All Good Things Must Come to an End

Hello everyone ☺ This is a happy and a sad blog today ☹

My time at Greenwich is over ☹ I have finally completed my PGCE which means that I am now officially done with Greenwich and pretty soon I will be moving home, which isn’t the best thing. I was hoping to move into my own place, but I am REALLY bad with money, so that never happened. I have loved my time at Greenwich and although I did spend most of my time moaning about all the coursework and the work load, it has been fun. It’s been four years of my life, I started when I was nineteen and I’m leaving University a twenty-three year old. I’ve grown up here, it’s been a huge part of my life, so it is very, very sad to leave. I have made best friends here so it has meant a lot to me.

I have learnt a lot about myself here as well. I’ve learnt that if you want to succeed you have to put in some effort and really go for it. I’ve learnt what it means to be myself and that if people have a problem with who I am then they’re not the right people for me. I have learnt so much about what it means to be a member of society and to get something out of life you have to put a lot in.

I’m not only leaving my course and my studying, I have also decided to leave the Enquiry Unit. I know I haven’t spoke about the Enquiry Unit a huge amount, but that is where I work. The Enquiry Unit has given me so much experience that I will take with me to any job, they have allowed me to write blogs, just like I am now, I have had experience in helping with training and helping with interviews and I am trained on a professional telephone system, phone system and emails. So I have learnt a hell of a lot that will definitely help me in the future.

But it is not just about the work, I have made so many good, close and amazing friends whilst working here. I know it sounds cliché but I have become friends with people I wouldn’t normally get to know in my everyday life and it’s really nice. I’m gonna miss it A LOT! But besides all this sad, I am really happy to be entering the next chapter of my life as a teacher, so it’s not all sadness and doom and gloom, it’s a happy sadness. Thank you for reading this and I wish you all well ☺

Love Terry ☺

Becoming a Teacher!

Hello everyone, sorry I haven’t blogged in forever, I’ve been super busy with work, placement, my studies and obviously trying to squeeze in a social life at the same time!

So in this blog I wanted to talk about where my life is at the moment, in terms of me teaching and becoming an FE teacher. The last time I blogged about teaching was way back in the distant year of 2014, when I began my placement at Bird College. I can confirm that I am still loving it and life at Bird is amazing, they are treating me well J Since beginning way back then I am now teaching five classes all by myself. I am teaching three groups from the Pre-Professional Foundation Year and two groups from the first year diplomas. They are all really lovely and have helped my training experience to be a good one, I think if I had really bad classes then I would be going bald and not enjoying teaching at all, but they have made me feel comfortable in establishing myself as a teacher.

Teaching at Bird College has not only helped me to love teaching, but it has also re-ignited my love for Drama and for Acting and Performing. I mean, what other lesson can you attend and be a fireman, a pirate, a doctor, a politician etc. The thing I love about performing arts is you can be whoever you want to be and you can escape the real world, escape your life for five minutes and just be someone else. When I was in college I had no problem getting up in front of an audience and playing a part, but as soon as I had to get up and speak as myself and talk to people, I became really shy. In my second year of college we did a production of Beauty and the Beast in which I played Cogsworth the talking clock and this role included acting, dancing and singing (I’m an awful singer by the way) but I didn’t care because it wasn’t me singing it was Cogsworth, the old British talking clock. After the show as it was my final year, I was nominated to stand up in front of the whole cast, technical team and audience in order to give out all of the thanks to the various helpers and I was more nervous for that than I was for the show.

I think throughout my degree I really lost touch with why I loved performing so much as a) I didn’t get to do it much and b) I didn’t really have a good time on the course. So coming to Bird and imparting my knowledge on to these young adults has been absolutely amazing and more than I could have ever dreamed of. I have three weeks left of placement and I am going to be really sad when I leave as I love it there so much. The students have really helped me to grow as a teacher and I have learnt a lot from them, and I hope that they have learned from me.

Once this placement is finished I plan to finish off the summer worker at the Enquiry Unit as part of the Clearing team (which I have done for the past two years). If you are a current University of Greenwich student and looking for work over the summer then we are recruiting for Clearing Assistants, it’s a very good way to learn some good office skills that can be transferable into almost any job, and you get paid well. So all is good. https://jobs.gre.ac.uk/Vacancy.aspx?ref=JS0142-15. I hope to start a full time job come September, if there is one out there for me.

Speak soon J

My Love for Musical Theatre!

Hello, hello, hello J If you’ve read the title, then you can probably guess what this blog is going to be able, that’s right, my love for musical theatre! First off I want to start by saying that I have recently gone to see a couple of shows which included Cats and Matilda the Musical. 

First off I went to see Cats which I was a bit sceptical about as it was a show entirely about cats and I didn’t really know the soundtrack. Don’t get me wrong, cats are my favourite animal but I wasn’t entirely sure about a bunch of adults acting like cats, it was just a weird concept for me. However, it was a classic, so I thought I needed to see it as it only had a limited season at the London Palladium. In saying all of this, I really, really enjoyed it. It was a great piece of theatre and the dancers were exceptional. Kerry Ellis who played Grizabella the Glamour Cat was absolutely amazing! Kerry Ellis is one of my favourite all time performers along with Idina Menzel and Kristin Chenoweth.

Above are two pictures of me with Kerry Ellis. The top one is when I saw her in Cats and the bottom one was when I saw her in Oliver! The other show I went to see was Matilda the Musical and I have got to say that this is one of the best things I have ever seen in my whole entire life, it is hilarious, it is sad, it is dramatic. There were about 15 little kids no older than ten and they were all so amazingly talented, I literally could not believe the talent I witnessed and it just makes my love for musical theatre as strong as ever.

This is quite a short and sweet blog but I just thought I’d mention what I’ve been up to lately J 

Speak soon.

Getting Into the Swing of Things!

Hello everyone, sorry I haven’t been blogging regularly… I’ve been so busy with getting back into the swing of things this year. A lot has changed for me this year in terms of my teaching degree that I am currently doing and my work placement. I will also tell you about what shows I’ve gone to see this month J

So first of all I will start with my placement and what’s going on at Bird College. I have now been given three classes that I teach regularly; these are the Pre-Professional Foundation Year groups. As that is a lot of word’s that you may not be aware of if you’re not in Education, I’ll just explain a bit about them. These classes are people who have come to Bird College for one year in order to be trained to audition for Drama Schools and Universities, therefore, no work is marked and there is no criteria or curriculum. This means… FUN! Yes, basically all I have to do with them is play games and build their confidence, so all in all my job does not suck.

One thing I do love about working at Bird College is that the students are so committed in being there and they are so much fun to work with because they listen and they really take on board what I have to say as their teacher. In some ways this scares me for jobs I get after as I won’t have had any experience in bad behaviour from students, but I think I’ll be okay. As my placement goes on I am being given more and more responsibility which is amazing as I am beginning to really learn what it is to be a teacher.

Now all of that is out of way I can tell you about the show’s I went to see in the half-term break. I went to see Miss Saigon, Memphis and Made in Dagenham (again!)

As you can see from my lovely Instagram pictures above! Miss Saigon was so beautiful in the way it was done, it was such a nice story and the music was phenomenal, it deserved to win the 12 What’s On Stage Awards that it did. Memphis the musical was also really good and once again a beautiful story told through beautiful music. Also I saw Memphis with Beverley Knight who was absolutely amazing in the role! Fun fact for you inter-racial marriage has only been legal in all U.S. states since 1967 which I found quite shocking as it was only 48 years ago. Then I went to see Made in Dagenham again which was amazing as it was the first time I went to see back in the previews.

Anyways, hope you enjoyed my blog. See you soon J

Happy New Year!

Hello J Welcome to the Year 2015

I can’t believe another year has passed us by. As you get older these years just fly by and it’s not fair, I swear it was summer like 2 minutes ago! As it is the New Year I thought I would do the standard ‘New Year’s Resolutions’ that I am bound to break before the end of January. This year I spent New Year’s with my best friend and it was really nice, we didn’t do much just drinking, listening to music and then venturing to a local pub for the countdown. Usually I struggle to find one New Year’s resolution; however, this year I had several. They were as follows:

To get fit and lose some weight: I believe this is everyone’s New Year’s resolution. But I thought I would make it mine because I say it every year and this time I want to actually stick to it, whether that sticks… We’ll see! Secondly, is to start up my blog again. In September last year I started my own personal blog (http://terryjordansblog.blogspot.co.uk/) I started this just because I enjoyed blogging for the University and I wanted to start up my personal blog where I do things like review the theatre shows I go and see or films that I watch as well as blog about everyday life and special events in my life.

My third New Year’s resolution was to get my head stuck down and complete my PGCE without leaving everything to the last minute. My next deadline is June 1^st, so as soon as I begin Uni again on 6^th Feb I want to start gathering research for my coursework so that it is much easier to complete when I need to. My final New Year’s resolution is just to be happy, I am a relatively happy person anyway. I just want to be even happier J So I wish everyone else will have an amazing 2015. I will leave you with one of my favourite quotes of all time…

Placement at Bird College

Hello everyone J I know I haven’t blogged in a while but here I am. Better late than never as I always say.

In this blog, I am going to talk about the new placement that I have just started at Bird College, which is a performing arts college based in Sidcup. I am in the fifth week of my placement now and I am enjoying every second of it. As you may already know (if you’re a regular reader of my blogs) I am currently taking my PGCE in the Lifelong Learning Sector to be able to teach Drama/Acting to college students. Bird College is perfect for me as it specialises in my chosen subject, opposed to a college that just offers Drama among thirty or so other programmes.

So first of all I will just tell you a bit about what I am doing at the placement so far. Currently, I have been put into three different acting classes, one of the classes are looking at duologues, at the moment they are rehearsing scenes from A Taste of Honey by Shelagh Delaney, which I studied in both the second and third year of my Undergraduate degree. After Christmas they will be doing duologues from musicals, and during this period the class will be split into two and I will take half of the class to help them with their scenes, which is really exciting as I am a huge fan of Musical Theatre. In the other two classes, they are just rehearsing plays for their end of year performance. One of the classes are looking at 4.48 Psychosis by Sarah Kane, which is one of my all-time favourite plays. Below is a poster of the show that was performed at Royal Court in 1999.

As you can see from the poster, it is quite a dark play, which is kind of why I love it so much. In this class I have been given two scenes which I can design a lesson plan for and complete as part of my teaching practice. My mentor from Bird is coming to view me on 3^rd December and then my Tutor from Greenwich is coming to view me on 7^th January. So that is quite soon, so I’m a bit nervous, but I think it will be fine.

The other group are currently looking at The Accidental Death of an Anarchist by Dario Fo which is quite a funny physical farcical performance, which is great. It is quite similar to Rhinoceros by Eugene Ionesco, which I directed for my third year performance last year, in terms of the comedy and physical aspects of the performance. A timetable has not been devised yet, but I will also be given scenes from this play that I will direct as a part of my teaching practice.

Another thing that I am really looking forward to in my placement comes in the summer term. Most of the classes at Bird have their final examinations in March and the summer term is left to the staff to create a scheme of work based on the student’s needs. I have been offered a six week period where I can create my own scheme of work and teach between 1-6 different classes the same scheme of work. Which I think is amazing as it gives me a six week period at the end of the year to act as an actual teacher.

That’s all for today, I just thought I would talk a bit about my placement. Until next time, ciao J

Outing in Central

Hello everyone, I know I haven’t been blogging regularly, it’s been quite a hectic summer with full-time work and then trying to get a place on a PGCE and then getting a place and sorting out finance and somewhere to lives, this list is practically endless. However, all that has calmed down now so I have enough time to sit down and write my blogs.

In this blog, as you can tell by the title, I’m going to talk about a trip I took to central. I began my day on Oxford Street with my friend Amy (pictured below), where I visited a few shops. I did plan to do a lot of shopping as I have just received my Student Finance but then I forgot that going shopping midday on a Saturday in Oxford Street is not the best idea I’ve ever had L So in the end I managed to go in Primark and HMV before feeling completely claustrophobic and departing to head to Charing Cross.

As I mentioned earlier I have just received my Student Finance and when this happens it usually means I’m going to see a West End show… or two. I have always wanted to go and see a Matinee performance followed by dinner followed by an evening performance; this is exactly what I did.

The first show I went to see for a Matinee performance was Forbidden Broadway, an Off-Broadway revue parodying musical theatre, particularly Broadway musicals. It was created in 1982 and has spawned 20 different versions of the show (West End being the twentieth). Forbidden Broadway took the current West End shows and mocked them, the show was performed by four actors (Including Christina Bianco who you may remember from her diva impressions for the song Let It Go: http://www.mstarz.com/articles/17891/20130813/christina-bianco-diva-impressions-adele-cher-britney-spears-aguilera-more.htm) . This show had me wetting myself, it was literally one of the funniest things I think I have ever seen. I advise anyone to go and watch this, even if you don’t know much about musical theatre then I still advise you go as you will still find some laughs in it.

The second play I went to see was Speed-the-Plow at the Playhouse Theatre in Charing Cross. As you may have heard on the news or on the internet, this did star one of my favourite people ever… Lindsay Lohan. I was quite excited and nervous about seeing this performance, I had heard mixed reviews on the play, so I really didn't know what to expect. I did see an article on the Daily Mail website that had gathered loads of reviews and made a report on the show,  quite a few Theatre reviewers that I had studied on my drama course had rated the show quite high, so that made me feel a little bit better about going to see Lohan’s performance.

In terms of the show itself, at first I did not rate the play at all. The performances were great, Lindsay Lohan, Nigel Lindsay and Richard Schiff all did fantastic in their performances but I just felt like the play itself was a bit boring. However, as a drama student I thought I would still buy the play text and give it a read as some times I find that the play is really good but then a production of it could be quite crap. I was right, when I read the text on the train home it was actually an alright play.

So that’s all that happened really. Obviously the highlight was seeing Lindsay Lohan because she is one of my favourite people in the world. Speak soon. J