I wish that I was ANY of these things!!!!

This has been sat on my desk since the Sports College conference in February. Its a nifty little packet of mints. They're now in my handbag ready to eat after I go to the dentist tomorrow - to get the taste of nasty dentistry things out of my mouth. Ugh!

I love the fact that the stick people look like they are running around in fright with their arms waving and their sticky up hair. I'm sure the designer didn't intend for that to be the interpretation, but thats how I see it.

Today I have a massive sense of achievement because I have really done absolutely stacks of stuff. This is partly because I know that I am not in work on Thursday and Friday because of the travelling to Cornwall and then the funeral, and also that I will not be back til late on Sunday, so I'll have no time to prep for work next week.

My achievements today:
Taught my own lessons - good they were too! Starting to get a steady stream of coursework coming in from my Year 10 kids - seem to be acquiring a sense of urgency and purpose - which is nice.

Supported a colleague who was in on supply cover - made sure that the seating records for both the lessons she taught in my room were done, did the registers, settled the kids, made sure she had everything she needed and then went back up at the end. Gave me a nice fuzzy feeling to know that I was being helpful - and that it was appreciated.

Set the cover work for my absence on Thursday and Friday, printed out worksheets and lesson plans, classlists with individual comments for every child about where they are up to and what they need to do. Must be mad - but I hate being away from my groups and I go to town on preparation to make sure that they can still progress with their work.

After school coursework session with one of my girls (who I mentioned yesterday) - it appears some numpty has accessed her workspace and has randomly deleted big sections of her coursework - I spent an hour this morning backtracking through back up versions to find as much as I could. She then asked me if she could stay to start re-doing the work...I feel really sorry for her, and I know that she is absolutely fuming, but she has accepted that being angry won't help her pass her GCSE, so she's just getting on with it. This is MASSIVE progress in terms of attitude and response from this young lady - made me really happy to see her being so mature about it.

Got home at 5, worked for 45 minutes marking some coursework.

Cooked tea - fresh ravioli with home made tomato, red wine and chilli sauce - it was a bit of a 'chilli roulette' meal - I had put rather a lot in, and some mouthfuls were fine, others were real burners ...even I broke a sweat and I am pretty good with hot food these days.

Sat down for half an hour after tea, then spent 3 hours marking coursework (24 portfolios checked and annotated this evening), prepping my lesson for tomorrow (past paper questions, with guidance and then a marking exercise for the kids so that they know how they will be assessed in the exam). Printed more materials for my lessons for Thursday, sent a couple of work emails, and finally got around to doing my blip.

Dentist in the morning, SMT, double lesson ICT, an hour to finish off my year 11 reports then staff training till 5.15 tomorrow.

I'm knackered!