How’s this for initiative from a class of yr 7&8 students? Faced with the prospect of their teacher going on maternity leave until the end of the year they’ve created their own advertisement to attract the sort of person they’d like to have teaching them in the interim!

Dorothy Burt, teacher at Point England School comments on her blog:

It’s becoming quite common to come across teachers online wistfully writing or tweeting about what they would like to do if they had the ‘right’ conditions to enable them to teach School 2.0 or use Web 2.0 or have whatever form of ideal 21st century classroom they can imagine. They would have motivated and engaged learners, they would have ample technology, fast internet, open firewalls, opportunities to innovate etc etc.

This week I have seen the other side of the coin; students who have experienced and enjoy learning in this way worried about who will be replacing their innovative teacher when she goes on maternity leave and taking matters into their own hands to film their own advertisement for the ensuing vacancy. They went through their usual process of brainstorming, storyboarding, scripting, filming and editing and produced this by themselves. With their permission I have embedded their movie below and if you want to see the full advertisement this link will take you to it…

Inspirational stuff Room 18 students – well done! I hope you get the teacher you deserve.