I started my teaching career at St. Michael’s School and had some of the happiest years of my life working there. I have made life-long friends amongst the staff and hopefully one or two children may remember ‘Miss Saunders’ in a few years to come!
My 6 years at St. Michael’s were heavily based in the Year 5 classroom, with Mr Cotterill just across the ‘art area’. Mrs Souter and Mrs Thair were my wonderful TAs and without them I would not have survived!
Most people who remember me will probably say I was musical, playing the flute, saxophone and piano at almost any opportunity. Miss Evans and I organised many a KS2 production in the Spring Term (often in a little over 2 weeks) and despite life being busy, they were always great fun. Please Mrs Butler, Colours, something about a Hot Air Balloon (!) were amongst the titles I can remember. In addition to this, I frequently played in the Church carol concerts, which just seemed to get bigger and more elaborate each year.
I also liked to bring dance to the school and alongside the Bracknell Forest productions of Yanamamo and Ocean World, I entered a Dreamcatcher dance, Olympic dance and a Blackbird dance into 3 separate Lift Off Dance Galas at South Hill Park. Performing in a professional theatre provided those children involved with a wonderful opportunity.
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| St Michael's Lift Off Dance Group - 2007 |
Other initiatives I was heavily involved in were; the playtime buddy system (remember those bright yellow hats?), the peer mediation system (remember the red tabards?), and the infamous Kick Start! I trained the very first Kick Start leaders to the tunes of ‘Blame it on the Boogie’ and ‘High School Musical’ amongst others. We would have Kick Start days in which I would teach the whole school new routines - class by class. After assembly each morning we would all stand up and have a quick ‘wake up dance’ and it really did work. In the summer term we would also do a quick ‘Kick Start’ routine in the playground before the bell for registration! Now what would the Victorian pupils have thought of that?
In charge of ICT I saw the introduction of the wonderful interactive whiteboards and the creation of our first ICT suite with wireless laptops. Believe me, this was VERY advanced in 2003!
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| St Michael's first interactive whiteboard - 2003 |
Another major part of my life at St Michael’s was the 3 day residential visit for Year 5s to Ufton Court near Reading. We went on the trip just after half term in the Summer Term and then the children were able to spend the rest of that half term making magnificent Ufton Court books. The pupils I taught will hopefully still have fairly neat handwriting, but probably don’t draw a 1cm boarder on EVERY page of work. All work was written in draft and copied onto plain paper, using very complicated guidelines, before being decorated. Some of these books were in excess of 100 pages of A4 and very impressive indeed. We had a great time on this trip, having the huge manor House all to ourselves - even if I can admit now that it was a bit creepy at night! Photomapping, orienteering, wide games, tudor banquet, animal studies, team building and bat watching were amongst some of the many activities we carried out on our action-packed 3 days at the centre.
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| St Michael's at Ufton Court - 2005 |
Cricket tournaments, netball matches, school trips, visiting theatre groups, school productions, carol concerts, end of year assembly (with THAT song that made everyone cry), art club, choir - life was always fun at St. Michael’s. Of course the children worked hard too - very hard, but most importantly they were always very nice to each other and very nice to me. St. Michael’s is a very special place and a very special school and long may that continue for another 150 years.
Never great with words (I am now a maths teacher!) I have attached
a number of photos to hopefully show what St. Michael’s was all about during the start of the 21st Century.
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