Children Take Ages To Walk Down Corridors, a problem for peris Options

[earplugs]

What do you do whilst waiting for them to arrive and is there any reason you couldn't go to get them yourself?

You have to know where to find them, bearing in mind they may be moving between classrooms, ability groupings, PE, assembly and the IT suite. Also they can arrive while you are out looking for them, conclude you are not there and return from whence they came. Another 5 minutes lost!

If the children who are being sent know where they are it can't be that complicated. I suggest walking with the previous pupils to collect the next two. This would prevent them wasting time on the way. Since they don't set off untill called they won't arrive while you are not there.

[Clari Nicki1]

Not just a problem for peris. As a parent I used to object to the fact that my daughter (who was then in yr 2) ended up with a 10 minute lesson rather than a 20 minute one. By the time the boy who had his lesson before had put his violin away, come to find my daughter, and she had made her way to the hall, got out her violin and had it tuned - half of the lesson had gone. The peri taught only 2 children in the school and then had to rush off to another school, so there was no option to extend the 20 minutes.

After a term of that, I bought her a digital watch, which she wore only on violin lesson days. I set the alarm for 5 minutes before her lesson was due to start, and when it went off she just walked out of her class and went to her lesson (class teacher had agreed to this in advance).

What a good idea!!!!
My own kids don't have lessons in school so that they don't miss out on lesson time!!!

I teach in a pretty small school, and I often go to fetch the next pupil whilst the previous pupil is packing away... then there is no wasted lesson time. No-one forgots etc .
I do sometimes finish a lesson and ask that pupil to get the next BEFORE they pack away, then they come back and pack away whilst the next puil gets the instrument out.

Unfortunately, they often forget if the next pupil is in the same class as them, as they get back, sit down and carry on with their work!!! It only works in a small primary and getting a pupil in a different class!!!!

[dacapo]

It surely can't be hard for a class teacher to have a list on her desk of who's got to where and when, and say 'Off you go' a few minutes before the time.

What an optimist! I assume you aren't a classroom teacher.

[jacobvaneyck]

It surely can't be hard for a class teacher to have a list on her desk of who's got to where and when, and say 'Off you go' a few minutes before the time.

That's what I would have wanted to happen, particularly at one school where the classroom was a long way from the teaching room. I never bothered in the end though.

[ad_libitum]

It surely can't be hard for a class teacher to have a list on her desk of who's got to where and when, and say 'Off you go' a few minutes before the time.

What an optimist! I assume you aren't a classroom teacher.

It seems reasonable enough to be able to look at a few times on a bit of paper?

[Dulciana]

An observation, which comes from knowing where some of our members are from.

It seems to me that those of us who come from N. I. have a higher regard for our education system - and, yes, are more optimistic and black-and-white in our expectations. I would expect a classroom teacher to send a child out on time. Just as I would expect the child to do as he was told and go straight to where he was told to go. I wonder if we're more demanding in N.I.? And I wonder if we have more respect for teachers here too, whilst at the same time not suffering fools gladly? To 'expect' is to assume competency. If one is held in high regard, then one tends to want to live up to expectations - because 'that's just the way it is'. It shouldn't occur to the teacher NOT to send the child for its lesson.

[notmusimum]

I fully sympathise with the poster and others in this thread, I used to go into High Schools and talk to pupils about their experinces of vocational training.

I had to smile though thinking back to my youngest and Primary Recorder lessons. The Recorderlesson was over Lunch as it is with some of you, the problem was the Teacher arriving late. My daughter and her group would sit outside the office waiting for her to arrive to make the point. Sometimes she didn't turn up at all and never let school know, she was less reliable than the children (IMG:style_emoticons/default/laugh.gif)

[jod]

You don't teach my boys then. They must hear their headteacher asking them to walk not run most days. They certainly hear it from me.

[LizzieT]

An observation, which comes from knowing where some of our members are from.

It seems to me that those of us who come from N. I. have a higher regard for our education system - and, yes, are more optimistic and black-and-white in our expectations. I would expect a classroom teacher to send a child out on time. Just as I would expect the child to do as he was told and go straight to where he was told to go. I wonder if we're more demanding in N.I.? And I wonder if we have more respect for teachers here too, whilst at the same time not suffering fools gladly? To 'expect' is to assume competency. If one is held in high regard, then one tends to want to live up to expectations - because 'that's just the way it is'. It shouldn't occur to the teacher NOT to send the child for its lesson.

Well, I've taught as a peri in schools for several years now, and in my experience it's extremely rare for teachers to remember when students' lessons are. Having said that I certainly don't regard any of those teachers as 'fools' or 'incompentent'. I certainly couldn't cope with the pressures and multi-tasking expected of classroom teachers these days.

[chris ward65]

I expect this is a common problem for peris. Teaching room and class from which most of kids are drawn, are at opposite ends of school. Kids only have a 20 mins time slot in pairs. Children A and B, who are only Y2 age, are sent to fetch children C and D, also from Y2. Child A stops to have a chat and Child B stops to read something on the corridor. Child C is in the middle of a painting and Child B has lost her music book and money. Result: nearly 20 mins of lesson gone, and children X and Y are squeezed into 10 mins before hometime. Kids are too young to time-manage themselves, and class teacher is too busy. Any suggestions or do I just have to put up with the situation as it is?

I have the same problem with students years 7 - 11. Except half the time they have forgotten they had a lesson. After which I forget they ever asked for lessons and give their time to a different student. Life is hard sometimes.

[ad_libitum]

In Primary school it was always the teacher who told me when to go to violin lessons, and in Grammar school you just remembered yourself...even if the teacher got cross at you for missing French lol!

At the school I worked in it was difficult as all the rooms were quite far apart, and I didn't always know which classroom to find them in! I stuck up timetables on noticeboards but even then it was unusual not to have at least one or two a week forgetting to turn up.

[Anniejane]

I've worked in 2 primary schools in the past where they had a phone extension in each classroom. It transforms your life as a peri! - you can ask 1 pupil to ring 5 mins before the end of the lesson to ask for the next lot. Any parents out there who find you are regularly payng for 10 minute lessons - it might be worth lobbying your schools to consider installing this. (Still doesn't solve the lunchtime problems though!)