Friday 22nd November 2024 - A Productive Day with Family Time

 Hello all,

With Juli back to help out, I finally managed to get to work on time, which was just as well since I had to prepare for the Year 1 assembly starting at 9 AM sharp. My role was to stream the assembly online via Teams for parents who couldn’t attend in person. It wasn’t perfect—the kids were too quiet for me to hear much from the back of the room—but considering it was their first performance, I felt proud of their efforts.

Once the assembly ended, I helped clear away the chairs so the hall could be used again and moved on to assist in a Year 6 computing lesson. The topic was variables—a cornerstone of programming—and the students were tasked with adding a scoring system to a light version of Pong in Scratch. Watching them figure it out and then help their peers was incredibly rewarding.

Later in the day, I was relieved to see the nursery door issue resolved after a visit from the fire alarm provider. Resetting the system brought everything back to normal. This freed me up to add the final touch to the nursery's TV PowerPoint—a menu update. Next week, I can finally get the presentation running as planned.

I also set up a new email account for the Headteacher and continued working on IT upgrades for the Teaching School Hub. Our delayed equipment order had arrived at last, and today, I configured two laptops to complement the iPad I set up yesterday. These devices will support the Hub staff for years to come, and I’m thrilled to see our resources improving.

Toward the end of the workday, I contacted my assistant referees to confirm their availability for tomorrow’s game in Sunderland. Both responded quickly, which was a relief. Fingers crossed the weather holds up!

On my way home, I posted two eBay items I had sold and returned a repaired gaming PC I had been upgrading over the last few weeks. Clearing it out of my office brought a sense of calm—less clutter equals more clarity.

The evening was dedicated to reconnecting with Juli and Fearne after not seeing much of each other during the week. We had a relaxed evening watching I’m a Celebrity, Get Me Out of Here, and after they went to bed, I found time to write this blog post. It feels good to end the day on a productive yet peaceful note.