How long now?

Boy it's been terrifyingly long since I've been able to post on this thing. My new job, being stuck in Twickenham without internet, and general disillusionment with blogging have conspired to my silence. So if anybody still checks this thing after over 3 months of silence, thank you for taking an interest.

I'm actually writing from Coffee Republic in Twickenham (how middle class of me) over my honey-flavoured cappucino, as I'm supposed to be searching for a new job for September. The school had apparently hired somebody already, so I'm on my proverbial rear for the new term. Luckily there's a horrific shortage of teachers still, so it shouldn't be that hard to find work.

I can't imagine why people don't want to be teachers here. I mean, you get to wake up at 5.00am to get to school in the transport system (a short commute is about 1 hour), get to school where you don't have any workspace of your own to prepare for a full day of teaching, with 11 different classes. You get a laptop which doesn't work, you get to see about 8 different classrooms in the space of just one day (they move you around to keep you on your toes), and all this for about half the average salary of anybody else with the same qualifications in London. You are told exactly what you should be doing at any moment of your teaching just in case you don't trust the four years of university and teacher training you've put yourself through, and you get to attend a parents' evening, a department meeting or any of 5 other types of meetings in the space of an ordinary week. Meetings!!! Yay!

Report writing, documenting absences, filling in forms for the Head of Year, filing resources and not being allowed to contact parents are only some of the perks of the job which aren't even mentioned in the job description (they must run out of space on the website), and if you are afraid you might get bored or lonely on a lunchbreak, you can be sure someone will get you to supervise a lunch club, a detention or any of the other activities which replace the ennui of actually eating.

When you are removed forcibly from the building by 6pm, you'll have an evening of marking to keep you from any dangerous personal activities (sports, culture, reading - God forbid) which will be due the next day. Two pieces of homework per week, set by somebody else, for each student of your 11 classes, plus marking the enormous copybooks they carry will guarantee that they don't go into any real depth in the topics they study, by keeping all tasks short and snappy. Happy clappy. Year ten and eleven exam coursework will be controlled, moderated, set and moderated again - and then, just in case, moderated - by other teachers in the department (i.e. you, when it comes to everyone else's coursework) to ensure complete exhaustion of the marking process. Complete and utter exhaustion to the very last toe-curling drip of coursework juiciness.

Sharing classes with other teachers means that you can avoid those pesky relationships with students, or getting attached to them and building an intellectual response beyond what happens in that one lesson. And lessons are divided into 30 to 35 minute periods, guaranteeing that nothing too substantial happens in the classroom (because if it did, then the marking would be ridiculous!).

So by and large, the system here works well for everyone concerned. Throw interactive whiteboards (giant computer screens) into each classroom and a training session for each teacher, and you've got the real deal, the interactive entertainment, Warner-Brothers-eat-your-heart-out, surround-sound experience of your local Imax cinema in your local classroom. You can shower with video clips and powerpoint the bejesus out of every kid in that room to stave off the boredom of listening to the teacher.

What more could an educator possibly ask for?

Off I go to apply for another job, in anticipation of tomorrow morning's fun-loving schooltastic experience.

By the way, for those of you who are wondering, the picture is of the famous London guitarist Will Rutter standing in front of a car-pooping chicken, sported by a trendy modern art exhibition in central London. Don't ask.