This week was half term, which would be more relevant if I had actually found a teaching job by now (okay, I know this is getting tiresome - I will stop going on about it!) but for little Z it means she does not have to go to school this week. PP had also booked the week off and so we all went off to Brixham in Devon for 5 days. We had collected our tokens in the Sun newspaper and booked our holiday online (a privilege allowed only to those who have been on a Sun Holiday before as we have). It cost us £9.50 each and then £10 for linen & services. So, for less than £50 we got to stay at Pontins' Wall Park Holiday Village in Brixham for 4 nights. It was great. The accommodation was a little on the small size and PP and I had to sleep on a sofa bed, which was not all that comfortable, but we had loads of great days out and spent some quality time together as a family. The best day out was undoubtably our trip to Dartmouth. We travelled by steam train from Paignton to Kingswear then took the passenger ferry across to Dartmouth where we then took a lovely walk for just over a mile to Dartmouth Castle. Dartmouth was really beautiful. I would love to go back there and spend some more time looking around, but have been warned that it is better explored on foot rather than by car.
So, a fantastic week was had by all, particularly the credit card company, who will probably have benefitted most from our day trips and visits to various tack-filled souvenir shops! I would definitely recommend collecting the tokens and trying out one of these holidays.
Saturday, October 28, 2006
Monday, October 09, 2006
Happy Birthday
Little Z's 7th birthday is finally over and I must admit that I am not sorry to see the back of it. Yes, I know that sounds like I am talking about a visit from a bossy old aunt (don't have one of those, all my aunts are lovely - just in case they ever get a computer and read this!!), but she has been talking about her birthday daily since Christmas and has got much worse since May when practically everyone in the extended family apart from Little Z has their birthday.
The day itself went very well. She managed to get up early (a major achievement in itself) to open the presents which had arrived and was very happy with what she got. Being a very girly girl, she was given lots of dressing up costumes, hair accessories and jewellery. She had a lovely day at school. She got to stand at the front of the class while they all sang "Happy Birthday" and then she was allowed to "show & Tell" some of her pressies. At the end of the day Granny & Seany turned up to surprise her from school and we had a little (okay, it was quite big) buffet style tea party.
The problem with children's birthdays is that they always seem to last longer than 1 day. Little Z's birthday continued into Saturday, when we decided to go out to Lepe Country park (again) for a walk on the beach (Granny was there this time to watch Seany and make sure he played nicely!). We still had loads of food left from the Friday's buffet, so we had another tea party to finish that off. Then on Sunday, Little Z had her party at Ollie's, an indoor soft play centre in southampton, with nine of her friends.
Ollie's did us proud with the party. I didn't have to life a finger, except to write the cheque at the end, but it was not too expensive. It cost just over £7 per child which included 1 hour play, 45 mins in the party room for food, our own party hostess, party bags, unlimited cold drinks for the children during play and party time and a couple of free hot drinks for the PP & I. It was well organised, the food was good and the children enjoyed themselves. It would have cost far more than that at home and I would have had to do all the organising and cleaning up too. for seventy odd pounds its worth it to save us the stress.
So, now it is all over for another year, little Z has already started talking about Christmas with the occasional mention of Halloween and Guy Fawkes night.
The day itself went very well. She managed to get up early (a major achievement in itself) to open the presents which had arrived and was very happy with what she got. Being a very girly girl, she was given lots of dressing up costumes, hair accessories and jewellery. She had a lovely day at school. She got to stand at the front of the class while they all sang "Happy Birthday" and then she was allowed to "show & Tell" some of her pressies. At the end of the day Granny & Seany turned up to surprise her from school and we had a little (okay, it was quite big) buffet style tea party.
The problem with children's birthdays is that they always seem to last longer than 1 day. Little Z's birthday continued into Saturday, when we decided to go out to Lepe Country park (again) for a walk on the beach (Granny was there this time to watch Seany and make sure he played nicely!). We still had loads of food left from the Friday's buffet, so we had another tea party to finish that off. Then on Sunday, Little Z had her party at Ollie's, an indoor soft play centre in southampton, with nine of her friends.
Ollie's did us proud with the party. I didn't have to life a finger, except to write the cheque at the end, but it was not too expensive. It cost just over £7 per child which included 1 hour play, 45 mins in the party room for food, our own party hostess, party bags, unlimited cold drinks for the children during play and party time and a couple of free hot drinks for the PP & I. It was well organised, the food was good and the children enjoyed themselves. It would have cost far more than that at home and I would have had to do all the organising and cleaning up too. for seventy odd pounds its worth it to save us the stress.
So, now it is all over for another year, little Z has already started talking about Christmas with the occasional mention of Halloween and Guy Fawkes night.
Tuesday, October 03, 2006
Have you seen the old gal?
After applying for a job at the first of the two schools I visited last week, I was very pleased to receive a call on the same day inviting me for an interview. I would have to teach a 15 minute lesson in the morning and then they would shortlist candidates for interviews in the afternoon. I was told they wanted me to "share a story" with a class of year 5 children (9-10 year olds) and that they would be looking for pupil engagement (are the children interested?), good pace (keeping the lesson moving at a good pace so the children don't get bored) and speaking and listening opportunities (not just reading a story to the children, but getting them involved in discussion).
I suppose many people may think 15 minutes is a long time, but actually I found it very hard to limit my lesson to 15 minutes. It is certainly not long enough to share a whole book with pupils, so as I thought most of the interviewees would probably be sharing an excerpt from a book, I decided to do something different in an effort to show creativity. So, I found this picture:
and played the song “Streets of London” by Ralph McTell. Then we discussed what we might like to find out about the woman in the picture and what questions we could ask her and what the answers might be.
I enjoyed the lesson, but apparently more than the observers did. I didn’t get it.
However, although I am disappointed they did not like my lesson enough to interview me in the afternoon, I must feel pleased that out of 25 people who applied, I was one of 8 invited to attend the morning interview/lesson. They interviewed only 3 people in the afternoon, so I was not the only one disappointed. Also, I am applying for 2 other jobs which I would rather have than that one, so it did save me having to find a polite way of saying, “Thank you for wasting your time interviewing me, but I don’t really want the job anyway, I am only here for the experience!”
Got some hard work to do now on my personal statement for the next application due in tomorrow!
I suppose many people may think 15 minutes is a long time, but actually I found it very hard to limit my lesson to 15 minutes. It is certainly not long enough to share a whole book with pupils, so as I thought most of the interviewees would probably be sharing an excerpt from a book, I decided to do something different in an effort to show creativity. So, I found this picture:
and played the song “Streets of London” by Ralph McTell. Then we discussed what we might like to find out about the woman in the picture and what questions we could ask her and what the answers might be.
I enjoyed the lesson, but apparently more than the observers did. I didn’t get it.
However, although I am disappointed they did not like my lesson enough to interview me in the afternoon, I must feel pleased that out of 25 people who applied, I was one of 8 invited to attend the morning interview/lesson. They interviewed only 3 people in the afternoon, so I was not the only one disappointed. Also, I am applying for 2 other jobs which I would rather have than that one, so it did save me having to find a polite way of saying, “Thank you for wasting your time interviewing me, but I don’t really want the job anyway, I am only here for the experience!”
Got some hard work to do now on my personal statement for the next application due in tomorrow!
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