Busyness, Priorities, Focus

What is they say about if you want a job doing giving it to be a busy person?  How on earth am I meant to fit everything into what was already a busy life?  The short answer I guess is to prioritise and focus.

No more rooms cleared yet but Kevin is threatening (well, that what it sounds like!) to start on the loft at the week end.  Yeuch, my heart has sunk to the bottom of my stomach.  On a scale of 1-10 with 10 being the most, how much don’t I want to clear the loft this week end?  Yep, no question, a 10.  Asking me to clear ‘clutter’ is a bit like a trip to the dentist with no hope of an anaesthetic 😦

However, before I even get to the week end there’s the small matter of a third evening of CELTA classes at Manchester Academy of English.  Last night we did a demonstration lesson observation and met the students we’ll be teaching over the coming weeks.

The demo observation flew past – an hour, I couldn’t believe it.  And then, much to my surprise, chatting to the students devoured another hour in no time at all (well 60 minutes if you want to be pedantic but it didn’t seem like it is my point!).

Anyway, much as I love writing here it isn’t really a priority today – writing up class notes, editing a client’s newsletter and taking the dog out before college – oops, forgot a client meeting – are priorities however so I’d better get going …

CELTA 1 Survived

That’s the first class done!  It’s always the trickiest because you don’t know any of your classmates, the tutors, or your way around the college.  You don’t know how long your journey will actually take at that time of day, whether you should have already bought the books on the Reading List and if so, do you need to bring them in with you?  And did you really need to do all 50 of the Pre-Course Tasks?

But, you’ll be pleased to hear that I survived all of it.  I arrived on time (which my friends will tell you is something of an achievement), participated without taking over (yep, there’s always one and ours is a young man who hasn’t yet learnt that you don’t need an entire back story with every single question you ask.  The question alone will usually suffice), found the coffee machine and even made a friend at break time.  Success!

Next week lessons begin in earnest and my next hurdle will be the very first teaching practice I undertake.  After that – it’s plain sailing.  Isn’t it?!