It’s been a funny old year. The press, and especially the satirists, will bemoan 2016 for Brexit, Trump, the death of every celebrity you ever loved and generally for being crap.
And most teachers would probably say that the workload has gotten worse, that balance has gotten further out of kilter, that DfE meddling has added more stress and I know that I’ve found it increasingly difficult to keep all the plates spinning.
I’ve not done as much CPD / CAS / outreach work as I’d have liked to, I’ve still not updated any of my YouTube revision videos for almost 4 years now(!) and my long term plans to tidy up and add to my various resource collections have utterly stalled. Not to mention the frequency of these blog posts.
BUT
In the last year I’ve been to France with my family (twice), seen performances of Mary Poppins (professional), Spamalot (amateur), Goodnight Mr. Tom and Blue Stockings (school), been to see racing cars, spent 3 awesome days at a music festival, attended a variety of gigs (the highlight being the Chili Peppers last night) and even run a successful Raspberry Jam for 10 months out of 12. I’ve had a great year. My daughter has started secondary, my son has flourished at college, I’ve had opportunities to spend time doing fantastic things with my fantastic family.
I’ve also lost a friend, had a health scare and am shortly to lose my eldest to university – all of which helps to add to the perspective.
Work life balance has never been so important to me. So while I struggle to get everything done, I’ve accepted that – despite being one of the good kids – I will occasionally miss deadlines. I will sometimes miss out entire tasks. I will prioritise what I can – but I will do my best by accepting my own limitations and not burning myself out.
So this Christmas I will take my to do list, I will take my marking and some of it will get done. And some of it, inevitably, won’t. But I will have a good Christmas.
And I hope you do too.
I Should Be Marking 