I’ve been feeling a bit at a loss since my form left school. It’s always strange having a group of kids you’ve had since they were little, watch them grow up and then suddenly they’re gone. The cogs of the school keep turning, but they’re not there and it takes a while to adjust to life without them.

Two of my lot popped in to see me today with one of the nicest things that anyone has ever done. They’d been down in the art room and had produced an enormous poster for my wall with their hand prints and a lovely message from each of them. When you’ve got a couple of 16 year old boys thanking me for ‘helping to make me the person I am’ and being soooo appreciative of all the nagging and teasing and chivvying I’ve done for the past four years, it makes me really quite teary.

Yes, the job can be hideous at times, but knowing you’ve made a difference… knowing they appreciate it just that bit… It makes all the difference in the world.

Some days, teaching is the best job there is. I’m dead proud of them too!

How do you make a bone idle year group pass their GCSEs?

If that was actually a riddle it might be funny. In actual fact it’s looking like a mammoth task. My classroom now looks like a scene from feeding the 5,000, and unless we start sitting on each other’s knees I don’t think we can cram anyone else in there. I’ve already got someone at my desk (and on my newly donated swivel chair!).

To digress, that chair is the most fun thing I’ve ever had in my room. It far surpasses my interactive whiteboard. There’s something hysterical about freewheeling over from the network terminal where I do the register over to the laptop to bring up the lesson objectives. One of these days I’ll probably go flying over a cable, but you’ve got to live a little some time.

We’ve retitled the revision classes to make them sound less boring. We’ve got booster sessions coming out of our ears. We’re shamelessly bribing them with tea, coffee and chocolate (they can have the migrane after the lesson!), it’s all singing, all dancing, more marking than I can eat in a month of Sundays, and I’m knackered.

And do they appreciate it?

Pah!