Teacher Training in Tough Times (I)
‘I didn't think that it would be like this’.
By Rachael Cooper (England)
I don’t feel like a ‘real teacher’.
In September 2019 I began my teacher training.
Teaching was in my family history to the point where it began to feel like it was in my blood.
I was excited, I was ready.
I started my training in a school in East London with a high percentage of pupil premium, in a tough area. To my delight and surprise I felt that I was managing my workload and even beginning to see the students’ progress. The classroom felt like an extension of home, with supportive staff and the hilarious antics from the pupils showing me that I had done the right thing.
I was in the right place. Everything was going wonderfully.
Then in March 2020 the pandemic began to weave itself around the country like a snake and we were given the dreaded news that schools would be (physically, at least) closed. Panic ensued for the trainees at our university.
As Course Rep I was bombarded with questions from my colleagues: ‘will we still pass?’ ‘will we get jobs?’. The biggest of these was: ‘how will we cope in September?’. That was of course, something none of us knew. Would we manage to remember how to do it after having our training cut in half? What would that mean for our future?
Our training provider assured us that, after training in these tough times, we would be in high demand. Things could only get better now, surely?
In September 2020 I relocated to the other side of the country to begin teaching in a school back home. I was to begin my Newly Qualified Teacher (NQT) year in a school that I had never visited, to work with colleagues I had only met through a screen in my spare room, and to lead my own classes when I had only spent the equivalent of half a term teaching. To say I was petrified would be a gross understatement.
My headteacher had made the decision to implement masks throughout lessons for all staff and pupils, a decision which in hindsight was entirely ahead of the curve. The mask wearing added to the dystopian feeling, as terms such as ‘bubbles’, ‘self-isolation’ and ‘social distancing’ became the ‘new normal’ .
My form were a bunch of terrified Year 7s who, having missed out on the assemblies, parties and outings of typical transition for Primary, were thrust into the environment of a Secondary School with only the preparation that could be given to them through video. At the time of writing, they have still not been able to have a tour of the school - a term and a half later.
After a few teething problems with mask wearing and physical contact between pupils, they began to settle into a routine, getting used to the constant sanitising and distancing to get on with the business of learning.
I myself settled into the routine of masking up and careering between different areas of the school to teach different year groups. As teachers we kept a sense of humour, exclaiming ‘getting my steps in!’ at every opportunity as we passed colleagues in the corridor. The family feel of our lovely school was - is - the reason I haven't lost my nerve or quit. I have had to change my pedagogical approach to teaching almost entirely. I based most of my PGCE research on the benefits of socio-cultural work between pupils, with most of my lessons relying at least in part on group work or pair work, the ‘more knowledgeable other’ being often quoted in my lesson plans. In a pandemic classroom this is not possible, pupils are required to stay seated away from each other as much as possible and group work has had to be put on hold for health reasons.
I am unable to live mark work as that would involve being too close to pupils, and books have to be marked within the year group ‘bubble area’.
To quote one of the poems I am teaching to Year 11 at the moment:
‘I had not thought that it would be like this’.
However, training and beginning my NQT year in a pandemic has given me the opportunity to be privy to the extraordinary resilience of both educators and children.
We were asked to provide live learning with little to no warning, and we did.
We have asked pupils to wear masks and stay six feet away from their friends at all times, and they did.
We are still teaching, they are still learning, and there is still opportunity for humour, interesting lessons and progress, both during physical lessons and through the computer.
I write this at a time when we are teaching from home, and I spend my days in my spare room on the computer, creating Loom lessons so that pupils are able to benefit from seeing a friendly face when they, too, are working from home. I attend live lessons so that we are still able to have real time interaction with our pupils. They continue to make me laugh with their jokes and their comments of ‘Miss it’s lovely to see you!’ ‘Miss I miss you!’ help me to keep going.
As an NQT at this time I lack the experience to know what it’s like when schools are ‘normal’ as opposed to the ‘new normal’. I have never had my own classroom, I have never experienced a school trip and I have never done a parents evening that wasn’t on a screen.
I don’t feel like a ‘real teacher’.
These have been the hardest two years of my life, but I have done it. We have all done it, and when we reach the point where we go back to the classroom fully, the resilience and hard work we have put into this challenging time will all pay off. We will not be afraid.
We are the trainees of the pandemic, and we are undefeated.
By Rachael Cooper (England)
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