DNA

Knowledge reigns supreme over nearly every one. Skills are needed to place that knowledge in a context and form which gives them power and purpose. Without power and purpose, you're that bag from American Beauty; a cheesy metaphor which doesn't really stand up to close analysis.

Several years ago, I started to picture progress in English as a spiral, a helter skelter . Each year, we revisit the same skills and similar ideas in greater depth and complexity. We marry these ideas differently. We combine ideas learnt previously in new ways with new foci. We adapt and move onwards, becoming more skilled and detailed as we do.

Over time, I've come to see progress in English as a double helix, that powerful piece of coding which contains all of the information for life, ready to be downloaded and adapted. I'm not the only weirdo who sees things like this. There are blogs here, here and here which explore these ideas in greater depth and detail than I can be bothered to do. Now, I don't fully agree with all of the writer's points, but there is something to think about in each blog. I also find it amusing that he blusters on about the historical and contextual knowledge required, with hardly a mention of the actual linguistic, literary and grammatical knowledge required to be truly excellent at English. He, ironically, becomes the opposite of what he opposes, rather than reaching a reification, a synthesis of the skills and knowledge dichotomy.

I believe in a powerful, varied, purposeful, politicised curriculum which engages and challenges. The skills for analysing and creating must run alongside through all of the content.

For this reason, the work you've recently produced on age related expectations has been exactly what the doctor ordered. You overstand the idea of having this clear mix run through all that you do. This will ensure that our pupils get what they deserve - and that is what matters. All that matters - droppin' skills and knowledge to achieve our goal.

Let it go...

More Orwellian linguistic-gymnastic contortions from our Dear Leaders in the Democratic Neo-Fascist Republic of Windsor and Eton. Now, requiring improvement means that you're coasting, and therefore failing, and therefore the logic of the market dictates that you must be privatised in order to improve.

This is flawless thinking. If you're a maniac who hasn't paid any attention to the world for the last thirty years. However, I encourage them, because it brings closer the day when the masses will awaken and unleash hell upon their oppressors. Non-violently, of course. After the bloodshed and disappearings.

One day, to be free of the threat of privatisation, which is all the free school and academy agenda is, you'll need a flawless pass rate at whatever level they make up, and to be 'above average' on every non-mathematical measurement they can excrete from their poisoned, reptilian hive mind. The truth is out there.

In other gibberish news from this odd ball of rock spinning towards its ultimate destruction, work email is making us stupid. Aside from the fact that the article, given a cursory glance, appears to have been written by the star of classic Western 'High Noon' - a great film - it talks a little sense, and even misquotes Einstein, an activity which someone must have written a book about. A quick google reveals that Einstein himself did so. Leaving aside the obvious irony of emailing this pointless drivel on your work email on a Sunday morning, there's a wider point here.

Pressure and expectation are facts of modern live. One day, someone will manage to do something about that. It might have to be David Icke; it won't be David Cameron. Most sane people would agree that society is being throttled, and that the lunatics run the asylum. We expect to be busy, we expect a  degree of pressure and challenge - we wouldn't work where we do if we didn't.

Regardless - there are limits, and if nobody else will impose them, we need to. You have to push yourself, you have to work hard and get those basics right, and fulfil the moral obligations of the job.

But you need to know when to let things slide. When doing more is counter-productive. You need to know where your Eastern front, your Russian Winter, your misguided invasion of the Ukraine is, You need to know when to let a few books go, when sleeping is better, when to pull a lesson from last year out of your bag of tricks. You need to know when to...

Blue

I don't like the colour blue. Chelsea, the tory party and blu-tack, especially when it goes old and funny. If, like me, you were a touch blue on Friday, I have found the perfect antidote. The Matrix.

Every second line of this brilliantly acted  mind-bending documentary  blockbuster explains why the nasty party appear popular to southerners and idiots. Like this one. And this one. And all of the others. Even the blue pill in the film conserves the illusory reality that morons erroneously think is of benefit to them.

Anyway. Pulling my head out of the rabbit hole, we have plenty to be concerned with in the desert of the real. The department needs to keep pushing on. Support with the new GCSE is vital - we all need to pull together to get that going. We're moving towards the end of the academic year now, and the changes that go with this. As it is early, this brings both challenge and opportunity.

This can be daunting. But we have to have faith. It may not be executed perfectly, but we can get ourselves into a great position, ready to push on again. As Muhammed Ali said, according to the internet, it's a lack of faith that makes people afraid of meeting challenges. he had faith in himself, and he met the challenges he faced. I have faith in the team, individually and collectively, to meet these challenges, and to do so in a way which is pupil focused.

Remember, the future belongs to those who prepare for it today. We, and our pupils, must be better prepared than anyone else - the rich, the southern, the Etonians, those at academies, everyone. That is our moral duty.

What we are.

We define ourselves in many ways. Two of the most common are what we believe in, and who we are not. Usually, these intersect. This links, intrinsically, to our sense of purpose.

We are not these people. Surely, we could not do this job if we were.

Purpose is key. That purpose is simple. As stated in the introduction to Stokely Carmichael's autobiography,

We are not what we think or say we are, not what we hope, not what we pretend we are. We are simply what we do.

We teach, therefore we are. That is our purpose. How we do this is immaterial. To put the above quote another way, it's not what you look like when you're doing what you're doing, it's what you're doing when you're doing what you look like you're doing. 

You're teaching. Most of us teach for a specific reason - the holidays  changing something, affecting something. If you don't, I don't understand you. 

Each lesson you teach must have purpose. It must focus on a specific goal. Each lesson contributes to a bigger goal, the larger purpose, the overarching aim. Day by day, this accumulates into something life changing. We learn from this every day, every lesson. 

We have three weeks with year eleven, longer with the others. Make the most of every chance, every opportunity, each glimpse of potential and life. 

So comrades, come rally, let us face the final fight... it's down to us, in the classrooms, for change will not come from above.*

*By above, I mean way above. Unless we elect a radical socialist government this week, and not just some feeble minded centrists who are terrified of the electorate and use their tombstones on the campaign trail.