The feeling of being "belonged to somewhere" rather than being "just a spare part"

Hi everyone, it's been a minute, so here's a short & brief summary of what I've been up to these past few months.

I'm back to working full-time in education, but this time, it's on a permanent basis! (I'll explain more about that later as per this blog title)

I've also been doing a lot of work with my 2 policing projects. If you follow me on LinkedIn, you'll know what they'll involve.

It's definitely safe to say that I've been rather busy during that time! But since I have a whole day to myself, I thought I'd use the time to make this blog post. Most of what I will be talking about in this post, will be related to my career working as an Agency Teaching Assistant (TA), and finally getting the job as a permanent contracted Teaching Assistant role.

Turning the attention back to the above title, I want to talk about why I feel like going to a job where I actually feel like I belong somewhere, and not just going to a job where I feel like I'm just a spare part.

This was because that when I was an Agency TA for a year & 8 months, all I was doing was covering for contracted TA's in classrooms where the Senior Leadership Team (SLT) couldn't hire any permanent staff at the time. 

I admittedly enjoyed the getting to go to a variety of different schools aspect of the role, as I got to work with different pupils. That said, there was 3 schools that I worked in where they made me feel valued, and treated me like I was a permanent member of staff.

However, these things also didn't mean that I enjoyed the job role altogether...

Again, most of my time as an Agency TA just felt like I was nothing but a "spare part" as there were some schools that I had worked in where their staff didn't appreciate me working there. Even if it was just for one day. 

Without naming some schools I worked at, I would get told by the agencies who put me in those schools that they won't be suitable for me. All because I happen to make a mistake with marking someone's work, or how I interact with the pupils, or even just how I talked with the staff in general. You could say those schools were very nitpicky about which staff they'd like to have.

This went on until the 10th of June, where I had an interview at a SEN & SEMH school in Crawley. I remember going into the interview thinking: "Will this be another interview that I won't be successful in afterwards?" Only because I had SO many TA role interviews with the outcome of being unsuccessful. Although, I actually had slightly more hope in this one due to the SLT who interviewed me seemed very impressed with the amount of schools I had worked in since November 2024. Especially with the amount of experience of SEN & SEMH I have gained during that time.

Anyway, the following morning (the 11th of June), I got the phone call to say that I was successful in the interview, and have been offered my place at the school to start in September! This then gave me a strong feeling of relief, finally feeling like all of my patience, persistence & determination has eventually paid off for something worthwhile!

Once I started at the school on the 1st of September, I began to carry a sense of "belonging" by the fact that the job is mine, and no one can replace me. This also meant that I can carry on working in education for as long as I want to!

That's all for now, but I'll be sure to be back on here once I have more time to do so.

Over & out!🤚🏻

What to expect from this blog throughout the new year, as well as the future

Hello everyone! First thing's first, I hope you've all had a great start to 2023! Regardless of whatever that may be. As for me, I am now currently in the exciting process of looking for bigger & better things for myself. 

What I mean by this is I am throwing myself into psychology communities, which will help me to give me more confidence with connecting with other people in those communities that share the same passion as me. As a bonus, seeing what people post on these psychology communities will help to give me inspiration about what posts I should do, as well as sharing my blogging content with them. In other words, some of the future-coming posts on here might not be hand created by me. Meaning I will be sharing other people's psychology content on here too.

Speaking of my blogging content, I am fully aware that last year hasn't exactly been the best year in terms of me keeping up with publishing on here, (see "Into each life, some rain must fall"  to see why) which is why I want to spend this year fully committing myself to keeping my blog active.

Finally, if anyone (including myself) was to look back at my posts in 2021, you will notice right away that almost all of them I did back then had a rhetorical question as their titles. When I think about it, in a way, it's like I was trying to make my topics sound philosophical. This was mainly because I wanted to be able to answer what people tend to ask about. Call me a guesser, but I'll hold my hand up by saying that I'm really no philosophy expert. But at the same time, however, I would like to develop a better knowledge on what philosophy is all about. Just to be basic here, if there is anyone reading who is unfamiliar with the term philosophy, it revolves around thinking. Yes, I do mean actually thinking in general. This is another something I want to add more of onto my blogging content. 

So there we go. Apologies for repeating myself yet again, but I honestly feel good about 2023 being my year of success! Even as I sit here on my bed just thinking about it, I sense the feeling of optimism running through my mind like it's constantly reminding me. 

Oh, earlier in the week, I came across something interesting on Psychology Today that caught my eye, and I thought about distributing what I saw onto my blog. I aim to get myself working on the research, as well as to have it published on here by this Sunday - 8/1/2023 the latest.

Stay tuned!

My 2nd university open event experience (10/12/2022)

I was originally going to make this post last night, but I became too occupied with watching the England V France football game. Sadly, the Lions lost, courtesy of the French. And let's also not forget Harry Kane's missed penalty.

Anyway, yesterday's experience was almost similar compared to last Saturday's experience. Although, I got to do some different things in this experience this time around. Here's my full takeaway of my 2nd open uni open day experience from start - finish...

I arrived in Portsmouth shortly after midday to begin my 2nd university open event experience. Once I got myself checked in, I immediately looked for the building within the uni campus that I needed to go to. Fortunately, I didn't have too much of a far walk to get to the Psychology building, where the course talk will be talking place. The King Henry Building to be more specific.

When I made my way into The King Henry Building, I went looking for the room I needed to be in for the course talk. Just like at Solent, there was a presentation that was talking about how psychology plays an important role in society. Or in other words, how psychology can shape the world. I was nothing but fascinated by the amount of examples that the lecturer was telling us of the examples of work placements involved.

Unlike any other university, this one in particular, has a lot of top reasons to study here statistics. It has even been ranked one of the best for specializing in Psychology!

Once we were done with the course talk in the lecture room, there was a tour guide who was keenly waiting outside to take us round the Psychology area. As it turns out, the tour guide is currently doing his 2nd year in Psychology at this university. We first went upstairs to tour round the Psychology equipment rooms. The first one had a human head sitting on a counter wearing a EEG brainwave cap. The second room we went into had an eye traking monitor inside. We also went into a room under construction process, which will become a laboratory. The rest of the rooms downstairs were just research rooms.

The last & favourable bit of the tour was going into a huge lab room downstairs, where research projects take place. What's best about them, apparently, is where students on the course get to carry out a research project on their own! I'll admit, I like the idea of carrying out a research project. (If I ever get the chance to do one...!)

The tour/open event experience concluded after that. Like before at Solent, I was satisfied with the amount of experience I had managed to takeaway.

My 1st university open event experience (3/12/2022)

OMG, I have just had one of the best experiences of my life! What I've experienced today has really opened my eyes to how psychology can go a long way into the world. It's not just my eyes that have opened up to everything I had seen today, my mind has also widely opened up to the mass amount of psychology careers there are out there.

To prevent me from rambling on anymore, I'll go straight into the story from start - finish...

 

2 weeks ago today, (19/11/2022) I booked myself to go to my 1st ever university open event. Fast forward to after a fortnight of excitement later... I had the morning pleasure of trekking down to Solent University in Southampton for what was unknowingly an eye-opening experience.

As I arrived at the building entrance, I was greeted by a member of the open event team who kindly made me feel welcome by handing me an open event programme. From that moment, I was deciding what to go and see. Whilst curiously scrolling through my programme, I saw that there was a psychology talk happening in one of the rooms on the 1st floor. Of course I chose to venture up there!

Inside one of their rooms to begin with, myself & a load of other people were warmly introduced to 2 of the psychology lectures. Both of whom, seemed experienced enough with years of being in the psychology industry. Hence, their industry knowledge was, needles to say, phenomenal! The male & female lectures hosted a quiz activity, which was to basically test everyone's knowledge of psychology. The first being to name as many famous psychologists as possible. Fortunately for me, I was able to name a few. At the same time, however, I do need to brush up my knowledge of famous psychologists a bit better if I want to expand my knowledge. The various other questions we did was based upon reading people's emotions through the look in their eyes. I couldn't remember the purpose of what the other questions were aimed at, but I had found them fascinating nonetheless. After the psychology quiz, the male lecturer was telling us something that made me view psychology from a whole different angle. It went along the lines of: "Psychology is not just about mental health". I absolutely agree with what the male lecture was saying, as psychology has an overall purpose of behaviour of anything. When I say 'anything' I am talking about animal behaviour as well.

One of the 3rd year students who was doing a psychology degree in counselling, was happily sharing her own personal experience of her time studying at the university. She was even highlighting her time studying abroad in Canada. The remainder of her talk was all about doing work placements around the university area. I think it was safe to say that the female student was enthusiastic throughout her time speaking!

The female lecturer was then going through Levels 4 - 6, explaining what different psychology degree modules will typically be taught. It was amazing to see how many of these degree courses have psychology alongside them. They all consisted of: Sport Psychology, Psychology & Counselling, Criminology & Psychology, Sociology & Psychology or just Psychology on its own.

Afterwards, we all went into the room next door to be shown a little fun psychological experiment. 3 people had volunteered themselves to be hooked up to this special piece of machinery, which was connected to the room computer. The computer screen was displaying these graphical lines that illustrated how calm these 3 people were, while sitting in the chair doing self-humiliating things. The 1st person had to count back from 280 in 3's. The 2nd person had to bravely sing a Christmas song in front of all of us watching. I can't remember what the 3rd person did.

All in all, the small psychology taster activities were very eye-opening, which really helped me to further widen my passion for psychology to a better level. Literally, the second I had walked out of the building, my motivation was kicked into overdrive. I was just now so keen to get myself into the psychology industry like never before!

To top everything off, I will be attending the open event at Portsmouth University the following Saturday. I expect more or less the same from today's open event at Solent, but it could be different anything. Regardless, I shall very much be looking forward to it!    

Good things are coming...😁

Yes, I've got various things to look forward to within the next few weeks! I say few weeks, but these things could may well run up towards April.

This is what set my excitement tone for today!

However, I intend to keep it that way, by keeping myself sane and being productive with my time during my week off college.

That means I will not be doing any blog work for this week. I always remind myself to limit the amount of screen time I have. Too much blue light can cause headaches.

I'm sure many of you out there can relate to this, as we all need to take an essential time out from the internet world, so we can prioritize our mental health on the productive side of life.

All in all, have a great week everyone!

P.S HVD💘