I've been doing this job for over 27 years, the last 23 in the same place - a very-well-thought-of boys' independent school in the suburbs of a big city.

During my teaching practice and my early career I was frequently delighted and rewarded by seeing that little light come on in the kids' heads when they 'got it'. This now happens rarely. Instead, my bright teenage boys, who are motivated to succeed partly by their own ambition and partly by the expectations of parents (who are paying) and staff (who are paid) to get these kids to succeed, have the stuffing knocked out of them by the exam boards, directed by the government, who insist on test, test, and test again.

The apparent necessity to test them at every opportunity interferes with actually teaching them. There's not time to branch off and pursue some interesting topic that comes up in discussion - even if it would be of great benefit to their understanding of the subject and how it works - as it would interfere with the great god 'Syllabus'. They ask 'Is it on the syllabus?' 'Do we need to know this?' 'Will it be in the exam?' when what I want them to ask is 'Why does that happen?' How do we know?' 'What if it's like this.....?'   And when they do we can't spend long enough discussing it because.....    well, you get the picture.

So that's why I'm getting out.   It's completely knocked the stuffing out of me, made me depressed and ruined my life. I wouldn't recommend anyone to go into teaching at the moment and am full of admiration and trepidation for some of the new, young and very capable staff we've recently taken on.

What will I do? Sail. Sing. Sweep roads. Dig gardens. Anything that will buy me food to eat. NOT teach in a school.


Rant over. Now, what have I got in the morning.......?



Steve