Rebecca Smithers talks to two young winners of this year’s teaching Oscars
Tuesday August 21, 2001
Alan Jackson has only got two years of primary classroom teaching experience. But his pupils and colleagues already rate him so highly that earlier this summer he picked up one of the prestigious regional prizes in the 2001 Teaching Awards – the Teachers’ Oscars – when he was named outstanding new teacher of the year in the north-west.
Alan, 29, now a teacher at St Paul’s Church of England primary school in Astley Bridge, Bolton, didn’t go into classroom teaching straight away. After taking a degree in English literature, he decided he wanted to get some hands-on teaching experience before committing himself to a career in the classroom: he started on a training course. Alan got a job in a hospital head injuries unit in Bury, Lancashire, helping youngsters recovering from brain and other injuries who were unable to attend school and needed remedial and educational help. There, he received specialist training on the job, and decided that teaching was what he wanted to do: “I was lucky to get enormous variety as well as really feeling I was helping people. The youngsters in my care were as young as two and as old as 17, and it was quite unusual to get the variety of such a broad age range. I knew then that teaching was for me.”
Alan took a postgraduate certificate in education (PGCE) in Carlisle, opting to specialise in primary teaching. He then joined his current school, where he began by teaching year 4 pupils (eight- and nine-year olds). He has now moved on to year 6 (10- and 11-year olds), the final year before the switch to secondary school; this carries extra responsibilities, such as preparing pupils for the national tests or Sats.
The variety of primary school teaching is shown by Alan’s involvement in extra-curricular activities, including organising Saturday morning booster classes for year 6 pupils and running the computer club. He has also taken responsibility for the school’s Information CT coordination, initiating ICT training for fellow teachers and for parents so that they can effectively use computers at home with their children. He is also building the school website, with just a little help from his class. Last year he was also elected teacher governor to the school board.
“I was a little bit embarrassed and shocked when I got the award. But the school is a fantastic one and we are lucky that we have so many extremely supportive parents. Teaching is one of those jobs where you really feel you are helping to make an impression on young people and that you have an influence. It’s a tremendous responsibility but it’s rewarding, too”.
He would like to see many more men teaching in primary schools. “Men can do as good a job as women, and I think it’s important that children are taught by both.” He is not sure yet about the future direction of his career, but is interested in professional development which “keeps pushing you in new directions”.
‘She’s cheeky back!’
When Clara Baker was interviewed for her current job two years ago, the verdict from the teachers on the interview panel was ‘Wow!’ Even in those early days she was seen as an exceptional English teacher, who has gone on to live up to great expectations. Her achievements have recently been rewarded with a regional prize for outstanding new teacher in the south-west in the 2001 Teaching Awards.
Clara, now 24, knew from early in life that she wanted to become a teacher. She was advised to take a postgraduate certificate in education after a degree in English, which she completed at the College of St Mark and St John in Plymouth.
As an English teacher at Penair School, Truro, Cornwall, which has 1,200 pupils aged between 11 and 16, she now teaches English to all ages up to GCSE level: “I’ll never forget that first buzz of excitement when I was in my classroom on my own for the first time. But that feeling has definitely not worn off. The challenge and variety of the work is enormous, but when you see an individual child make real progress, that is absolutely the best thing”.
As well as her teaching duties, she has taken on extra responsibility for raising the profile of the English faculty through wall displays, creating web pages, writing articles for local papers to publicise events, and organising an annual book week. She also taught for two weeks on the school’s literacy summer school, and has provided Inset training on boosting attainment in English. It is quite an achievement to offer training to colleagues who have been in the job for between 10 and 30 years.
She is also involved in primary school liaison work, and as the new school literacy co-ordinator has set up an after-hours club, asking students and other staff to help pupils with home and coursework. Like so many teachers, she would like to move up the career ladder but does not want to move out of the classroom.
“I’m quite an ambitious person and would definitely like to go for head of department.”
Clara was particularly moved by her pupils’ comments in the nomination forms for the teaching awards. One wrote: “She is like one of us. If someone is cheeky to her she is cheeky back! Monday’s lessons are the best. You’ve just come back from a weekend thinking, ‘Oh no, it’s Monday’, but after English you feel that it’s all OK. The atmosphere is great – she sings the register!
In year 10 I was petrified of reading out loud – but now I will do it with no problem. I feel she has made me more confident in general, not just in English. She’s brilliant.”