September Makes Me Insane

September approaches. It's the new school year, and for me that carries more meaning than the start of the calendar year. It's deeply rooted psychologically - the excitement, the new stationary, school bag, putting on your school uniform again. It's also the promise of something stable, secure and familiar - the routine of getting up, going out, doing things and coming home to relax.

OH HOW THINGS HAVE CHANGED! Well, to an extent. Now I work in the evenings, so I wake up in the morning and wait for the day to begin at 3.30pm. It does seem that I am learning how to do life on a very gradual basis. For example, this end-of-August I have quite a detailed schedule of work I do from waking up time until about 6pm, after which time I can read, watch TV or Skype my friends. (Mostly the latter.) This is so lovely, and so reassuring and just like the days of yore. In a way, I am a little but wary of going back to the routine of getting up and waiting to work.

At this time of the year I start to get anxious that I'm not fulfilling my potential, and that I'm basically wasting my life because of sheer laziness. This year, at least, I can take a step back and say to myself: 'No. I am working towards goals. I am doing as much as I can.' A lot of this feeling of inadequacy comes down to being distracted. I look after people and let them take my time, even when I have a defined schedule. At least I recognise this now, and I can work towards fixing it.

Does anyone else have a panic in late August/September? Or do you just think: "I WANT NEW STATIONARY!!!" (I think this too....)

Schoooool!

I teach music to second years (14 year olds). Maybe studying Drama and Theatre Studies at university completely spoiled me, but I can never understand why our education system requires nothing more from the pupils than to sit an absorb the information only to regurgitate it later in an exam. What's the point? That's not learning. That's glassy-eyed recitation.

Their lack of motivation and team-skills astounds me. Out of two second year classes, I can only trust one in a practical situation not to just start screaming and banging things. They don't want to listen to me, maybe because all they do all day is listen to teachers. They are actually so used to the classroom situation that as soon as it changes, they get out of control.

It's quite sad. It's sad for me to see but it's really sad for them because they are missing out on so much. They need teamwork exercises. They need to learn to respect each other and to respect the teacher.

The weird thing is that they don't actually understand why the would benefit from listening to each other and listening to the teacher. And I completely understand! I was exactly like that when I was in secondary school. We all were. We didn't know anything different. But having been to university has just completely opened my eyes to everything that could be done to make school a better, more educational place for the country's teenagers.

Shaaaaaame. :(