Teacher Through and Through 

I may not be materially rich but I am rich in so many other ways. I am incredibly lucky to have my two amazing children and of course my fantastic fella, Paul. Whilst I may have the occasional moan about not having a ‘proper job’ , I have a feeling that perhaps this is how it is meant to be for now as apart from my career, my life is pretty perfect.

I have always said that I wanted to be able to spend time actually being with my children as they grow up. Whilst my career may not be entirely as I’d imagined, I at least have the chance to fulfil my dreams of ‘being there’ for my kids each and every day, then later pulling pints for a few hours to bring in some pennies.

Today was a particularly perfect day, the sun was shining and the birds were singing in the trees. It was ideal for getting out into the garden and having some fun in the sun. E was happily playing in the water with her teapots in the water/ sand table whilst I setup a few other activities. We had Play Dough at the picnic bench, colouring on the larger picnic table, chalk drawings on the paving slabs and Duplo and Weebles on the picnic blanket. E had loads of fun running from one activity to another, from swinging to sliding, to bouncing on the trampoline, to playing house in her Little Tikes playhouse, to br-br-brumming around in her Little Tikes Princess car to getting messy and constructive with all the other bits and pieces setup.

It was at that moment, as we sat together colouring neatly in the lines of the colour-in-cake that I realised, whilst I may no longer be working as a teacher, I have never actually stopped teaching…

My kids are my pupils and I am their educator, their guide and their all round entertainer come rain or shine. I may not be in a classroom, but I still find myself rotating books, differentiating tasks for differing levels, monitoring progress, and every now and then I even have to deal with the odd behavioural issue (usually when E has been asked to apologise for a random mishap but refuses to utter the word “sorry” and instead bursts into tears to divert the attention from the initial mishap).

I may not be escorting my class down to assembly or taking them from one classroom to another but I am doing the school runs and chauffeuring my kids to and from classes and clubs each week.

I may not have break, dinner time or after school clubs to run whilst trying to fit in time for something to eat myself, instead I am now ‘on duty’ 247 and am lucky to get the chance to sit down and eat at all without an interruption of some sort. I may not have break duty, instead I am on full-time duty monitoring the wellbeing and safety of my own children.

Teachers provide us with information, knowledge, skills, confidence and understanding, all of which are essential elements of our development, so that we can go out into the big wide World and make something of ourselves.

I may no longer be a Teacher but I am preparing my kids for the realities of the World, whether it’s teaching them their A-Z or teaching them how to recognise their bodies needs or how to tie a shoe lace. It’s all pretty essential and I am so glad that I get the chance to give my time to my top two students, J & E.

I loved being a teacher and I guess it became part of who I was back then and still am now… I may not have a ‘proper job’ in some people’s eyes (as I am regularly reminded of by blatantly rude individuals with nothing better to do than make other people’s lives a misery)  but I’ll always be a teacher at heart because as the saying goes “Once a Teacher, Always a Teacher”.