30 years ago, I was about to start my PGCE course at Hull University.
I'd found a room in a house in the Avenues area to live in, bought some books and had a hair cut...
30 years on, a lot has happened, and it's now getting close to the return to school to start what will be my 25th year of teaching, which goes along with 3 years working for the Geographical Association, and 2 years as a freelancer.
Even after that length of time, it isn't going to be any easier to go back to the daily commute, the 12 hour days, and the physical and mental exertions that teaching places on you, but equally there's still the irresistible draw of working with young people, and time in the classroom, and working with colleagues at King's Ely, and seeing the creativity of the students as they develop their geographical thinking.
I've had a productive summer, with trips to Salzburg and Portugal, and there've been family holidays and the much needed lie-ins.
I've finished my GeoLibrary project - 365 books for Geographers all reviewed and described.
There's plenty of exciting things planned for the new academic year, which includes fieldtrips, conferences, visiting speakers and the chance to use a range of resources that I've written for the first time…
We have Google Expeditions and Professor Shailey Minocha from the Open University visiting us in a few weeks, field trip to the Norfolk Coast, and plans for our next overseas trip, and also a visit from Daniel Raven Ellison later in the term.
We also have some new microclimate sensors to trial from Do it Kits, and the first teaching of the new GCSE using the OCR B textbooks which I helped to write.
Which means that after a short break it's back to blogging here. The next milestone coming up this academic year will be to reach 7000 posts on this blog alone.
I'd found a room in a house in the Avenues area to live in, bought some books and had a hair cut...
30 years on, a lot has happened, and it's now getting close to the return to school to start what will be my 25th year of teaching, which goes along with 3 years working for the Geographical Association, and 2 years as a freelancer.
Even after that length of time, it isn't going to be any easier to go back to the daily commute, the 12 hour days, and the physical and mental exertions that teaching places on you, but equally there's still the irresistible draw of working with young people, and time in the classroom, and working with colleagues at King's Ely, and seeing the creativity of the students as they develop their geographical thinking.
I've had a productive summer, with trips to Salzburg and Portugal, and there've been family holidays and the much needed lie-ins.
I've finished my GeoLibrary project - 365 books for Geographers all reviewed and described.
There's plenty of exciting things planned for the new academic year, which includes fieldtrips, conferences, visiting speakers and the chance to use a range of resources that I've written for the first time…
We have Google Expeditions and Professor Shailey Minocha from the Open University visiting us in a few weeks, field trip to the Norfolk Coast, and plans for our next overseas trip, and also a visit from Daniel Raven Ellison later in the term.
We also have some new microclimate sensors to trial from Do it Kits, and the first teaching of the new GCSE using the OCR B textbooks which I helped to write.
Which means that after a short break it's back to blogging here. The next milestone coming up this academic year will be to reach 7000 posts on this blog alone.
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