TM4T Techniques 4.1.2.3 - Location Awareness - The Case of the Wandering Teacher
You may have come across the wandering teacher described elsewhere on this site:
Terry's Morning - Part 1
Terry wakes up grumbling and switches off the alarm. He wanders to the kitchen and while the kettle boils he checks the calendar hanging on the kitchen door. Today's date says 'remember – performance review next week'. Terry makes a cup of tea and goes into his study. He has left a post-it note for himself on the PC 'gate duty for Jenny'. He checks both his home e-mail and his work e-mail. He also has a quick look at Facebook and notices a post on the School account about a Y7 trip next month – this reminds him that he needs to get that Risk Assessment form.
Terry drives to school and pops into the staff room. There is a memo on the noticeboard summarising the Governor's meeting. One of the items is about lab equipment and Terry needs to talk to his faculty head about this. His pigeonhole has a memo in it, and Terry reads it as he heads for the faculty office. It is from the IT technicians telling him his laptop is ready. In the office, he notices the Answerphone is flashing and he plays a message from an anxious parent. As he does this, he sees there is note from the Deputy Head for him left on the desk. Nothing urgent, but another thing to do. Terry heads to his main teaching room and turns on the PC. A colleague has left a note on the keyboard: 'Hi - can I have a copy of the test paper you did for Y12?'. As he pulls his chair out he sees a folder of student coursework with 'Mark Me, Please!!' written at the top. As the PC is warming up, Terry notices a message from his faculty head scrawled on the whiteboard: 'meeting re OFSTED 08:00 in old gymnasium'.
Remember that when we ask the question 'where does our work come from?' the answers we need are specific and physical. 'The Governors' or 'Students' would not be good answers. If the governors post minutes of their meetings on the notice-board, then the answer we are looking for would be 'the notice board'. If our students leave homework for marking on our PC keyboard, then the answer should be 'the keyboard in Room 3'. Before setting up your Time Management system you should look for your Sources of Work and list them Here are some examples, based on Terry's morning.:
The desk diary
The answerphone
My staffroom pigeonhole
The coursework crate
My briefcase
Post-it notes on the fridge
The office whiteboard
My to-do list
The faculty in-tray
My planner
The suggestion box
My e-mail inbox
The department e-mail
My office desk - on the deskpad
My classroom whiteboard
My office chair
My jacket pocket
The lost property shelf
The school website
For an example of how to integrate these into a TM4T system, click here.