Adam is a Recently Qualified Teacher in the North East of England, who completed his NQT year in 2015. A Mackem (originating from Sunderland) working on Geordie (Newcastle/Gateshead) soil, he teaches French, Spanish and Latin, but is also available in Russian and Czech. This year, Adam is exploring Teaching and Learning in his classroom, with a little help from some of his colleagues through Teaching Triads. Furthermore, he takes a deep interest at literacy and numeracy across the curriculum. When not teaching, he can often be found legging it down cycle tracks as a form of relaxation.
Last year, I was approached to see if I would be prepared to lead a new subject in my school. I say ‘new’ in the loosest of terms, as it was Latin I was asked to teach! Being a geeky linguist, and having studied the History of the Spanish Language at university, I did get a little excited at first, but then was overcome by a cloud of hesitation – how would my students take to a language that is no longer spoken? How would they see the relevance to their current studies? And what skills would it provide them for today’s world?
This time last year, I was in your shoes; a 23-year-old, fresh-faced former trainee teacher who was jumping onto the relentless treadmill that is the NQT year. Last August, I made a vow to myself: to provide the students in my care with the best education I can provide, but to not completely surrender my life to my career. In this article, I hope to share some of the tricks I deployed in order to help me keep calm and soldier on through my NQT year, hopefully for you to plunder.
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