Why Do I Want To Teach?

I was lucky enough to be invited along to a Plymouth primary school to join in on an introduction to the new Digital Literacy course for the new starters. Bob Harrison gave a great interactive talk, with a lot of questions for us, getting us thinking – hard to do that when you have had the Summer off!

At midday, we were given hints and tips for interviews by both Bob and the head teacher of the school – I was particularly interested after Pete reminded me that I will be applying for teaching positions in just over a year!

Both Bob and the head teacher said that a question that will always be asked is “why do you want to be a teacher”? As we went around the room, almost all the answers were the same –

“I want to inspire children”.                            “I enjoy working with children”.

This made me think – I’m not sure I have ever really thought, “why do I want to be a teacher”? I just know that I have always wanted this.

I remember wanting to be a teacher at school, mostly because of a few stand-out teachers and so I did my work experience aged 15 in a primary school. Having ‘achieved’ a D in my Science GCSE, I wasn’t able to do a teaching degree and by 16 I had enough of education. I attempted AS Levels and struggled and so entered the world of work, working in offices and later as a Legal Secretary, along with a couple of trips to Asia and Eastern Europe.

Throughout this time, I knew I still wanted to teach, and so I took an Access to Higher Education course (a life-changer for a ‘mature’ student!) and the University of Plymouth was kind enough to let me take a Science equivalency test which meant I finally had a good enough Science GCSE to take the course!

However, I have gotten to Year Three, without really having an answer to why I want to teach. When you decide as a child that you want to be a teacher when you’re older, you don’t think along the lines of being inspiring or changing children’s lives.

When I think now about what excites me about being a teacher, having had experiences in placements, the thing that does stand out is seeing a child go from struggling and not understanding something, to that moment when they ‘get it’ and you know that you have got them to that point.

Another main reason for me, is that having been through a period between the ages of 16-21 when learning did not appeal to me at all, I suddenly reached a stage where I found learning fun and enjoyable. The beauty of teaching is that not only are you educating the children, but you are constantly being educated yourself. Teaching is always changing and developing, even more so in my specialism of ICT, and so I feel honoured to be going in to a career where I every day I get to teach, but also I get to learn myself.

When I do get thinking about it, of course there are many reasons why I am going in to teaching:

-   - The job satisfaction of knowing that you have done something good that day.

-   - To be able to spend my day working with children – having worked in offices for            5 years, I know that working with children is way more appealing for me!

-   - To know that when a child leaves my class, I have changed their life, even if only slightly.

-   - To help children to enjoy primary school, as I did, and to hopefully be a teacher that they can look back on fondly, as I do with a few of mine.

-   - To be a good role model to the children.

-   - On a purely selfish note and looking to the future – teaching is a great career to get in to as a woman in terms of having a family – although this is just a bonus, rather than a reason.

-   - To use my head – I spent way too long working in jobs where I would turn up, do as I was told and leave – I am looking forward to being able to take charge of my class, giving them interesting and exciting lessons and being creative in my teaching.

    The list goes on…!

So, just out of curiosity, why did you go in to teaching? Was it a lifetime ambition or a decision made later on?

Amy :)

A New Year...

So, it’s the 10^th September and time for me to move back to Plymouth for my third year (how did time go that fast?!).

After an amazing Summer (Ibiza, Woolacombe, Isles of Scilly, festival, friends, family, work, general fun!), it is time to get on with what will probably be the hardest year of my four year course. Almost as soon as I have settled in to University life again, I will be off to start my placement which will last until Christmas. It feels like I have only just finished my last placement, which was amazing, and so this upcoming one has a lot to beat!

Following the placement, I have my dissertation which just terrifies me! Where do I start? What do I focus on? So many questions flying through my head!

I’ve just moved in to my new house, with new housemates, in a new part of Plymouth – it feels like a proper fresh start. Living with girls is much more relaxing (so far!).

I have spent the day with Kelly, the President of the Plymouth  Education Society, of which I am the Secretary. We spent the day answering Fresher’s questions about the Society and the BEd course and it was great to meet such motivated people – I wish I was as motivated as them in my first year, although as Pete told me today: “You are a converted nail!” – based on his analogy that you are either a hammer (you do things) or you are a nail.

This made me think a fair bit – I definitely was a nail in my first year. I just coasted through the first 9 months, doing as little as possible to pass the year, and enjoying myself at the same time!

However, second year produced a whole new me and I ended up getting more involved than I thought I would ever be – talking in front of 300 people at BETT, organising a Teach Meet for PELeCON, making a Deaf Awareness DVD for Eggbuckland Vale Primary School, becoming the Secretary for the Plymouth Education Society, being interviewed for BETT radio… just to name a few!

This year looks set to be just as filled with opportunities for developing myself, mostly within the Education Society. We have lots of trips, socials and events planned and a great website to go with the Society.

I am currently helping to plan the Teach Meet for the SouthWest Learning and Technologies Conference, which I plan to host. This will help with the planning for the SEN Teach Meet hosted by the Education Society which I will also give a talk at.

I will be learning sign language after receiving a bursary from the University to do so, which has always been an interest of mine, and will be continuing with the 100WC which I really enjoyed being a part of last year.

So, with all the above, a long placement and a dissertation as well as trying to have a fairly normal student life, I have a pretty busy and exciting year ahead!

Another School Trip?!

After my amazing week long residential to London with the Year Six at my placement school, I was really lucky to be asked to go on another residential – this time with Year Two on a two night trip to Escot in East Devon.

My experience of Escot was watching a James Morrison gig in the grounds, and as a friend’s wedding venue and I didn’t even realise they offered overnight stays, let  alone residential trips for schools! Our class was one of the youngest they have had to stay, and I was worried that, being Year Twos, they may struggle being away from home for two nights, but they did so well, with hardly any tears!

Escot’s residential offering is called “Camp Wild” – they run residential trips as well as day trips and summer camps. The whole residential is focussed on everything natural, staying in yurts, eating outside, having campfires etc. All of the activities are based in the grounds, making the most of the amazing opportunities for learning that they have there.

When we arrived we were taken to the yurts that we would be staying in – I had always wanted to stay in a yurt so was probably more excited than the children at this point! Our bus journey only took about 45 minutes and so the children weren’t too grouchy when we got there!

 
 

The children settled in to their yurts – two for boys and two for girls. I was expecting it to be more tent-like, but there was hardwood flooring, IKEA bunk beds and a wood-burner, making it really cosy and not like camping at all. The set-up of the yurts was a large one in the middle which was equipped with lots of games, toys and books to keep the children entertained during any free time. This had the only entrance and exit, and joined on to this central yurt were the four bedroom yurts. It was a great set-up as it meant that the children couldn’t leave without going through the central yurt, where two teachers also slept, meaning that they were safe and secure, even when they did sleepwalk! 

We had some lunch in the great outdoor eating area – the food is cooked in an outdoor kitchen, and the children are split into teams to lay the tables, clear up and wash and dry at the end – I thought this was a great idea, meaning that the children worked together to make sure all the work was done (although the teachers mostly washed!).

We were then taken on a night-time walk – although it was still light! The grounds are full of interesting things to look at, and we made our way round going through trees and along muddy paths until we made it to Jurassic Pork! This is where the wild boars were which we would feed on the last day.

We then went to the drop slide and most had a go on that, before heading through a giant termite mound replica which was really interesting. Along the walk we were shown interesting trees, such as the cork tree and a tree that you can make a drumming sound on!

 

They have a great play park and rope swing part way round so we had a good play in there (adults included!) and then made it to the maze. The maze is right next to the yurt village that we were staying in, so we made our way through and then had a great view of where we were staying from the middle.

Back to the yurts and I was hoping the children would get to sleep early as they were tired – how wrong I was! The last were asleep by 12:30am and the earliest up were 4:45am! Luckily my yurt with a couple of other teachers was slightly away from the main yurts, but I still had a wake-up call of children playing!

After our early start and lovely breakfast, we made our way over to the Saxon Village. We were taught how to make name necklaces using hand drills and wooden discs – the children were amazed to learn I had a first name! After another trip through the maze, much quicker since we knew our way round, we were taken in to the woods to learn how to build a fire and a shelter.

We split in to two groups and began with learning how to light a fire. We used the flint and steel to make our fires after a great talk on the best way to build the base.

We then learnt how to build a shelter and why it is best to be built in a certain way. We had a go at building a shelter, although ours didn’t turn out great!

The children really seemed to love this and they made some great shelters and all of them managed to start a fire, even if with a little help – pretty impressive for a group of 6/7 year olds!

After our lunch we went on a walk to make a salad. We stopped at lots of different trees and plants and were taught about what is safe to eat and what isn’t, and what different plants can be used for – we all even ate leaves from a Lyme Tree which I didn’t see myself doing!

After some free time, we made it over to the swamp walk – the part of the trip that most of us were looking forward to the most! After donning our messy clothes and taking off our shoes, I was given the job of going first! The swamp started off being up to about my ankle height and was very squelchy underneath! Being only half a metre wide, we all made our way up the swampy path in single file, before I had to slide down a muddy bank in to a freezing cold pool of water! It came up to about my waist, so obviously quite high on the children. And this is where it got messy! 30 children had to come down the side in to the water and I think only about 10 managed to not cry – and I don’t blame the ones that did cry! The water was freezing and it must have been quite scary for them, not being able to see the bottom. So, we carried most of the children across in to the final pool where we all had a good splash around.

I absolutely loved the swamp walk – would love to do it again, and so would most of the children, despite all of the tears.

We showered off (lots of showers and toilets outside which are much nicer than the usual camping ones!) and went back to the Saxon Village to be taught how to toast marshmallows over a campfire.

Then we went on to a Jousting and Falconry show which was having its first display of the year. We only watched half but it really was amazing, with the birds doing amazing flying. The children were amazed.

 Thankfully, the children were much more tired and so everyone slept well, including me! We woke the next day to bacon baps and then headed to feed the otters and the wild boars. Finally, we had a walk around the birds and were given a great tour and found out lots of interesting facts about the birds they have on display.

As you can see, we fit a huge amount in to 2.5 days and Escot’s staff were absolutely amazing with the children. The children all learnt a lot, as did I, and I would love to go back there on another school trip. 

Year Two Placement - Amazing!

So, it has been a LONG time since my last post! The last 5 weeks have been manic with my second year placement, which has been absolutely amazing.

Having spent a week with the class before Easter, I was really looking forward to getting back to the school. I was really lucky to have a great class teacher. In the past my teachers have been a bit older, whereas James was still in his mid-twenties so I was looking forward to having a younger teacher’s advice to add to the experiences I have had with other teachers.

The class teacher was the most enthusiastic teacher I have ever met – he really worked well with the Year 1/2 class and I felt that I learnt so much from him.

When he first gave me feedback on my lesson I started having second thoughts about teaching – was it really what I wanted to do? The planning and stress of being observed had really got to me and it had made me question my decision. However, I took all of his advice on board and since then I have had no doubt that this is what I want to do.

Something that he really does well is using his voice in different ways to control how the class behaves and feels – something that I struggled with. He uses silly voices, and really exaggerates everything and I found this really difficult to do with other adults in the room. However, following his advice I just completely let go and I ended up teaching some of the best lessons I have ever taught!

My feedback has been amazing, more than I could have ever expected, with my tutor even saying:

"Amy has achieved a standard of teaching rarely seen in a Year Two placement"

and the school was so pleased with my work that I was given the last space on the Year Six residential trip to London in my last week. Whilst my partner got to stay in school and observe the Year 2 SATS, which would have been useful to me, I was able to experience a week long residential trip which I have found completely invaluable.

I had such a great week – one of the best of my life – and made some great relationships with the children and other teachers (special mention to David Bond, a current PGCE student!). Following the trip, it made me realise that Exmouth is definitely where I want to teach and so I am going to spend some of my long holidays going back to the school and teaching and helping out in Years 1/2 and Years 5 and 6.

I feel I have developed so much more on this experience, mostly down to the class teacher’s advice and the opportunities he gave me. Now I just can’t wait to have my own class!

I Organised a Teach Meet!

Pete offered our class the opportunity to organise a Teach Meet to get free entry to the PELeCON event and so I jumped at the chance! Along with James Stoner and Scott Parker we set about planning our Teach Meet.

Having only been to the BETT 2012 Teach Meet and having spoken at that one and not taking much in due to the nervousness, we asked JCSheffield to host the event and he did a great job.

I was really nervous that the Teach Meet would be a failure – no one would come; no one would sign up to speak; we would have computer failure! However, despite the microphones not working, everything went smoothly and we had some great speakers, talking about lots of different topics.

What I enjoyed most was seeing fellow ICT education specialists, Kelly Stone, James Horne and Hannah Shelton get up and give talks. I know when I did my talk at BETT it was a huge thing for me – public speaking is not something I had ever done – and so I was really pleased that they gave it a go too, and they had great reactions to their talks! Check out #TMPELeCON on Twitter to see what people had to say!

Having been to two Teach Meets, one of which I spoke at and one of which I organised, I am looking forward to just attending the next one! However, it looks like I am going to be organising the SWLTC Teach Meet which is a great opportunity for me and I will be involving the PES in the running of it as their new secretary as of September.

Being able to organise the PELeCON Teach Meet and it going so well has been the icing on the cake of what has been a fantastic year at university for me! :)

The Past Few Weeks...

Wow… it has been a hectic few weeks! I have had so much going on that I haven’t had a spare moment for my blog, but thought I would do a quick update as lots has been going on.

The main highlight of the last few weeks has got to be my placement. This is my third placement since being at university and it has been almost a year since my last placement, so I have really been looking forward to it.

I have been placed at Marpool Community Primary School in Exmouth which is a lovely school in my home town. I am in a Year 1/2 class and have to say that originally I was disappointed not to have a higher year group as I have previously been placed with a Year 1 class – although I am well aware that every class is completely unique!

However, I am now absolutely loving my Year 1/2 class and wouldn’t change it! I have been in the school for a week and I now have to wait five weeks for the main part of the placement. The past week has been a great opportunity to meet the class and the staff and to get used to the school and its policies etc. The class teacher is only a couple of years older than I am and it is really nice to work with a teacher who is so enthusiastic about teaching – I have already learnt a lot from him in only a week.

The children are absolutely lovely and I can’t wait to get back there and get stuck in with some proper teaching.

The week has consisted mostly of working with small groups and individuals with a couple of observations thrown in, and a very fun trip to the zoo! My feedback has been great so far so I am feeling really positive about the rest of the placement.

 

Another highlight of the week for me was finding out that I was in the TES! This came as a surprise to me when I received a tweet from a lecturer congratulating me on it and I still haven’t managed to track down a copy of it! However, Alex Gingell kindly sent me a picture of part of it and as far as I gather, it seems I am in the TESPRO section of the TES from 9^th March and it focusses on extracts of my blog about my experience of using Kodu. 

I have also been busy planning a Teach Meet for the PELeCON in Plymouth in April and following a meeting this week to further plan, there will be more details released!

I have a lot on at the moment, with assignments and organising the Teach Meet as well as working full time to try to fund a trip to France later in the year, so I will update again when I find time!

What Do People Think Of Me?

Pete started our ICT lecture asking us to write down how we think our course mates perceive us. We are all great friends and enjoy a lot of ‘banter’ and so I thought I knew what they would write about me, so my page looked like this:

I know that at 24, I am not old! However, as the oldest in the class they like to bring my age up as often as possible, so I thought this would get mentioned! I am a friendly person, and like to think that they see me as this, and I am pretty sure they see me as a hard worker, as I try to put my all in to each lesson, and they can see my blog and extra curricular activities.

We then had to go around the room and write down something on each other’s page, about how we perceive them. This was really interesting and I was expecting my page to look the same as I had written – “old, friendly and works hard”. I went around the room and it was interesting to see how people perceived each other.

Mine ended up being: 

As a future teacher, who is concerned about the way she comes across in a professional manner, I was pleased with the comments, although I couldn’t help think that actually, it made me come across as quite boring!

However, I agree with every comment! I am super organised, but like to think I am fun. I believe I am professional as I have taken on Pete’s comments over the past two years to change myself from having a ‘student presence’ online, to a ‘professional presence’. I work hard – I have a part-time job at the University and I take on as many extra-curricular activities as I can, from being elected as Secretary for the Plymouth Education Society, to taking part in the 1oo Word Challenge. I’m glad that my hard work does show to others!

I am a student, in my twenties and I do like a drink – I won’t deny that! I am determined, and I think this can be seen with how hard I work. I am really pleased that people think I am friendly and good to talk to, as this is how I try to be, but I am not surprised that I was told I am mature – probably too mature for my own good at times!

I liked the full of life comment as I try to be full of life and take every opportunity that comes my way, and its nice that someone thinks I am “really cool” but I’m sure this one isn’t true!

The point of these activities was for us to see how we perceive ourselves, and how people perceive us and how these are similar and how they differ. We then had to write a few words to describe how we want to be as a teacher:

As ‘Miss Parkin’ I want the children to see me as supportive and friendly; someone they can learn from, but who also makes learning fun and exciting, by creating memorable and new, creative lessons.

We then had to write down how we would like to be seen in the staff room, and which areas of ourselves we might need or want to ‘hide’ from our colleagues. 

Having worked full time since I was 17 until I started University, I know how important it is for your work colleagues to perceive you in a certain way, and that this isn’t necessarily the way that you are in your personal life. However, I have also made some of my best friends through work and this wouldn’t have happened had I not been myself.

Personally , I am a fairly sensible person, and I don’t think there is anything I would need to ‘hide’ from my colleagues in a professional environment. Saying this, I did put down that I would ‘hide’ liking a drink and how I can be opinionated. Although, I don’t see either of these things as bad qualities – I like to go out occasionally on weekends, and that is actually all I do at University – I’m not one for drinking three or four times a week, and so, I don’t think this is something that I would ‘hide’.

I do have opinions and I do like to share them, but again, I am a mature and sensible person and I know when it is a good time to share these opinions and when not to!

We then had to Google ourselves… we have had to do this before and Pete managed to find out the address of a girl in the class, and then found out the colour of her curtains by going on Google Maps, and so I was slightly worried about doing this! However, I was really pleased that all I found was:

Since beginning University, Pete has mentioned a few times about our internet presence and our digital footprint, and I have been working to make my personal accounts as private as possible, and create a professional internet presence for myself.

I was happy to find that my Twitter and blog were the main things I found about myself, and I didn’t find anything personal from a basic search of myself.

Again, being quite a sensible person, I would not put any pictures or comments of my personal Facebook page that I wouldn’t want to be found by a prospective employer. However, we see more and more often these days, the mistakes that people make in putting photos and comments on what they think are their private accounts, which eventually lead them to trouble.

Only earlier this month did a teacher get disciplined forcomments and photos made on her Facebook profile. 

When I started University, I had set my Facebook as private, but I had a personal Twitter page and I probably had photos that I wouldn’t want my boss to see. In these two years, I have dramatically changed and I now have deleted my personal Twitter, and I have my Facebook as private as can be. I have deleted any photos that I am not happy to have on my profile, and now the results when searching for my name are my professional Twitter and my blog, which I think is a great result to have!

Today really did make me think about my internet presence and made me consider my Facebook account more in depth – I have been considering deleting it for a while, with the only things keeping me there being the photos and the ability to create groups to help with my University work. I spoke to Pete about this and he suggested that I could have two accounts which is something I might look in to – a personal one, for photo sharing and staying in touch with family and friends that I don’t get to see very often, and a professional one for talking to colleagues and for helping with university work. I’m interested to know what others do.

I’m happy to say that my online presence is now mostly @amyparkinbed and I’m going to work my hardest to stay that way!

Following today’s seminar, I would be interested to know how people reading this, and who follow me on Twitter, perceive me, so please comment!

Developing My Writing

When I began University I was insistent that I would achieve a first class degree – this is still my dream but recently, I have been wondering whether that is all it is – just a dream. Can I really achieve a first?

Having left school in 2003, I took an Access to Higher Education course in 2009 to enable me to get in to University. I found it difficult to write essays having been out of education for so long. We were encouraged to reference in our assignments but using journals was never mentioned and most of us gained distinctions on our work having only referenced websites and the one AQA textbook we used!

I was getting distinctions in most of my work – the highest I could get – maybe I didn’t need to improve! I began University and it hit me that this was a completely different type of writing – the Access Course should have prepared me for University but I was disappointed that they had not made more of a point of referencing and wide reading.

Still, I passed my first year at Plymouth University and as the first two years are pass or fail only, I wasn’t able to really see if my passes were high or low ones. It was only this year, when we began to be given percentage grades (although the year is still pass or fail) that I realised I was not achieving what I wanted to.

I was planning to have a chat with Pete (@ethinking) about how I could develop my writing so that when our marks begin to really count, I am achieving good marks. Luckily on the day that I planned to talk to him, he addressed our class and said that we need to become more critical in our writing.

I know I am too safe in my writing. If I am asked a direct question then I will gladly give my opinion on it – but when it comes to writing it down, I just can’t seem to form opinions that come out well on paper!

So, my first stop was Twitter. I mentioned I was looking to improve my critical writing, and Amanda Corrigan (@ajcorrigan) gave me my first piece of advice – “Keep asking yourself WHY and SO WHAT as you read and write”. Only 12 words yet it summed it all up for me. I need it putting simply and having this in my head will keep me remembering to be critical in my writing!

Second stop was the library. I took out a few books and found “The Good Writing Guide for Education Students” by Dominic Wyse to be particularly helpful.

I also found the websites from the University of Leicester and Manchester University very helpful.

And so, I developed a list of tips and advice that I have found useful and that will hopefully help me out in my future assignments.

-    Read the key texts.

We are provided with the key texts at the beginning of each module and yet I always leave it too late to get the book out from the library – by which point it has been taken out! I’ll now make sure I get there earlier – if I still can’t get hold of it then I will search electronically – so many books are available online nowadays. I will also search for other books by that author. 

In general though….. READ, READ AND READ MORE!

-    Read the primary source.

Too often do I reference from a secondary source. We are told time and time again to read from the primary source but I still fail to do so – from now on I will!

-    Read more journals.

Journals scare me. I don’t know how to navigate the library to find them, and then how to navigate the journals themselves! This is something to learn.

-    Use paraphrasing.

How easy it is to bung a quote in to an essay to take up some of the word count. This is something I won’t be doing. I have been gradually moving on from using direct quotes to paraphrasing – it is a daunting task as it seems a very easy thing to get wrong, but practice makes perfect.

-    Plan and plan again.

I already plan my essay. I make small titles for myself and then write it in sections, before ensuring it flows well. From what I have read, if this works for you then it is a good way to plan – but to plan, and then plan again. Plan to form a structure for the essay. Plan again to form a structure with questions to answer and points to be made.

-    Stop and think.

I came across a quote from Piaget. “I have always preferred to reflect upon a problem before reading on it”.

I usually dive straight in to an essay – I read and find other people’s opinions before thinking about my own. If I want to develop a more critical writing style then I need to stop and think. Stop reading and planning and writing and just think for a while about what I think.

-    Balance.

Writing needs to be both descriptive and critical and I saw a good way to evaluate whether my writing is a good balance of each. Using two pens highlight one colour for descriptive writing and one colour for critical writing. If the critical writing colour is more then you are on the right track!

-    Recognise my limitations.

When putting down my ideas, I need to recognise that my knowledge and experience is limited in relation to others, but that this does not mean that my opinion does not matter.

From now on I will be checking through this list, making sure that I am being critical and that people will be convinced by what I am writing and the words “Keep asking yourself WHY and SO WHAT as you read and write” will be with me whenever I write a sentence!

I feel like that first class degree is now within reaching distance again!

Since publishing this post, I have had heaps of advice on Twitter... 

Thanks everyone for your help and advice!

I am an I.S.F.J.!

I am an I.S.F.J. – that’s an introverted, sensing, feeling and judging person – according to the Jung Typology Test. 

As part of our Psychology and ICT module, Pete asked us to go to this website (http://www.humanmetrics.com/cgi-win/jtypes2.asp) to take a test based on the Jung and Briggs Myers personality aproach. There are 72 questions with yes or no answers and the idea is that you answer as quickly as possible. I actually found it really difficult to answer quickly, without thinking about the answer, and realised that this is because for some questions there is the desire to answer the question with how you would like to be, rather than how you are. For example, some people might like to think they are the life and soul of the party but know that, in fact, they love nothing more than a quiet night in! 

So, we answered the questions and were presented with four letters – mine being I.S.F. and J. 

We were then told to turn off our computer screens – I was perplexed… we were in an ICT lesson! But there is always a method to Pete’s madness! 

We were given a piece of paper and were told to be silent for two minutes. We had to keep a tally, marking each time we wanted to do something. I ended up with seventeen marks on my paper – partly due to being sat next to Scott who kept mumbling under his breath!

We were then told to stand on either side of the room, dependent on what our first letter was – E (extrovert) or I (introvert). We were then told to look at each other’s tally charts and we noticed that the introvert attitudes generally  had fewer tally marks than the extrovert attitudes.

Briggs and Myers suggest that those extroverts draw energy from action, and that they act first, reflect on it, and then act again, compared to introverts who expend their energy through action, reflecting, then acting, and then reflecting again. 

Given the options of introvert and extrovert, I would say I was an extrovert – I like being around people, I feel confident around people and am outgoing – however the meaning in this context is different, and therefore I would say I am an introvert and that the test, for me, was correct – I do think before I act and speak. 

Pete then asked us to go in to two groups again – one side for sensing and one side for intuition. I was ‘sensing’. He then put the picture below on a computer screen for each group, and asked us to discuss the painting with eachother and then describe it to the other group. 

The sensing group stated what was in the picture: a dog, a boat, water etc. The ‘intuition’ group described the picture in detail – they mentioned that they thought it was set in the Victorian era due to the clothes etc. 

Briggs and Myers suggest that sensing and intuion are information-gathering functions and they describe how new inform ation is understood and interpreted. 

Our sensing group formed information that was tangible and concrete about the painting, whereas the intuition group formed information that was more abstract. 

Again, I think the test got it right for me – I tend to take things as I see them, although I would like to be more intuitive! 

We were then split again in to those whose test results gave the thinking function and those who had the feeling function. 

I was a ‘feeler’ as was most of the class. We were given the scenario of being a head teacher and, having sent a TA on an expensive training course, finding out that they had not been attending due to a family member being in hospital. We were asked to discuss how we would deal with the situation.

Instantly, we all agreed that we would talk to the TA to discuss the situation and explain that it shouldn’t have been done, but that they should feel that they could talk to us. The ‘thinkers’ all agreed that they would ‘sack her’. 

The thinkers make their decisions from a more detached position, doing what seems reasonable and logical, whereas feelers empathise with a situation and consider the needs of the people involved.

I agree again with the results, that I am a feeler – the thought of sacking the TA never crossed my mind – but I don’t think that this is necessarily always a good thing! 

The final dimesion of the model is judging and perceiving. I was on the judging side and we were given the scenario of being given £3,000 to plan an end of year university party. We could spend it on whatever we wanted. We found ourselves planning a party with details of money spent, and on what, with lots of details. The perceiving group came up with “Magaluf and a free bar”! 

The judging personality like to be organised and have all details sorted, whereas the perceiving group like to make vague plans and keep decisions open. 

This is the one I agree with the most – I am definitely a very (over!) organised person, with lists of things to do that are endless!

The seminar was a really interesting one, and I enjoyed being taught in this way rather than Pete simply explaining it on the board. The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator is a complex subject to explain and by learing it kinaestheitcally, it has lodged itself in my head!