Then it all calmed down. A few days later the temperature rose ten degrees and the sun was shining. Not, of course, all the time. Typical March: one on, one definitely off - cloudy, murky, raining. For the first half of the month, anyway.
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| Grape hyacinths just outside the front door... |
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| 'Little guy' not so little any more... producing a long tendril, carrying offspring. #morelittleguys |
At school, we had all kinds of challenges which had little to do with teaching but, perhaps, a lot to do with education in many areas.
First off was 'team building'. Teachers and teaching assistants working in one part of the school were requested to go on some kind of team building activity; perhaps playing golf, or watching a film together as one of the other teams had done. Our ideas ranged from a chocolate-making workshop to an adventure activity involving problem solving (at a cost of a mere £50 plus....). Putting aside my strong objection to being required to take part in a work-related activity in my own time at my own expense (yes! really! #worldofeducationworkers #neverheardofcorporatefunding), I went, with half a dozen colleagues, to take part in a quiz.
It was GREAT. A fundraising event held by parents for and at the Upper School (our secondary education department), it was a really good evening. The questions were all based on school subjects and were easily doable or guessable. We had to guess quite a lot.... the History round was surprisingly tricky and quite informative. Who would recognise the name of the inventor of the 'kitchen time saving device' and then correctly identify said device? (Our 'educated' guess of microwave was CORRECT!)
One round involved building a world-famous landmark out of spaghetti and marshmallows. Trying to guess what the children might be impressed by, we went for the pyramids of Egypt. We even managed to make a (very sticky) marshmallow mummy. It was very hard to tell from the faces of the Year 7 children whether we had impressed them or not. Possibly not. Their response seemed rather like that of an indulgent parent, looking at the attempts of their three year old to reproduce the Mona Lisa... or the wonders of the ancient world, in this case.
Anyway, we came a very respectable fourth out of 15 teams. It was also a fun evening of reconnecting with former parents and pupils (including one young man who was almost unrecognisable as the nine year old I remember) and, of course, building stronger relationhips with our team.
Otherwise, March is building up to the End of Term and the School Production. And Production It Is. This year, the musical 'Seussical', based on the books of Dr Seuss, has been chosen. We were treated to the opening sequence one assembly: much polishing to take place, apparently, but to the untutored eye it was already impressive, worthy of a West End production. Rehearsals, rehearsals, rehearsals was the Word of The Week... the last TWO weeks of term, in fact. More to come in April...
On top of learning lines and songs and, in the case of Year 6, complicated actions, the children had other tasks to achieve. Complicated Science homework for National Science Week, including designing a poster; an art competition for a play promotion poster; and taking part in a photography competition. (Staff were required to enter as well: I managed to drag something out of the archive of photos we took in France at half term, but it did motivate me to snap various other 'nature inspired' shots as we went on walks...
With all of this, there is no time for any charity fundraising: for the first time since I arrived at the school, we are not supporting Sports Relief...
Instead, we had an 'Outdoor Neuroplasticity Challenge Day'. I was indeed challenged in trying to come up with an activity which would engage 4 year olds equally as well as 11 year olds... and help them to work together in a team. Solution: build a Lego tree house in honour of our former head, who is seriously into Outdoor Learning and was visiting especially to officially 'open' our new outdoor classroom. I had various 'Mr Walton' figures, from a block of wood sporting his photograph to a heavy metal Darth Vader figure (Mr Walton after eating a big dinner' and a Lego figure, appropriately dressed for hiking with hat, backpack and waterbottle. The children had great fun...
At home, we Skyped family: missing them so much and yet rejoicing in their adventurous and exciting lives. We watched the Six Nations Rugby, and a New Zealand film 'Hunt for the Wilderpeople', which brought back many memories, including the time we ended up being part of the background on John Campbell's news programme Campbell Live (we were in Manganui World Famous Fish and Chip Shop at the time) and stumbling across a huge car wrecker's yard at Horopito....recognising much of the scenery from our visits there.
Richard acquired a mechanical log splitter - and a load of firewood, just in time for another spell of cold weather. Many happy hours spent splitting and stacking wood: much easier than using a sledgehammer.
And the clocks 'spring forward', giving us an extra hour of life in the evenings. Time to get out in the garden...
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| Celandines heralding spring |
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| Fattsia survives the snow |
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| Evening view... con trails melting into the atmosphere... |
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| This beetle was covered with tiny crawling dudus... mites? aphids? spiders? Fast-moving on a sluggish beetle, yet he flew away out of the jar the next morning. |
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| Another beetle, iridescent blue. |
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| Thistle. #beautifulintherightplace #butnotinmygarden |
The day after: the treat of a spa day at a local hotel with my good friend Kareena. Brunch, pool, sauna, spa, afternoon tea, chat, reading.... #supertreat
End of the month: finally: Good Friday.
Motorhome to France.
Another ferry crossing.
Another fortnight.
Filled with adventure
Pickle takes up residence
in her home on wheels.
