The plan on moving up to Yorkshire was that I would be doing some sort of Teaching Assistant job. But after putting some applications in with no qualifications I was beginning to give up hope of getting anywhere. No matter how attractive my cv was a lot of the schools were quite small and really couldn't afford to take a chance on someone with no qualifications or experience.
Luckily I landed the ICT technician job and the need to do the course was alleviated slightly. But I knew the ICT technician job was temporary so I knew that I'd still need to the course at some stage. After all, the attractiveness of a male teaching assistant with experience of schools, ICT and science with a good degree should mean I could get a Teaching Assistant job, shouldn't it???
Today was the first night of the Teaaching Assistant course.
I've already had the pleasure of one adult ed course in Pocklington when I did the computer course thing to get the qualification.
So I know how crap it was going to be - and it's not just Pocklington I'm sure - but even I wasn't prepared for the most tedious and wasteful 3 hours of my life.
First problem was that we got in to be told that we had to do a quick 20 minute literacy & numeracy standards test. At this point it was very tempting to ask if I could receive a bye for this as a science degree surely indicates some basic standard? But I was already being studied with some suspision by the 11 women on the course so I thought better of it.
Off to the computer room we traipsed for the testing. I then quickly suffered the guilt of finishing the first part of the test so much quicker than the other attendees. It's horrible having to just sit there desperately not trying to look like you've just blazed through the thing - that desperation not to be seen as a cocky bastard.
But really - I know how to read and do sums.
For example: 3/5ths = 60%, The median number in a series of 5 is the third largest, a rectangle 50x20 has a perimeter of 140. Not rocket science.
Then the printer fucked up. And no-one on site seemed to have the faintest idea what to do. So, having already wasted nearly an hour on a 20 minute test I tried to fix it and managed to find out that it was, technically speaking, having a paddy with the testing software and wasn't playing. I'm sure that made me seem even more a a Y chromosomed bastard in my fellow attendees eyes.
It finally finished at 9:30. Two hours of bollocks about the course. Which, as is usually the way with these things, could have been accomplished with the handouts and a quick half hour talk. Why do people always want to read out handouts. We're all literate people; hell, we even took a 20 minute course to prove it.
Homework is to write an introductory statement.
2/3rds of a page of A4 max.
I've already decided that this is going to be the one thing in my bloody life where I do just what is required and absolutely no more. No perfectionism, no slogging over it for hours.
Starting tonight.
2/3rds A4 - 20 minutes?
Go.
Update 11.56pm- it took 40 minutes. But 10 of that was cutting stuff out to get it down to the required size. Not bad.
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