At the chalk face: Teaching - Would we do it again?

At the chalk face: Teaching - Would we do it again?

Craig & Dave take a look back at their teaching careers and ask - If we could go back and do it all over... would we? 🤔

In this very personal episode of At the Chalkface, we reflect on nearly 30 years in education — from our first terrifying lessons and early career mistakes, to leadership, imposter syndrome, tutor groups, and the students who stay with you forever.

This isn’t a pedagogy-heavy episode or a resource plug. It’s an honest conversation about teaching careers, the realities of school life, and whether the profession is still worth it. Along the way, they share stories about:

🎓 Starting out as nervous new teachers
💻 Coming into teaching from industry
😅 Feeling completely out of your depth
📚 Why subject knowledge isn’t everything
👨‍🏫 Great mentors and leadership lessons
🚬 The “creative” ways they supported difficult students
❤️ The tutor groups and students they’ll never forget

Whether you’re an experienced teacher, an ECT, thinking of leaving the profession, or wondering if teaching is right for you at all — this episode will probably feel very familiar.

👇 We’d love to hear from you in the comments:
What have you done to reach the students that other teachers struggled with?

📢 Your turn: Tell us your teaching story in the comments! Why did you get into teaching?

👉 Don’t forget to like, comment and subscribe for more Computing education content from Craig’n’Dave!

🔗 More from us:
Website & resources – Craigndave.org
Smart Revise – smartrevise.online



#Teaching #Education #Pedagogy #CraigAndDave #AtTheChalkface #TeacherLife 
#CraigAndDave  #ComputerScience #atthechalkface #TeamCompSci #CraignDave #Teaching #AtTheChalkface #UKTeachers #ComputingTeacher #TeacherStories #GCSEComputerScience #ALevelComputerScience

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

The 31st of May is fast approaching. That's the last date you can hand your notice in. Are you staying? Are you leaving? This is our story of our teaching career.

SPEAKER_01 0:16

Hello, welcome back to another At the Chalk Face with myself Craig and my colleague Dave. So if you're new to this channel, uh we run an education company called Craig and Dave, and we resource all your needs for computer science. But we used to be computer science teachers ourselves, and before that, Dave, dare I say it, IT, ICT teachers. And we did it for a long time. It's what we wanted to do. So we've ended up here running this company. And the reason I mention all this is we're doing a bit of a personal episode today. No uh sort of pushing our resources or talking about pedagogy, although we can't talk for more than three minutes without going into pedagogy. We don't have any special guests on. So um we're gonna do something that really has a personal connection with Dave and I, and I have no doubt an awful lot of you out there. So there's the teaser, Dave. What are we talking about today? Start us off.

SPEAKER_00 1:10

Yeah, well, really, as you said, it's our personal journey of our uh careers, and it's a reflection uh about whether we feel we made the right choices at the right times, would we do things differently? Would we even go into teaching again? So thinking about myself, I started my teaching career in 1997, so I'm fast approaching 30 years in the profession at this point. So for me, is the the question is if I could go back 30 years, would I become a teacher again? For me, the answer is yes, absolutely. What about you?

SPEAKER_01 1:48

Oh, okay, okay, you've thrown that straight at me. Um okay, let's start off simple before I get into nuanced. Would I go back and do teaching again? I I think the simple answer is yes. There's a mute more nuanced response to that. Um but it is a profession I still love, still have passion for. Uh I miss the teaching aspect. Uh it was definitely the thing I was meant to do. Like you, by the way, it wasn't a thing I left out of university doing. I went into industry and then kind of took a left, and I'm so glad I ended up where I did. I probably should have done it from the start. But but would I go back? Yes. And I've started straight out of university uh as well. Oh, I said I wasn't gonna get too nuanced. Sorry, I've caught myself, Dave. Would I do it straight at university? Because of course, an interesting thing about us is that we both had commercial experience, and actually, with a subject like computer science, would I take away that? Probably not. I mean that that that helped so much. I'm gonna be careful what I say here, Dave, and I'll let you sort of jump in with your opinion. I've always said there are certain subjects and be careful here, maybe history, English, maths, the the sort of the pure academic uh subjects, or the ones where you you can't go and necessarily get an easy job in history, so to say. I understand that exists, but it's like, well, go in and teach it. Then there's other subjects, the more practical, arty subjects, which I consider computer science and art, where it's like, oh, my teacher has experience in that industry, walking the walk, talking the talk. I really felt that helped me being a programmer in environments with project management with real deadlines. Um, yeah, I've gone off them on there, Dave. What do you think?

SPEAKER_00 3:32

Yeah, I think you were walking on eggshells a bit there. I I I yeah, I I do think some um career. I say career as if teaching's not a career. Okay, backpedal myself again at this point. Uh I think having some experience in your industry, in your subject specialism at secondary school is worth having. Um, because let's consider the alternative for a second. You do your GCSEs, you do your A levels, you go into university, you come out of university, and you become a school teacher. And then you do that for 40 years. It is possible to do that, and there are people that do it. Um, and I was quite a young face teacher at 24 years old, but I could potentially have been 22 years old. Yeah, I think that's a little bit young to be a teacher, to be perfectly honest. I think you're probably a bit too close to the age range of the students you're actually teaching at that point, that can become problematic. Uh, I also think though, the main reason is you don't have that industry experience, that subject specialism knowledge in the field in which you're qualified to um really draw on uh when you're giving examples to students and you're talking them through the real world. If you haven't got that real world experience, and I I personally think that's a problem. So I wasn't in the industry for very long. I mean, don't get me wrong, I was only in the industry itself for about 18 months uh before I then switched and became a teacher. So you could say, well, Dave, that's that's not really that's not really an experience, is it? You're a you're a career teacher, aren't you? Let's face it. So hands up, yeah, I guess I am a career teacher, but even having that little bit of uh experience in the industry really helped me. And before that, I did a lot of Saturday jobs. So I worked in retail, I worked in and around um IT in industry, as it were. And so I picked up quite a lot about networking and how systems work and you know, new features coming in and what it meant for training staff and things that can go wrong and how they go wrong and the importance of backups and all this kind of thing. I kind of learned a lot just through doing my Saturday jobs as well.

SPEAKER_01 5:47

Yeah, I mean you're right. I've I'm similar story to you, but a bit different. I did sort of five years before I took the shift and then went into teaching. But I'm thinking now of my GCSE and especially my A-level classes, it some of the some of the best things, some of the best lessons were where I could tie the theory to something I had done. And of course, my six ones used to love that the game of how long can we distract him talking about a story of his days working for the working for the government as a spy. I was not a spy, I was a civil servant. But of course, as soon as you tell them you work for the government, did you own a gun? But you know, they they really appreciated that, you know, and taught them like this some of this stuff isn't just made up. And you were honest, I was honest as a teacher, like, oh, this is academia. You're never going to use this in the real world, but you're gonna learn it for your exams. But there's an awful lot which is relevant and you could apply. And yeah, maybe I was a bit glib earlier saying, Oh, math teachers don't need that experience, and history teachers don't need that experience. And I apologize to other teachers, but uh I do think for the more creative arty subjects, so I'm thinking your art design, textiles, or all of those, um, your computer science, there's an awful lot of subjects where I think the that the industry experience can really help ground the theory and the skills you're teaching. And I think the students really appreciate that. So I've gone off on one, but no, I wouldn't, I wouldn't start, I wouldn't start teaching Strat at university, I wouldn't change anything. I would go back, is the answer to your question.

SPEAKER_00 7:15

I was just gonna say before we kind of go any further, though, I think the thing that surprised me the most in my early teaching career is how little I actually knew about the subject. Surprisingly, I mean, you know, I um had a love of computers and computing. I'd been programming since I was nine years old. Um, I felt I was quite a competent programmer even when I um, you know, had left in uh university and was getting into the industry. And uh I had a degree in computer science, a little bit of industry experience. I felt I knew computing, I knew the field of computing, I knew the algorithms, I knew the data structures, I knew the core theory, I was set, I was ready to teach. And it was almost my very first lesson. Um, that and I can remember my very first lesson. I was teaching Stacks to year 12. It was an awful lesson. And I think my mentor was very kind to me, to be perfectly honest, when I reflect back. But um I realized almost instantly how little I actually knew. And it was exposed really quickly when students started asking questions of me as a teacher stood at the front of the room that I didn't really have the answer to. And the reason was I've never asked a question myself. Uh it's one thing to learn a subject, it's quite another to be quizzed about it from any angle. Uh, because students that know less than you ask questions with a real innocence and a real naivety. And they ask the questions that you wouldn't ask because you have the experience and the knowledge. And those kinds of questions can expose the weakness in the subject knowledge really quickly. And I remember thinking to myself, I don't know as much about this as I thought I did.

SPEAKER_01 9:18

Okay, right. Hands up, any teacher watching this who at any point in their career, or maybe still, thinks they're suffering from imposter syndrome, and they just, I hope no one finds me out. You are not alone, okay? I had it for a very long time. I think we've all had it. But some interesting facts here. As a teacher, naturally, the students in your class think you are the font of all knowledge and absolute authority on that subject. That you know, that's the way it is. Um, but it is not surprised that in Hattie's research, and I won't go into Hattie now, the the effect of teacher knowledge on achievement is very far down the list. Yes, sure, you can't teach an A level without a certain depth of knowledge, same with GCSE, but it took me quite a while in my teaching before I realized I don't have to know everything. What I'd have is a skill set to know where to find out, a drive to continue to improve, and then you look at the things that make a bigger benefit in students' achievement. Oh, the ability to communicate clearly to students, the ability to be concise, the ability to get across concepts, teacher students' relationships, you know, the way you communicate knowledge. And um, obviously, I won't give any names here. I had a member of my department for several years who was quite clearly the the academically the smartest member of our department. I mean, you know, the the knowledge was phenomenal. Um and I was like, Blimey always knows everything. But they lacked the ability to communicate that knowledge to students, so of course they weren't an effective teacher. They've probably been great lecturing at university. Uh so um that's uh what yeah, I knew I knew it.

SPEAKER_00 11:09

I was waiting for the opportunity to say you were right. We can't go three minutes without talking about pedagogy.

SPEAKER_01 11:15

There I am right there. It's true, but the point is subject knowledge isn't actually as important as students think it is. I remember when the currently what we call the new A-level specs, the ones which are now 10 years old, remember us looking at those, even then with 15 and 10 years teaching experience, degrees in computer science, interesting experience, looking at going, what on earth is that? Well, you know what? I Google it, I go find out, I go watch some videos, I read a book, I go, oh, I totally get it. Because I have the tools that allow me to go and pick up new knowledge if I don't know it. I know how to go learn. You know, whereas students, I know how to go learn. That sounds very caveman there, Dave. Whereas students, too often these days, it's like, I can't do it. What have you tried? No, I'm stuck. But obviously, as an adult, we've learned, well, I can start to learn anything. I just need to know how to go about learning. I remember our school for a short period and it didn't last very long. We actually, year nines, had a lesson a week on their timetable called Learning to Learn. Was that an initiative at your school? Yeah. Equipping students, yeah, equip equipping students with these skills to learn how to learn. As adults, we take that for granted. So, yeah, and we're still doing it to this very day, aren't we? I mean, you know, we look like experts to some other teachers. How do you know all this? Well, we've just been applying and learning continuously. There's still plenty of times where I ring Dave and go, Dave, how does this work? Dave will be in secret here, Dave gonna expose you now. And Dave will be like, Well, if I was being arrogant, I'd tell you, well, it's blah, blah, blah. But actually, while you've been talking, I've just asked Chat GTP. Yes, no one can know everything about everything.

SPEAKER_00 12:56

Yes, I've had to reveal my secrets over the years. I used to at one point sort of just um put myself on a pedestal of Epcraig. Because he always used to look up to me as, like you say, some kind of font of all knowledge of computing and teaching. And I just I accidentally stumbled on my pedestal once and fell down and thought I can't climb back up.

SPEAKER_01 13:20

Yeah, well, that's it. For those who don't know, I know a lot of you do. Dave, 20 plus years ago now, was my PGCE pathway subject mentor. So this was the chap I'd go and see every Thursday along with all the other trainees and sit there at the foot of Yoda as he spouted some stuff, like, oh, this man knows everything. Of course, now I realize it was all completely smoke and mirrors. Uh but but I've learned those smoke and mirror techniques and thus become an excellent teacher.

SPEAKER_00 13:47

Um, you have to know where to buy the the mirrors and you have to know how to create the smoke, and then you have to actually be the magician of the illusion. Come on, man, give me some credits.

SPEAKER_01 13:59

It's it's a weird job, isn't it? Teaching. I mean, um, a lot of people, you know, I I can't stand the phrase those who can do and those who can't teach. I mean, well, then try teaching because I've often likened it, and I know other teachers will appreciate this. It is a job that has about 20 different hats on it. Yeah, you are part firefighter, part policeman, part judge, part parent, counsellor, social worker. Um, you know, that there's so many different skills you pull on in dealing with a class of 30 different individual humans and then trying to get that knowledge across. It's um but when it works, it works, which I think is why when you said, Would I go back and do it again? The answer is yes. I I loved it and I didn't want to leave, um, and maybe we'll get into that, but um, yeah, I'd go back and do it. The profession certainly changed.

SPEAKER_00 15:00

Yeah, I think all professions change. I I do know where you're going because we've had conversations about oh, it's not like it was back in our day. But I think every teacher can say that. And and I remember uh in my very early days of my teaching career, we had uh wine club on a Friday. So picture this, right? So Friday lunchtime, um, there would be a group of staff that would go off to the pub. They all have to teach in the afternoon, by the way. And but I belonged to the slightly more upmarket uh wine club, right? I didn't know the floor. Of course you did. I didn't know the first fiddle about wine. I was quickly found out about that as well. But the point is that we would uh all sit around um at lunchtime and there would always be two bottles of red and a bottle of white, and we would uh pretend that we were wine critics and you know, we would uh we would give uh scores to the wine, and and not a single drop was uh was left before we went to go and teach uh period five. But I remember the teachers, even in those days, saying, Oh, well, of course, this was the smoking room back in the day, and then before that, it was uh, you know, oh, there used to be a pool table in here. I can't believe they've taken the pool table away. And I know in some schools uh they still have this uh situation, but but the schools I worked in very quickly modernized, let me put it that way. And suddenly, I mean, can you imagine um having a drink of wine in the staff room now on a Friday afternoon? It's like it wouldn't happen, would it? Not not in your average school, anyway. That's what I'm saying.

SPEAKER_01 16:40

It didn't happen, certainly didn't happen in mine, no. The most the most you'd get is maybe at the end of term when all the kids had finally gone up and you went up to say goodbye to the staff for leaving, and then if you were lucky, the SLT had bought a few bottles of really chimp plonk from bargain booze.

SPEAKER_00 16:55

That's right, yeah, yeah, that's right.

SPEAKER_01 16:57

A bit like the suitcase coming into the master. Yeah, and we all couldn't drink it anyway because we all had to drive home.

SPEAKER_00 17:03

Yeah. Anyway, look, we digress. Let's get let's let's get back, let's get back to it. So um that was me in the uh staff room, not knowing half as much as I felt uh I should, feeling completely out of my depth, both in the classroom and in the staff room. And uh that was my that was my early introduction uh to teaching, which I did uh for a couple of years before I then uh took my first promotion, which for me was to be an assistant head of year. Now I'll get into that, but uh just talk me through um your sort of early years, as it were, Craig.

SPEAKER_01 17:47

Um well, I mean, my early years, obviously, we're not gonna talk about pay scales and everything, but you know, I progressed up the main pay scale and you know thoroughly enjoyed the job, and it it wasn't many years until a sort of um head of department role came up. There weren't other opportunities for me in there. Um there were others presented, but not ones I was interested in. So obviously, as teachers will know, you've got two main routes, haven't you? And I know there are a little offshoots, and you've done some clever things, but really it's do I progress down the pastoral route, which is what you've just said, assistant head, head teacher, head of key stage, or do you go down the academic route? And I was quite happy, you know, I'll be a form tutor throughout school and I enjoy that, but I want to progress down the academic route. So I didn't come for any of those sort of assistant head of year opportunities. So the the first promotion I went for was uh uh head of department.

SPEAKER_00 18:37

But I think that's where I think that's where I'm headed with this because we've not talked about this, so I'm genuinely um interested. The first promotional opportunity that came along, I took it, and I took it for a reason, and I'll get onto that in a second. But it it sounds like you spent a few years not taking potential promotion opportunities. Things would have been presented and you took a conscious decision. That's not what I'm going to do. I'm I'm interested in that, and then perhaps after you've told me a little bit about that, it's fair to say you weren't successful uh becoming a head of department at your first attempt. So, again, I'm interested in what motivated you to go for that post, how you felt when you didn't get it, and then what you did to get it in the end, as it were. Talk me through all that.

SPEAKER_01 19:25

Wow, open up sore wounds there, Dave. Didn't get my first promotion. Yeah, sure. Let's revisit that trauma. Um yeah, um, no, you're right. It's not like there were an awful opportunities. It wasn't actually too long into my career that I I got the head of department. Uh, but yes, there probably were there were definitely at least one or two opportunities that that came up down the pastoral route. And um, it was really quite a simple decision for me. I just didn't, I just wasn't interested. So it'd be interesting to hear your perspective, uh, but I just wasn't interested in progressing on to sort of the the any sort of management scale or responsibility scale down the pastoral route. I love the tutor group aspect, always enjoyed my tutor groups, appreciated them. Um, you know, still uh still aware of a couple of them today, you bump into them occasionally at age 30, that makes you feel old, isn't it? 30 or 35, and they they tear you on, they remember you. And I enjoyed that, but that was as far as I ever wanted to go. So in my head, it wasn't even a consideration. They'd come up and I wouldn't look at them. So you're right. Um it looked like the head of department from our school wasn't going to go anywhere, and I thought, I I'm ready now. Yeah, I'm ready for one. And um, a head of department role came up at uh Stroud High, an all-girls grammar, and I thought, ooh, okay, we'll go from this comprehensive school, which I have thoroughly enjoyed, to an all-girls grammar school. That would be a that would be a shift, won't it? And I remember applying and being all very confident, and I had my plan and all the rest of it, and I thought the lesson went well and the interview went well and the student panel went well, and then oh, I'm sorry, Mr. Sargent, uh, you haven't got the job. Um, I I later found out it went to an internal candidate. Now, don't get crappy about that, Craig. You internal candidate and got your next head department job. But you just sometimes you realize, oh, is this one of those, I don't want to sound bitter, is it one of those vacancies where we generally want to find the best person? Or is it, oh, we've got the job for someone internally and we have to advertise it. Uh now that is very, very unfair. But at the time that's how I felt. I was like, well, you've wasted my time, blah, blah, blah. Luckily, I had sensible people around me that brought me back down to earth and went, just get over yourself. And then it was within a year. It was within a year that um the head of department at our school did go. And then I I I went for uh that job. And um, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 21:50

Probably um is if have I missed something there though, because wasn't there a situation at the school where you did eventually become head of department? Yeah. Where you had applied there to be head of department as well. And they actually gave it to your colleague who they were more experienced than you, but they certainly didn't have your subject knowledge or your rapport with.

SPEAKER_01 22:15

Oh my god, you really are opening the wounds. You're talking about my lifelong friend Ian, which I will mention. You were ah, I don't mind mentioning Ian. Ian, if you watch any of this stuff, hello, buddy. So Ian and I joined as NQTs together in the same year, and we were shoved in the old building with the CRT monitors. All the new stuff was taken by the head of department and the existing teacher. So the two NQTs were shoved in a building on the other side of the site. A 10-minute walk away from the head of department, make that work, next to each other. I had a room of CRTs where the the we had still had the mouse, sorry, I'm reminiscing now, had the mouse balls in, but because kids nicked the mouse balls, the technicians would glue the bottom of the mouse shut, which meant all that happened is they carried on collecting dust and they would then stop working. Meanwhile, Ian next door had air conditioning that that leaked and a waterfall down the roof down it. Yes, Ian, that's right. And when our head of department left, we both went for it. And again, I um I arrogantly assumed, because my subject knowledge was was better than Ian's, and Ian won't mind me saying this because you know he was always asking me for help, and and we still talk to this day. Um and and I I just assumed I would get it. It's the arrogance of youth, I think, partly as well. Of course, Ian, well, as I said, I had sort of five years' experience, Ian had a lifelong um of experience. So, as well as multiple jobs, he'd done at least 10, 15 years in the army as well. And it's I'm appreciating now in my late 40s, approaching 50s, you you can't really there's no substitute for time and life experience, I think is what I'm trying to say. You know, I didn't have experience of leading teams or managing or handling people. Uh, Ian had oodles of that. And I remember thinking, how could they give that job to Ian? I then was under Ian as a head of department for several years, and I learned a very different side of things. I watched how he would protect the team from initiatives. It's like things would come down, it's like, right, we have to do this, and I will fight your case, and he would be a barrier between us and SLT. Not not that you not not that there's it's a them and us strategy, but I I saw something that I realized I never realized was such an important skill. He stood by his team 100%. He he covered your backs, he stood up for you. Uh, he you know, he let you know what you needed to know. If you had a whinge, you could go and have a whinge, and it wouldn't be that the SLT would know you're complaining or winning, it was like, oh, my staff are complaining again. They'd never know. He would take it all on his shoulders. And I remember the day I left Archway, sort of 15 years later. Ian was still there. Uh, but hang on, Craig, you said you were head of department, but he was your boss. Yeah, Ian actually stepped down after several years as head of department and said, I just want to go back to being a normal teacher. So he'd been my boss, and then I became his boss. And I remember when I left after 15 years, I'd give you a leaving speech, and I did a few bits here and there and a few jokes, but I always had planned my final mention was for Ian. And I remember it to this day, and I apologise, Ian, if you're watching. But I said, and I have to say my final thank you for Ian. You know, we started as NQTs together, you became my boss, I became your boss, and I told a very brief version of the story about how I was so arrogantly cross that I didn't get the job, and how on earth could they give it to Ian? He doesn't know the subject, and Ian there was laughing away, and everyone else is laughing away. Of course, what I learned from being under Ian, there's an awful lot more we said at the start to uh being a good teacher or a leader than there is just from subject knowledge. And I said to Ian, uh, I wouldn't be the person I am today, and I wouldn't be the effective teacher and team leader and manager I am today if I hadn't have met you. And there was this genuine ah, and the closest I ever saw in 15 years from Ian having a tear, being an ex-army man, he wasn't fond of emotions, but he was like, very kind, Quake. But but yeah, you're right. Yes, so I lost two jobs. Thank you, Dave, for bringing that all back up.

SPEAKER_00 26:28

You know, like a stickler for detail and all that. I have to just make sure the audience know the full story of your career here. Not all success, right?

SPEAKER_01 26:37

Anyway, not at all, but right things for right reasons at the right time, I believe. Working under Ian made me appreciate a whole skill set I didn't even realise that I needed. And if I and also SLT had seen that in Ian, and if I'd got that job straight away, I might not have developed and I might not have been as good as a leader because I might have not realized those skills were so important. Definitely a bit of an arrogant youth, I think.

SPEAKER_00 26:59

Yeah, absolutely. That um he taught you how to manage a team. And essentially, the head of department isn't about your subject knowledge, it's about managing people. And so, as you say, that's a a completely different skill set. And um, it's quite warming to hear that what he actually provided was the buffer. Um, he prevented the things that were happening on the ground floor getting up to management that you know would cloud strategy and weren't weren't necessary and would create uh unnecessary angst that wasn't really there. But similarly, he was creating that buffer coming down as well and saying, okay, this is what we have to do in terms of leading our school forward, but what does it mean for my team and what does it mean for my individual members of my team and the strategy that we're employing within our own subject area? How can we make this work in a way that resonates with our subjects? And as you say, that that's a completely different skill set. So being that buffer in the middle that allows things to filter down and things to filter up, but that doesn't mean everything necessarily comes down, and it certainly doesn't mean everything necessarily goes up. That's the critical thing, right? So yeah, so for me, um I'd been teaching um a couple of years and an opportunity for an assistant head of year came up, and I really, really wanted it. And the reason that I really, really wanted it is because in the first couple of years of my career, I had a real bond uh and an affection for my tutor group. They to me were my babies, I was looking out for them um, you know, right across the school and everything that was happening. And I had a lad that um, you know, I really liked in my tutor group, and he had forgotten to get his mum to sign his homework diary. And this was a thing in the school that you had to every week get your parent to sign your homework diary. And I was the kind of teacher that I felt quite early in my career I'd got the line right between respect and almost the genuine affection for the students and being able to kind of be on their side, but we are we're we're not I'm not down with the kids. You know what I mean? I I got that line right, I think. But I did protect my tutor group because they kind of felt special to me. So I would be like, oh, okay, well, don't worry about it this today, but can you get that done tomorrow? And you know, nobody's gonna notice if if we sign that tomorrow. No one's gonna notice. Just go and sort that out, you know? And so I would do these little deals with my tutor group, whatever it was. Someone would get into trouble with a piece of homework, they'd come running to me. Bear in mind they're year sevens, right? Um, so they would come to me and they'd be like, Oh, Mr. Hilliard, Mr. Hilliard, uh, oh, I'm going to get put into detention because I haven't done this homework. And I'd be like, just leave this to me. And I would go and have a conversation with the teacher because I got quite a good relationship with the teachers in the school quite quickly as well. And I'd be like, Look, you know, I've come to tell you that, you know, Jack's beside himself because he hasn't done his homework. He doesn't want to let you down, and he knows he's going to let you down. He doesn't know I'm even telling you this. But is there any chance we could, you know, just sort something out here? I'm sure he can hand it in tomorrow. And it'd be like, of course, Dave, all right, you know, and and and so I'd be able to go back to Jack and say, look, it's sorted. As long as you get this in tomorrow, you won't be in trouble. Okay. And this was the kind of relationship that I'd built up with my tutor group. Uh, anyway, one day I was um off on a course or something. I was away for the day, and it was homework signing day. And uh one of my two tees, who um, you know, I'd got a good relationship with, they hadn't got their homework diary signed. And I think they knew the deal, which was we'll get it done tomorrow and it'll be okay. You know, Mr. Hilliard's a cool guy. But I wasn't there, and the assistant head of year took my tutor group, which was the kind of thing that used to happen, you know, they would sort of knuck in if one of the two tees was one of the tutors wasn't there, and uh, but he was a stickler for the rules, and so when uh one of my TTs didn't have their homework diary signed, this was a major offense, and they immediately got put into detention.

SPEAKER_01 31:47

Oh, get over it, yes.

SPEAKER_00 31:49

And this this child was in tears, right? Because this isn't how it worked, and so I came back the following day, and you know, they're in tears. And I'm like, what is going on? Oh, I've got a detention anyway. So I was like, Oh, all right, I've got to I've got to, you know, use a bit of my magic here. So I went to see the assistant head of year, who was kind of my boss pastorally, yeah. And I said, uh, you know, got this little situation, but can we just let it go this one time? You know, it's it's not something that happens regularly, it's an oversight, they're only in year seven, you know, they're they're learning. Um and he basically said, Yeah, that's right, David, they're learning. And the lesson they're gonna learn is they do as they're told. Because if they don't do as they're told, they're gonna get punished, and then they will definitely do as they're told next time. That's the lesson they're learning. So off you go. And I was like, Wow, okay, this is not what I was expecting, and from that moment forward, I was like, I'm gonna have your job, hey, and I'm gonna show you how the job should be done.

SPEAKER_01 32:58

Because you believe with a stick as opposed to a cow it is the way to do it, and yeah, yeah, and that's no, yeah. Go on, go on.

SPEAKER_00 33:05

What that's the story of my teaching career. I mean, we'll we'll take this further um into another episode because there's so much that we can say, and and there's so much more ground to cover. But essentially, that has been the story of my career. I have been very, very content. I have not chased promotions necessarily, which has meant it took a long time for me to kind of get to where where I got to in the end. But every time I took a promotion, it was because I looked at the person above me and thought, I can do this job better than you. And part of that was an arrogance. I'm not gonna lie, just like you, Craig, part of me it was just pure arrogance, and um that was not fair on my superiors. Uh, but there was certainly an element of truth about it as well. Uh, and I did feel like I could get better outcomes if only this was done in a slightly different way, and um, I've proved that in my teaching career. So, yes, a lot of it was arrogance, and a lot of it was just a genuine desire to want to do better. And so, as it so happened, that teacher got a promotion into a head of department job in another school. It opened up the opportunity for an assistant head of year job, which I wasn't really going down that road like you. I was really very much computer science through and through. I had no idea about you know, pastoral and that kind of thing, other than having an affection for the students. Yeah. And so uh, anyway, I was desperate to get this job, and uh the head teacher had been quite impressed with what I was able to bring to the school in terms of computer science and some of the things that I was doing in industry, I then brought into education, and he was, you know, quite genuinely surprised at how I could transform things um in the school through IT. And um so essentially the job was mine, um, which was great. And um, so I became an assistant uh head of year. Um, it only lasted a year. So uh maybe next time we'll get into what happened next. Good. Right. Well, we're gonna leave it there and we'll pick this up in a second episode because there's so much more about our teaching careers that uh we're ready to uh share with you. And I'm sure that some of our stories resonate, and I'm sure some of our stories leave you in horror. But I'll leave you with this question for the comments below. What have you done for your two tees or for those students uh in your school that other teachers couldn't reach? The untouchables, the unreachables, what have you done to reach them? Comments below.