Teaching would be great if it weren't for the kids

Every now and again, a day passes at school when something is up with the kids. And it's something that runs through all of them, making them non-responsive or disruptive, and it's incredibly irritating. And there's usually no reason for it: we try to say it's the weather, or there's a holiday coming up, but there's no real pattern. Admittedly, the students have had a couple of very distracting weeks, so it could be hard to get them focused again, but it means I've had to shout and give punishment homeworks.

And I don't like shouting. But I do it a lot more these days. Maybe the extra classes are trying my patience, maybe I'm just finally realising that yelling is at times necessary, or maybe I'm just fed up with the whole teaching lark and it's about time I got out of it!

I don't really mean what I say in the title; the kids are great most of the time, and they do make me smile and constantly amaze me with their creativity and friendliness. But on days like today, I wish I could just make them all sit on their hands, like my teachers used to!

Tomorrow will be a brighter day. Hopefully travel arrangements for the mud festival will be booked by then. More on that later!