Looking back, college and university has been a bit of a comfort blanket for me. I did three years at college to get the grades that I wanted and now I'm entering the final stage of my 4 years at university - I spent a year away from home doing BA Education Studies before I realised that I needed to push myself and go start afresh studying BEd Primary Education. Ever since I was 16, I've had the long holidays and days off in the week but now it's time to grow up and do whatever adults do.
Last year, my university gave me the option to study for three or four years - if I studied for four years, I could get specialism in a subject and some credits towards masters. Up until second year, I thought, "why not? If I'm at university I might as well get as qualified as I can." But after being placed by the university to do work placements in schools up to 30 miles away and travelling the 2 hour slog home after a long day teaching, I decided I didn't want another year of it, and now I'm so happy I ended up choosing three years. But why would I want to give up on the long holidays and mid-week days off? I could relax in the university bubble for another year!
It's strange, because - not going to lie - I've always been lazy. Leaving things until the last minute, picking the easy route, but this year I've been feeling an increasing pull towards growing up. I've been looking at houses with For Sale signs with longing eyes, I've been walking around TK Maxx homeware and I've been checking TES Jobs daily. The girl who my friends used to call 'Peter Pan' is turning Power-Rangers-style (well ok, maybe in a more clumsy fashion) into something that could resemble an adult.
Yesterday, I visited the most friendliest, perfect school with amazing staff and beautiful setting - which is coincidentally the place where I will begin my final teaching placement before becoming a qualified teacher (if all goes well... *touch wood*). Although I only spent two hours there, it's given me a high. Without going into detail, last year I was placed in a lovely school although the rigorous scrutinising and extremely high standards left me occasionally struggling to jump the hurdles, or should I say high jump? The school that I visited yesterday, although having a better Ofsted rating, had a much more laid-back atmosphere where all the staff seemed to be happy rather than pulling their hair out. Thinking about it, the schools I have visited with higher Ofsted ratings were the ones who didn't have to write a paragraph of marking in every child's book or create all-singing-and-dancing lessons.
So I'm hoping that there is actually a point behind all of this - that sometimes, you can take the easy route out. I don't need to faff around doing four years instead of three - because at the end of the day, I'm still going to get the same job with the same pay. I don't need to spend hours marking or planning lessons trying to impress my markers. Sometimes you just need to accept that you can't do everything and realise that the most important things don't revolve around work but your happiness and positivity. I don't want to jinx it, but I've got a weird feeling that everything this year is going to turn out ok. :)
