It’s over a year now since I completed my first placement on my PGCE. When I started the PGCE in September 2019, who could have imagined how 2020 would pan out, both globally and for my teaching career.
Scrolling through Twitter during the year brought back how I felt finishing my first placement. In short – exhausted and confused. December 2019 and January 2020 were my two lowest months in terms of mood during my whole course. I wanted to write this post, in the hope that other trainees might read it and feel comforted that they’re not alone.
Reflecting on my first placement there were a lot of mixed emotions – I was finally teaching, something I’d been preparing for for many years. I was teaching French – a language I’d learnt in only 8 weeks, 2 months prior. I was getting to teach German, my first language love. And I was in a new setting in a very different type of school than the one I had previously worked for.
I still feel my placement got off to a good start. I liked my mentor, my timetable and the other trainees. The school was high achieving and had a good behaviour policy. The students were mostly polite, well behaved and hard working. I learnt their systems and tried to adapt and take onboard as much as I could.
When my university tutor arrived, the feedback was good – I was very good and good in all categories with just 2 weeks left on placement. After this, it all started to change.
Up until this point, my mentor and I had gotten on well. She was part time, so I didn’t see her everyday, but she would check in and give me advice for the lessons we had together.
On the run up to my university tutor visit, my mentor became quite panicky – although I was a little nervous about the observation, I knew it was designed to help me improve, not to catch me out. My school tutor asked almost daily if I was nervous. Although I hadn’t been to begin with, the more she asked the more I felt that maybe I’d misjudged how worried I should feel about the observation. Luckily, these worries were unfounded and it went as well as I could have hoped for. My school tutor gave me a positive review and good feedback.
After the university tutor visit, my school mentor changed – every lesson I made was pulled apart and scrutinised in great detail. Every minor error on a worksheet was ‘detrimental to the lesson’. The more issues she found to raise, the worse the lessons got as I fixated on trying to make things right.
Obviously the job of my mentor was to make sure I was learning how to teach correctly – and I had, and still have, no issue with that. What affected me was the way in which the feeling changed post-unviersity tutor visit. The issues raised in my final two weeks were never mentioned before and certainly weren’t raised in the meeting.
At the end of my second to last lesson with Yr8 German the lesson has gone okay, but I knew I had made mistakes I would not ordinarily have made. By this point, I felt like I was walking on eggshells – I was waiting to be tripped up and I knew that I was becoming defensive. My mentor asked me to rate my lesson and I gave my score. Clearly she disagreed with my ranking, and asked me to describe a perfect lesson. I asked her if any lesson is ever perfect.
In no way do I feel any lesson I’ve ever taught was perfect or even close to it. I don’t think ‘The Perfect Lesson’ exists. To me, being asked to describe a perfect lesson was to describe something unobtainable – could my lessons be better, certainly. But there is no perfection in teaching and to imply that it exists is damaging, especially to trainee teachers. This pursuit of perfectionism is what leads to burnout for trainees and NQTs.
I continued into my last week. My last lesson with Yr8 was better and it finished on a high note – the students gave me a round of applause for their last lesson and many told me they were sorry to see me go. In my last week I also taught my best lesson to Yr10 German. My final week was ending on a high point. Or so I thought.
At the end of each placement, the trainee, the mentor and the supervisor for teacher trainees complete review paperwork for the placement block. I had to evidence how I had met all the teaching standards and give a reflection on what I wanted to work on more at my next placement.
My feedback from my mentor on each teaching standard was constructive and I agreed with her feedback. In her final comment however, my mentor implied that I had failed throughout my whole placement to act on feedback – she also implied I needed to learn the difference between being a teacher and a teaching assistant. The comments really threw me. Just two weeks prior everything was fine when my university tutor visited – my mentor never made any mention of concerns about me taking onboard advice. In fact, I had evidence for my teaching file for several instances where I had visibly acted on advice given and received positive feedback. I tried to ask for clarification.
During my last placement week I was due to finish on the Thursday. My mentor only worked Monday, Wednesday and Friday. My mentor left at lunchtime on the Wednesday knowing that she and I would not meet again. She left without saying a word to me. At this point I had not seen my feedback although she had already submitted it. I thought her departure without talking to me was strange but I didn’t think to much of it.
That evening on the bus home, my paperwork came though. I was stunned. I spoke to my friends and family during the evening and decided to ask for clarification of the comments. Since this was not something I had heard before, I felt I would be able to accept the criticism if I could just understand where it had come from and what prompted it.
I spoke to the overall mentor for trainees. He agreed the wording was strange and that he would seek clarification for me, since I would not be returning to that placement. I trusted that since I had respectfully asked for advice, that I would be treated with the same respect. I was wrong. Despite promises to get back to me, the school became radio silent. I sent a a couple of emails in my final week at university to ask for clarification but they were all ignored.
Looking back on this now, it no longer feels as raw or upsetting as it did at the time. I remember having to summarise my feeling about the placement to my university tutor. I can’t remember my exact wording but I do remember the basic sentiment -that although the comments hurt, I had done my best to ask for clarification and behave in a professional way. I could not undo those comments and despite asking for more information, no-one from my placement 1 school ever got back to me. I had to swallow my displeasure and get on with the job. My university mentor was understanding and explained that there would be people I would and wouldn’t see eye to eye with in my career and this was just another part of the learning process. Thankfully in my other placements and jobs since in education, I have not experienced this again.
Despite my best efforts, this did affect my confidence moving into placement 2. My second placement was back at the school I had prevy worked at as a teaching assistant. The pressure of being back in a place where I was well known coupled with the criticism from the end of Placement 1 made me very anxious. For the first two weeks I would walk up to my placement crying. When I was in school I felt better but the fear or being caught out, the performance anxiety, was very real.
I spoke to both my my school and placement mentors who were both understanding and supportive. With the belief that things would get better, I kept going – and it did get better. Being in familiar environment meant I could concentrate on my lessons and subject knowledge. I’m not saying all my lessons were great – I had some particularly memorable ones with Yr8 Spanish and not for the right reasons! – but overall things did get better. Then COVID hit! But that’s another blog post!
I hope my reflection on my change of placement is useful for PCGE students from all subjects. Teaching is an ongoing learning process, for the teachers as well as the students. Your best is good enough. Done is better than perfect.
Alex
ichliebelanguages 