Tuesday 6 October 2009

Jumping Beans

This afternoon we had PE! We were told to turn up in our PE kits (that is to say, loose/comfortable clothing and trainers), tie back our hair, and remove our jewellery. Then we all had to run around the hall playing Beans and Traffic Lights and Stuck in the Mud. That was ok. But then we progressed to throwing and catching skills, the difficulty of which increased quite rapidly. There are big windows in the doors of the hall where we do PE, and I'm fairly sure that 20 postgraduate students running about the room in random directions trying to throw and catch tennis balls with their weak hands [1] must have been an amusing sight to passers by.

Then it was back upstairs for yet another mass information session. It doesn't feel like I'm doing this PGCE, but more like the PGCE is something which is happening to me! I think we all felt we were getting to grips with things at the end of last week - we produced display boards and presentations, and had managed to assimilate at least some of the information they'd thrown at us. But the last two days have felt like chaos to me. I think it would be ok if I had a clear way of classifying all the different tasks, advice and guidance in my head - but I don't. It's all just sitting there in a big mental heap, not dissimilar to the big physical heap of information right here on the desk.

In fact it's rather like the PE lesson. All the different things we've been told are careering around inside my head in different directions, trying to catch runaway tennis balls... and I haven't a clue how to organise them! But I'm beginning to think that, clueless or not, I'm going to have to make an attempt. The heap on my desk must disappear. It's time for a little administrative trial and error!

[1] "That's the hand you don't colour with"

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