Guiilotined

Over the last two weeks, through coincidence, I have been formally assessed twice at work.  The first time it was myself personally, the second, as a member of my department.

The garnish on the whole nut roast (to subtly alter the icing/cake metaphor) is that over the whole two weeks I have been suffering from a nasty head cold.

Probably brought on by the stress of assessment.

It is not just our department which is being assessed and the indications are plain in the staff room.

One sign of a very new teacher is that they spend a disproportionate amount of time around the school guillotine.

For that is where one makes exciting resources –little puzzles and top trumps cards.

Now in my third year of teaching, my relationship with the cutting machine has rather cooled.

But this week it is the old lags who are clustered round the guillotine once more in some sort of nostalgie de coup, preparing fascinating lessons for the assessment.

At this point, it becomes noticeable that while we have three large hi-tech photocopiers, we have only one guillotine.

What with the stress and the jostling, it is only a matter of time before somebody loses all the fingertips on their left hand.  I bet they didn’t put that in the health and safety assessment for all these inspections.

And on the lesson assessment form, there will probably be a criticism for getting blood all over the children’s work sheets. Ho hum.