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These are just some of the lines I used to tell myself about why exercise really wasn’t for me.  Yes, like most people I would dabble but then I would let life overtake and exercise quickly became the least important thing on my to do list.

Then, 1^st April 2018 came along, and I decided I needed to make a change.  I felt like a small, weak insignificant female and I did not like it.  I decided to try something new, something for me.  I spent time searching and discovered this thing called Krav Maga.  Wikipedia describes Krav Maga as

 a military self-defence and fighting system developed for the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and Israeli security forces derived from a combination of techniques sourced from boxing, wrestling, aikido, judo and karate, along with realistic fight training

It was so completely and utterly out with my comfort zone; I had never even thrown a punch yet alone tried something like this.  However, for some reason I decided it would be worth a go. Unfortunately, the class times and my schedule did not match.  I decided I liked the look of Tactical Defence Krav Maga.  They had profiles of their instructors on their website and seemed like nice people.  So, I sent them a wee message.  Soon after, I started 1to1 training with Alan. 

A year on we joke about that first session, but it really was terrifying!  I was so nervous going in.  I didn’t get through the warmup before my lips turned blue, I was told to sit and handed a glass of water, which I didn’t want to drink as I really was concerned that I was going to throw up!  Throughout that Alan was awesome, supportive and didn’t make me feel useless or any of my other negative thoughts floating around in my head.  There was only 1 way to go, I could only get fitter.  I just had to keep turning up. 

As we got into summer, we could see a real difference in my physical strength.  In my head though I would still often tell myself I couldn’t do what was being asked of me.  Alan was great though, he kept me focused and paid attention to how much I could physically do, pushing me to my limits.  Week on week I was achieving more.  I bought a decent pair of boxing gloves and got used to having the odd bruise.  Most of the time no one noticed them but if they did, they were a badge of honour.  They represented me and that I was growing stronger.

I kept training through Autumn.  Still, Krav was the only exercise I would do regularly.  Every Thursday morning, I would turn up.  I am self-employed and with that comes stresses.  I would turn up and Alan would ask how I was and how the business was going.  He would hear my wins and my woes.  Then I would learn how to punch, kick, elbow, knee and all sorts more.   

Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi states that people are at their happiest when in a “state of concentration or complete absorption with the activity at hand and the situation”.  For me, this was achieved through Krav.  The sequences and moves in addition to the theoretical and ethical knowledge that I was learning meant I could not think of anything else.  For that 1 hour a week the rest of the world, it’s stresses and strains, simply vanished.  This is when I became hooked.  This is when it went from being an item on my to do list to being important for self-care.  Krav Maga became something I was doing for me, not because I felt I had to, but because I wanted to. 

Winter came and I kept training.  I was learning to put together complex boxing sequences.  I was feeling physically strong.  But Christmas is a hard time for me.  I have lost both my parents, I need to take a break from business and life stops.  This was tough.  But Krav kept me going.  Then I hurt my back. 

Not being able to exercise for a couple of months was tough.  Really tough.  My anxiety kicked in a gear; business was going through a tough patch I stopped coping.  I started having panic attacks daily, often more than once a day.  It was during this period that I realised what a stress relief Krav really was to me.

I am now thankfully back training.  Every cloud has a silver lining and the period of not being able to train really helped me understand how my mindset had changed over the year.  I realised I was now strong, capable and determined.  When I first started Krav and got to that tough point in a session I would tell myself I couldn’t it.  In time it had moved to me telling myself I needed to do this.  Now, well now I tell myself I can do this. 

I train both with Alan but I also gym and do home workouts.  I actually enjoy pushing myself hard.  The psychologist Albert Bandura coined the phrase self-efficacy.  It is the boost you get when you achieve something tricky.  Each tough session was helping to develop my self-efficacy, my self-belief and ultimately my sense of self-worth. The magical thing here is this has transferred over to my real life and my business. 

Krav Maga has helped me develop real self-belief.  It has only taken 37 years!  However, I now know that it is ok to push myself.  In business, this means actively growing my business and taking risks.  I started my tutoring business 2 years ago with just me.  Since starting Krav it has now grown so I have a team of teachers working for me.  Furthermore, after starting Krav I also started an outdoor learning business.  This has grown hugely over the year.  I do not think it would have if it wasn’t for the self-belief and drive which I discovered and developed through Krav Maga. 

Whilst Krav Maga is the right thing for me, it doesn’t mean it is for you.  Be open minded and find your thing.  I had never thrown a punch before starting Krav and now would say I have a decent hook.  Chloe Brotheridge talks about exercise in her book The Anxiety Solution.  She says how exercise should be a form of self-care, not another item on the to do list.  This is because exercise lowers stress hormones, helps your brain recover from over-worrying, produces mood boosting endorphins and quietens mental chatter.  This is exactly what Krav does to me.  I may be fast approaching middle age, but I can see e enjoying Krav for many years to come!

January, traditionally a long and painful month.  The nights might be getting lighter, but it feels like it is deepest darkest winter.  A time to hibernate and recover from a busy festive period.  But here at Love Outdoor Learning this January has been about growth and business development, setting the seeds for what shall hopefully be a very exciting year!

It started with us taking on not one but two new members of staff.  Kimberley and Kaseyrose are the newest members of the team.   Kimberley is a very experienced teacher and is a great asset to us.  Kaseyrose has volunteered with various children’s clubs but this is her first job.  It is a privilege to introduce such a smart and determined young lady to the workplace.  She has been fantastic in our sessions so far and long may it continue!

Next up was us launching a new group, our family session.  Each month shall have a different theme.  This month was wildlife in winter, February shall be mythical and mysterious.  This is a fun session for kids aged 2 and over.  Of course, we still have our usual Fledgling’s Story sessions and STEM sessions.  February sees us launching new parks, which we are very excited about!

I have found being a business owner is very different from being a primary school teacher and I appreciate I still have a lot to learn.  I approach this 2 ways, firstly by attending some great networking events.  There is always someone interesting there that I can learn from.  However, I have also started the Royal Bank of Scotland’s Pre-Accelerator Programme.  This is all about teaching entrepreneurs the business skills they require.  It is an intensive 8 week programme and I am now 2 weeks into it.  I am learning so much and it is helping the business so much!

One of the early lessons was on growth mindset.  I taught this, I thought I knew it.  However, on reflection my mindset was holding us back somewhat.  Therefore, we have now started our schools programme!  After teaching for 10 years I understand how outdoor learning should be a part of every teacher’s toolkit, and not an add on to a packed curriculum.  It is an essential tool and can make a huge impact on all children’s learning.  We have begun providing CPD to schools and outdoor sessions for children within schools. 

We have also started looking at the options for purchasing our own land for our outdoor groups.  This would allow us to have a firepit, vegetable patches, offer groups every day of the week and even have an after-school club!  It is hugely exciting so watch this space to see how we progress with this.

We have no doubt that 2019 is going to be a very exciting year.  We really hope you will continue to join us on our amazing journey!

Dear Mr Swinney and the Scottish Government,

I am Carol.  I come from a family of teachers, my dad was a teacher and both my brothers are.  I qualified as a primary teacher back in 2010.  I have faced some real highs and lows before leaving the profession in 2018.  Five months ago, I wrote a blog about making the change from being a part time teacher to a supply teacher.  (you can read it here – https://carols-tutoring.com/2018/05/03/why-i-switched-to-supply-teaching/ )  At the time it was the best thing for me and I was truly happy.  However, I have now left teaching to allow me to focus on my studies and the two sides of the business which I run.  I tutor children and provide outdoor learning opportunities.  It does not mean I no longer care about teaching, I am still a teacher, just in a non-formal setting.

It recently came to light that teachers are being “encouraged” not to speak out about the difficult situations they are facing.  This “encouragement” can be to the extent that they can face disciplinary procedures if they do speak out.  This has led to a teacher writing anonymously to the Scottish Government to discuss their concerns.  Why were they anonymous?  Some say they were a plant from the Ruth Davidson, others say it was altogether a fake, teacher’s up and down the country however believe that it was real, it resonated with them and it resonated with me. Therefore, I am writing this today.

Since writing my initial blog about supply teaching and making the switch I have had numerous teachers contact me privately.  Many I have met and enjoyed a coffee with, some I am now lucky enough to now count as friends. These are women and men who made the choice to be teachers, who made the commitment.  These are also people who cannot do the 60+ hours every week anymore.  Who miss their own children and seeing them excel because the job has eaten away so much of their lives.  Who are on long term sick leave.  Who are just wanting the very best for the children in their care but cannot see a way of giving them that anymore as they are spread too thin.

I look critically at what a teacher needs to do, daily, weekly, termly and yearly plans, new schemes to imbed before the last lot are fully imbedded, new policies to read and understand, new curriculum developments, meetings for meetings sake, management giving them pedagogical books to read over the summer on their “holidays”, and more besides.  I look at this and realise it is unsustainable.  However, teachers in the system often feel it is their failure as a person and a teacher which stops them managing to stay abreast of everything.  They simply do not see that the system is sick from the top down and the inside out.

Teachers are working ever increasing hours.  It is suggested that many teachers here in Scotland work an extra 11 hours a week on top of their contracted 35 per week, with 20% working 60 hours or more!   Given that a teacher should have 22.5 hours of class contact a week, these figures alone highlight the unprecedented levels of admin expected of teachers now.  At what point do those up the ladder realise that 20 to 40 hours a week of admin does not make better teachers?

But let us just look at the figures for working just an extra 11 hours.   There are 39 weeks in an academic year.  This means the average teacher is working 1794 hours within those 39 weeks.  Compare this to your average worker, who works 37 hours with 25 days holiday a year and 10 days public holiday will work roughly 1665 hours a year.  A teacher is working, on average, just 129 hours extra a year, not a lot.  But when you consider this is squeezed into just 39 weeks you quickly see how teachers can become exhausted! And this is just for 11 hours extra a week.

In addition to this, teachers in Scotland are some of the worst paid in Europe.  This is compounded by the guilt teachers are placed under to buy resources for their classroom.  This can be anything from pencils and glue to books and board games.  Whilst teaching I would buy all this but also cushions, tables, cooking ingredients, schemes of work and more.  This was to help create a stimulating environment with exciting lessons for the children.   Indeed, now I have a tutor company I have teachers and principle teachers coming to work for me whilst working full time.  The reason is often simple, they simply cannot make ends meet on a teaching salary alone.  This is not ok.

The Scottish Government do pay lip service to reducing workload and looking after teachers.  Whilst I am now out the classroom I have many friends still working as teachers and they assure me that the situation continues to worsen.  Your policies are not helping teachers on the ground in the slightest.  As the teacher who wrote the anonymous letter said, you are sticking a plaster over a gaping wound.

We are living in a country where teachers are just expensive babysitters.  Society no longer values the role they play in educating children and shaping them for the future.  Pay and government policies in addition to the media has created a blame culture and teachers are the villains in this story.  This, in part, has led to an increase of verbal and physical assaults directed towards teachers and other school staff.

We also face difficulties with lack of resources and inclusion.  In theory, inclusion should have been a huge step forward.  However, it needed resourcing and proper funding in terms of staff and training.  Children are being left to struggle now as teachers have no choice but to focus on the higher tariff pupils whilst the others are left to float along.  It means very few children’s needs are being fully met. As a teacher I was experienced and worked hard.  However, I was still punched in the face, had my fingers broken, was hit, spat on, kicked and abused.  At times, this was a daily occurrence.  I still believe it was never the child’s fault.  There were simply not the resources required to support them in the environment they were in.  Incidents such as these are hugely under reported, there simply is not time to complete the required paperwork.

However, I still see the impact of inclusion daily when working with tutor families.  90% of the children I work with are well behaved and within the middle of the class in terms of ability.  It quickly becomes apparent that often these children are working below their ability levels due to undiagnosed learning needs, whether it be dyslexia, dyscalculia or something else.  I am lucky that I can support the families through pushing the school for diagnosis, receiving the diagnosis and adjusting to life with it.  The reason they have not been picked up sooner is often because teachers are now pulled in too many directions to properly get to know and support every child in their class. If a child is well behaved and generally achieving, there simply is not time to look at why they may not be achieving even more.  There are high tariff pupils within the class that require that time and attention and there is often only one adult there to give them it, the teacher.

Then we have management.  They are trained educators but often not trained to work with people.  They are put under enormous strain which can often lead to them forgetting that without healthy staff, their school cannot fully function.  I have been unlucky in my career with some of the management teams I worked under.  From one school where a pupil broke my finger, I was taken to hospital at lunch, patched up and placed back within the classroom, in a high degree of pain, that same day, with the same pupil that broke my finger.  But there is a positive here, they at least took me to hospital.  There was the time I broke two toes in class and management would not allow me hospital treatment until after school as they had a meeting with the council, so no one could cover.  But maybe the least supportive management team I had was the one I was working under when my father died.  He passed away the Tuesday before the summer holidays.  I luckily had phoned in sick that morning as my gut told me to go to my father’s bedside, he was dying of cancer, but I had taken no time off.   When I phoned in that morning I was asked to update at lunch whether I would be in the following day. I phoned in to inform them that dad had passed away.  Instead of condolences, I was asked if I would make it back into school that week.  Looking back, it is crazy that I allowed these things to happen, that I did not challenge them.  But they are the norm within education and why would you fight against the norm?

Some of the factors I have discussed lead to teaching jobs going unfilled and teachers leaving the profession in droves.  Statistics suggest that 40% of teachers consider leaving the profession in the next 18 months.  Scottish education is now at crisis point, it may even have got past that point.  It is time for teachers to be allowed to speak out and the Government to listen.  After all, it is not only the teachers and their families that are suffering.  The children in the system whose needs are simply no longer being fully met are also suffering.

Please, make a public statement which allows all teachers to speak out and guarantee that they will not face any form of disciplinary for doing so.  Please listen, really listen to what is said, I know some of it will be hard to hear.  Please work with us to try and fix this broken system before it is simply too late.

Yours Sincerely,

Carol Murdoch