basically had to work in our 'theatre', which is really just three converted classrooms, one of which forms an endstage. I'm thinking there must have been twenty actors on that stage, many of whom were lined up, seated, not quite out of sight behind the curtains. There was no special lighting on the stage; no sound effects; no son et lumiere tricks. No, just a group of enthusiastic skilled performers who generally embraced their roles with gusto. The house lights were left on during the performance, which may have assisted with students' behaviour. But I think our kids were seriously engaged.

We've been studying The Crucible since the beginning of term. The students have already completed two pieces of writing on the Context. They've also watched the film. So today, they were generally looking forward to seeing a live performance.

For me, it was extremely rewarding to see about a hundred of our Year 12 kids suspending their disbelief and really getting involved. During the scene where Abigail pretends to see a bird in the rafters, many students stared around in horror to see what all the players were looking at. I even 'teared up' a bit at the poignant ending.

But the greatest part of the entire performance was how I felt about our kids. These students generally have not been exposed to any live performances, other than rock concerts and Big Days Out. They haven't seen any live theatre since an anti-bullying production in Year 8. Yet they were an excellent audience. I think I told one kid to put his foot down off the seat of the kid in front of him, which he did without demur. And the production took the best part of three hours. Our students missed their recess and three quarters of their lunch break, yet they quietly, respectfully watched the entire production. It was terrific to hear the genuine applause as the players took their bows at the end. Furthermore, the actors approached me at the end of the play to tell me our students had been just about the best audience they'd had since they'd been touring the play around the schools. I felt really proud.

Last period I taught - I use the term loosely; I was a bit worn out - one of my year 12 English classes. The students were full of chat about the production, quoting memorable lines and laughing at how they'd all jumped when Abigail started screaming. It was very gratifying for their teacher. Me.

Too old for this??

I've always quite enjoyed disruption in my school day. Others bemoan interruptions to their chemistry classes, their routines. Not I. I welcome little diversions in the order of the school day. Bring on the fire drill! It's a chance to get out in the fresh air and have a break. I like a bit of excitement, like the Year 12 coordinator interrupting my class twice today. It's a different face. Someone else to banter with.

So when the newish principal decided we would alter the arrangement of the school day I thought, what the hey? I've always worked in schools with six 48 - 50 minute periods per day. Change would be good; as good as a holiday.

So this altered timetable was more or less rushed through after about six months serious planning last year. Now it's careful what you wish for.

The new day is possibly killing me. I can feel the future years dropping from my life span. This is the thing. The periods are seventy five minutes long. That's four seventy five minute periods per day. Yes, the students are well and truly getting their 300 minutes of tuition each day, and there's less movement around the school and blah, blah, blah. But when one has first 'three on' it's hell on wheels, especially when one gets an emergency yard duty thrown into the mix, as I did today, and as frequently happens. Today it was morning assembly, Advance Australia Fair and all that, then into class for a 9.05 start. Double year 8, recess yard duty, year 12 after recess, and no break until 1.15. It's crippling me. After lunch I find it difficult to use my spare period effectively because I have that hit-over-the -head-with-a-housebrick feeling. Pity my colleagues with their four-on days. Happily, I'm spared that.

And I've got to do it all over again tomorrow morning.

The other problem is extras. Under the old system, one would rarely get an extra on a five on day. Now, however, most people have an average three periods a day, so when they get an extra, it's a full on day. And seventy five minutes is a long time to be taking an extra.

Oh for some real forward planning.

I hate parent teacher interviews

While I was talking to the first parent, the room started to shift around her. I felt spacey. It was probably the lighting in our school gym where we were all lined up in exam like rows. And the dread of the ordeal facing me. So to focus, I concentrated on her protruding teeth and her badly dyed blonde hair; her eyes were wrinkled around the edges from self-deprecating obsequious smiling.

“How’s her spelling?” she asked. “I can’t understand why she can’t spell. I never had a problem with spelling.”

How many parents tell the teacher – me, or me at ages 21 to 51 – except for that blissful ten years when I taught adults and didn’t have to wade through this necessary shit – what they were like as students? Or they tell their kids off in front of the teacher, as if that will have more effect, or to show that they are serious parents and it’s not their fault that their kid is recalcitrant, or whatever.

I asked Fart Boy, when he made his appointment, how he thought his parents would react if I told them how many times he disrupted the class with his explosive bowels.

“My dad will think it’s hysterical,” he boasted. “He taught me everything I know.” And then I meet mum and dad; middle aged, ordinary people. Fart Boy has preempted anything I might say to his parents. They allude to it. I tell them he says his dad thinks it’s funny. Dad looks embarrassed. Clearly, small conservative bald dad isn’t full of the bravado that his son is.

At my most recent parent teacher day/evening, between one and eight pm, with an hour break, I spoke to forty four families. Mostly the interviews were positive, but three were appalling. How can these ignoramuses possibly think that it serves their kids well if they give the teacher a serve?

They just don’t pay me enough for this torture.

In one interview, this harassed looking thirty something is restraining a struggling toddler on her knee. Another of her children stands quietly, its nose level with the edge of the table. Her daughter, my student, stands quietly behind her mother and father while the woman attacks me because I’ve given her daughter an ‘unsatisfactory’ on her interim report. She challenges every aspect of my teaching, makes me explain all my teaching methodology and then still won’t accept that her child deserved the grade. And she’s shouting and waving her free hand around while the toddler squirms to free itself. The woman is dressed in business clothes. Looks like she’s come straight from work. Her babies are driving her batty and perhaps she feels inadequate because she hasn’t paid enough attention to her daughter’s progress. So I have to pay the price and sit passively and wear her aggression because the customer is always right in these market driven league table days. She even slaps at the sign hanging on the front of the table which says I’m the English coordinator. “Coordinator. Hmmmph!” she says.

Furthermore, what does a kid’s grey unshaven father think will be achieved if he abuses the teacher on the basis of some spurious allegation made by his daughter, possibly to avoid a beating? This unkempt down-at-heel father sits in front of me. Because I’m dazed by the lights and the thirty something families I’ve already interviewed, I don’t immediately perceive his rage. He glares at me. Why have I made an example of his daughter because she didn’t have her text book? What?? That’s not true, I manage, but he’s not listening. A small crowd waits behind him. He’s right up in my face, eyes blazing, lips a thin line. Breathing at me. I tell him I won’t speak to him unless he calms down, which enrages him further. His daughter sits smugly beside him while he explodes. I stand and tell him the interview is over and begin to walk away.

“I demand to see the head-master,” he says. “Where is he? Where is he?”

“It’s a woman,” I say, and begin to walk away but he blocks my path. Meanwhile, my colleague intervenes and tries to direct the man away from the masses of parents witnessing the assault on the hapless teacher.

I head into an office with my heart beating rapidly and steady myself for about twenty seconds before I return to the hall and sit to interview the next parents. The mother immediately puts me at ease.

“It’s all right,” she says. “I understand. I’m a teacher.”

Reflections on my Saturday at the VATE conference

I didn’t get much out of the 2007 VATE conference.

Perhaps it’s best to examine it in context.

Let me go back a day.

I didn’t attend the Friday session of the VATE conference for a couple of reasons. First, it’s so bleeding expensive now it’s almost extortionate. I’m the English coordinator at my school and funding is scarce. To send teachers to the conference, not only must we pay for registration but we must also pay for CRTs to replace the staff who attend. Second, I would miss double year 12 English and it didn’t seem right to leave them just so I could have a PD day. So I sent two of my colleagues and satisfied myself with attending only the Saturday session.

When my year 12s told me on Thursday – the day before the VATE conference – that they would be away on a careers expo the next day I was a bit put out. The two replacement classes I was given didn’t help. But this is the teaching life, isn’t it?

Last period Friday is Year 10 English. Even on a good day, most of my year 10s are inclined to hyperactive bestiality. They can’t help it. And it’s not my fault. They were like that before I met them. Actually, after the occasional morning session with them, when I’ve put the chair and the whip down, I almost feel that I’ve made some slight progress with them, even after Swearing Emo Girl has effed and c-eed her way through the lesson and Fart Boy has punctuated every five minutes with his effluent wind section ejaculations.

But Friday, they were insane. Not worth describing. My strategy for coping with such behaviour is to tell myself that even if they’ve learnt nothing they will not leave the room until the floor is tidy and the chairs are put up on desks. Pathetic, but it generally retrieves some of my sanity at the day’s end. It almost happened according to plan, but when that bell sounded I was rushed at the door. I managed to intercept two students to make them finish off the job with the chairs.

Blonde Boy was compliant and even wished me a good weekend as he cheerfully left the room.

However, Aggro Girl was not so compliant and tried to barge through me in the doorway. Unfortunately, I have an inclination to resist such students. I caught her by the wrist as she pushed past me and ordered her back to clean up her area.

“Don’t touch me,” she snarled. Of course, I let go of her wrist.

“Because you are not an animal,” said I, “you will go back and pick up your chair.” (Sounds so pathetic when you write this stuff down, doesn’t it? In the scheme of life it’s less than crap.)

Anyway, she complied. I thanked her and wished her a good weekend. Honestly.

So imagine my surprise when fifteen minutes later I’m summoned to the AP’s office because an irate father has demanded to know why the English teacher has assaulted his daughter.

Dad is livid. “It takes a lot to make my daughter cry,” snarls this parent – an imposing dust covered bearded lumberjack of sorts. Aggro Girl is looking smug but won’t meet my eyes. There’s this other kid in there as well, who turns out to be the younger sister. She, too, says her piece, without looking at me. “She ad no right ta touch er!” Who are you? I’m thinking, and why has my esteemed leader allowed you to be present at the interview?

Finally, Dad is satisfied with my recount of events and my assurance that I had intended no physical or emotional assault on his daughter. But it left a nasty taste and made me realize how vulnerable I am – we all are – as teachers. We are at the mercy of such students. And how I wish I had a dollar for every parent who has said to me over the years that his or her son or daughter does not lie, when clearly kids do.

And for this I gave up the VATE conference? Perhaps though, it was a good reminder. Never touch a student. (Let’s face it, I shouldn’t have grabbed her wrist.) And students have no loyalty. But I’m sure that the next time one student starts smashing into another in the canteen queue I will still grab them both by the shirt front and march them to the coordinator’s office. Do you let them beat each other senseless while you stand back vainly blowing your whistle?

So sandwiched between that and a four hour pile of marking today, I had VATE on Saturday.

I felt dissatisfied with my VATE experience this year, apart from Ross Huggard’s presentation on Year 12 Creating and Presenting. He never fails to deliver. However, just one day didn’t do it for me this year, and the negatives obsessed me. I am utterly sick of those delegates in the audience who feel they have to contribute their own anecdotes whenever they get an opportunity; who hijack. I was in a small room with about twenty people and really wanted to hear what Susan La Marca and Pam McIntyre had to say about their new book, Knowing Readers. Yet I was surprised when Dr McIntyre spent too much time reading two picture books aloud to us like she was auditioning for Play School. I found the subsequent class activity twee and useless. It would have been enough to quickly relate Aidan Chambers theory from his book Tell Me, and trust that we’d be able to apply it in our own classrooms. But it took up time. As did three persistent audience members who felt they had to contribute their unoriginal thoughts on everything that was said. Unfortunately, both presenters happily listened, even encouraged these interjectors who were contributing such wisdoms as ‘kids say that they don’t like writing book reports’ or ‘it helps if you share your own love for books with your students’. Well, hello.

The presenters didn’t get through all their material, but three old teachers left the room feeling good about themselves and their invaluable contributions. I wasn’t one of them.

The forum, “Good English for Good Citizenship” was stimulating and one speaker, Mark Lopez, was provocative. I’m paraphrasing, but he said something which suggested that some students feel that they can’t confidently express their traditional, conservative or politically incorrect views to their English teachers, who are PC and left leaning. This was based on his experience as a tutor. It was infuriating to listen to, knowing how I’ve been shouted down by racist, homophobic students who think because there are more of them than me that they are right. He certainly stimulated responses, if not applause.

But the chair of the forum irritated me intensely, especially when the woman next to me mustered the courage to walk to the microphone to make a contribution and he made her stand there waiting while he told his own pompous little anecdote. And then I was trapped while the same chair received his life membership of VATE and I was forced to endure the accolades and his acceptance speech.

Just my opinion, of course. But VATE – and I know how much good tireless work this organization does – often seems to me like an exclusive little self-congratulatory Sunday afternoon club to which I’m certain I wouldn’t want to belong.

Next year, I expect I’ll return to the conference, but I’ll attempt to go for full immersion, instead of one day. If I survive the year 10s.

The art of the pathetic professional development presentation.

First, pay your audience to attend.

Last week. First week of term two.

Principal: I’d really like you and Helen to attend this Literacy PD.

Me: I did get the email about that PD but I didn’t think it would be appropriate for me as I attended a Literacy Coordinators’ conference for five days not so long ago at great expense to the school.

Principal: But they really want people to attend this PD. Maybe they haven’t had many takers because they’re prepared to pay schools to cover the cost of emergency teachers.

Me: But that will mean I’ll miss teaching my year 12s. Ahh, I suppose they’ll cope. They’ve got plenty of work to do. But Helen doesn’t normally work on Mondays. It’s her day off.

Principal: Do you think she might go anyway?

Me: Well, knowing Helen (very dedicated; always goes above and beyond the call) she won’t mind. Perhaps you could pay her the CRT money for working on her day off.

Principal: No. (Laughs nervously.) Well, I’ll put you both down for it.

Me: (Thinks. Hmm. Probably won’t be too bad. Two days off campus followed by Anzac Day on the Wednesday. It’ll be like a holiday week with a bit of learning thrown in. Pollyanna. Fool.)

The PD

A literacy resource has been created for literacy leaders in both primary and secondary state schools. This has been compiled by some hard-working seconded teachers who work for the department of education. The resource is actually useful in that it provides theory and teaching strategies and it’s linked to the Victorian Essential Learning Standards. The department is evidently keen to get it out there into schools. One requires a bit of time to get one’s head around this multi-layered resource; bit of time to read the dense text and work out all the interfaces. The PD time-out could be used very effectively to allow teachers to wrap their minds around it with a bit of planned direction.

But no.

Find a presenter who thinks very highly of itself. (Let’s protect this person by giving it anonymity, after all, this is just about me venting.) Give your presenter free rein to be spontaneous; to have a vague notion of where the day might serendipitously head. Allow the presenter to waste time by talking itself up and advertising its own private enterprise.

Find a presenter who claims to be a master of its field and who spends time explaining how clever it is and how much longer than everyone else it’s been teaching. Allow the presenter to bring in silly hats, bells, whistles, squeezy noise-makers, rattles and wigs. The presenter encourages us to play with and wear these toys. Isn’t the presenter a wag? Isn’t it jolly? Isn’t it so hilariously funny? Aren’t we all so stimulated to learn by this puerile patronizing adult play?

Spend the first forty-five minutes of everyone’s precious time getting them to introduce themselves around the room. That’ll get our presenter half way to morning tea break. Keep reminding the group of the time line for the day, rather than actually teaching them anything.

Tell the group they’re going to do a ‘jigsaw’ activity to share their expertise around the group. But first ask if anyone’s unsure what a ‘jigsaw’ activity is. Everyone knows, according to the lack of raised hands. But go on. Explain what the activity comprises anyway. After all, that’ll take up more time.

Now, give your captive teachers a vague task. They are required to read some brief theory about a literacy guru then share it with others in this jigsaw activity. “Right, you’ve got ten minutes. Right, stop. Time’s up,” our presenter says before we’ve had time to digest the material. Off we go to our allocated tables to try to sound intelligent. Somehow, we manage.

During the morning, we are encouraged to write our responses to the session on post-it notes and stick these to the whiteboard. Our presenter wants lots of notes. After lunch, our presenter – “I’m being very brave”, it says. “I’m not going to go home and cry” – reads out the negative comments. One reads. “This is vague and directionless. I have learnt nothing that I can use back in my school. It’s a waste of time.”

So, we’re made to ‘workshop’ this, and other negative comments, in groups. We’re required to valiantly turn the negatives into positives. We’re amazingly tolerant and kind in our responses. “Now wasn’t that a good activity? You can do the same with your own classes when they’re being negative!”

The post-it note activity takes around forty minutes. What had our presenter planned to do had five people in the group not been brave enough to write some honest comments?

And while all this transpires, our presenter drifts around the tables in a variety of wigs and hats, stating the bleeding obvious and big-noting itself, completely oblivious to the negative body language in the room despite being a self-proclaimed and no doubt masters-degreed expert in neuro-linguistic programming.

And I’ve got another day of it tomorrow. I regaled my hapless pharmacist with the story when I popped in to get another packet of Codral Day and Night tabs after the day had ended. Ironically, I would have had to stay home sick today had I been required to teach. His suggestion for coping with the second day of the presentation? When you get there, take two of the night time tabs.

I’d prefer to set my Year 10s on our presenter. They wouldn’t spare our presenter’s feelings.

Cheating

As a teacher of VCE English Units 3 and 4, I spend lots of time dealing with cheating in School Assessed Coursework. The fact that as teachers we can’t trust more than a few of our students really spoils the intent of the VCE English course.

In past years we allowed students to bring notes into Text Response and Craft of Writing SACs. To ensure consistency across classes, we specified that the notes had to be in the students’ own handwriting and that they were only allowed to bring in, say, two A4 pages. Of course, as specified in the Study Design the work had to be completed mostly in class and under teacher supervision. Seemed clear. Unfortunately, this allowed for cheating. Under such conditions, one student produced a film review vastly superior to anything that he had written, or that I believed he was capable of writing. Yet I’d supervised him, and the other students, closely during the SAC. He only had the permitted notes which I thought he’d produced largely under my supervision in a previous session.

At the next opportunity, I asked the boy to remain behind.

“Harry,” I said, “I don’t think this work is your own. You’re going to have to redo the SAC.” I can still see his open affronted mouth.

“I wrote that, I swear. You can ask anyone.”

“Look, Harry,” I said. “You’ve been getting a D average for the past two years. I know this isn’t your own work.”

“I swear to god it’s my work.”

“Well, I’m sorry, Harry, but I can’t accept it. I’m giving you the opportunity to repeat the task. You’re lucky to be given this opportunity. Many teachers would simply fail you.” I thought I was being extremely generous.

Just out of curiosity, I googled his work and, lo and behold, found the exact film review that he’d painstakingly hand-written on his two A4 sheets. He’d then evidently copied these a second time during the SAC.

Two days later, the principal summoned me. He questioned my supervision of SACs; demanded to know how I could have allowed this cheating to take place. You see, Harry had run home and told mum that his wicked teacher had accused her precious child of cheating. (By the way, how stupid was this kid??)

I explained exactly how Harry had managed to conceal his cheating and produced the article that the boy had plagiarised. Principal ordered me to ensure this never happened again. I must tighten up the procedure for SACs.

But mum was not mollified. Her hatred of me was put into writing for the record. How dare I suggest that her son wasn’t capable of producing A plus work? She trusted her son. Her son would never cheat. The teacher – me - was unprofessional and shouldn’t be allowed to teach let alone teach Year 12. And here’s the rub. Even after being shown the plagiarised documents she still didn’t believe that her son had cheated.

This incident prompted a review of our procedures for SACs. Students would no longer be permitted to use prepared notes during SACs.

Dictionaries would, however, still be permitted.

This year we’ve had a few incidences of students writing essays in their dictionaries. This happened in one of my classes. I was immediately suspicious when I noticed a student studying what appeared to be the Z section of his dictionary as soon as the SAC had begun.

In another teacher’s class, a student had meticulously typed an entire essay in about a 6 point font and had pasted it flawlessly throughout her dictionary.

Another of my students had his bag under his desk and for the duration of the SAC was taking surreptitious glances down at a page of prepared notes in his bag. I was very grateful to the student who dobbed him in because I had no idea, even though I was closely supervising. I just didn’t see him. He cheated so deftly and looked so innocent.

Another student, according to the posse that dobbed her in to the Year 12 coordinator, allegedly wrote parts of her essay on tiny scraps of paper concealed amongst the pencils in her pink pencil case. This one couldn’t be proved – the cleaner had emptied the bin where she’d allegedly disposed of the evidence - and the student had to be given the benefit of the doubt.

Now all bags and pencil cases must be placed at the back of the room before the SAC begins. Dictionaries must be surrendered to the supervising teacher at the start of the SAC. This hasn’t stopped kids writing essays on hands and arms. One desperate student had an intro on her palm and a topic sentence on each finger!

The craft of writing SAC is a joke. Our current practice – necessitated by the rifeness of cheating - is to ask students to produce a draft of each piece that they intend to complete in the SAC. Teachers comment on this first draft and make suggestions as to how it might be improved. Students must then reproduce this piece under exam conditions. Students with good memories can then vomit up what they’ve remembered. As if writers produce ‘finished’ pieces of writing in 90 minutes under such conditions.

We spend lots of time theorising about ‘Teaching and Learning’, and what is ‘powerful to learn’, thinking of all these wonderful ways to inspire learning. But this is the reality of the pressure of competition, disadvantaged desperate kids and the ENTER score.