Miss Sarah Buckham
Teaching Awards 2008 Winner
The TDA Award for Teaching Assistant of the Year in North East and Cumbria
Churchill Community College, WALLSEND
Anyone who can get pupils to enjoy PE lessons on a freezing, windy winter’s day has to be exceptional, and everyone at Churchill Community College says that’s exactly what Sarah is!
In fact when she took the decision to train as a teacher – she is currently employed as a PE technician - the school was so keen to hang on to her that they decided to become a graduate teacher training school just so she could stay.
Students love the way she is “always smiley, really listens, supports you and has time for you” and when inspectors visited the school and asked pupils about their teachers, it was ‘Miss Buckman’ who was praised time and time again. They love her calmness, her cheerfulness, and the way she boasts about their achievements to anyone who will listen. “She’s lively, helpful and kind and never moody,” says one. “You can always talk to her about anything. She’s always reliable and makes us laugh a lot!”
Sarah, a sports science graduate, is easily able to run her own lessons and good at making sure all her students – she calls them ‘ladies’ – know what they are doing. She spends long hours in school and runs lunchtime trampolining sessions.
In her own time she has trained in rounders and music and movement, and has accessed modules from the University of Northumberland’s BTEC programme.
Colleagues say that the “school does not run as smoothly when she is not there.” She accompanies school trips and works with gifted and talented pupils and is considered “a total asset, not just to the PE department, but to the whole school.”
The Teaching Awards judges feel sure she will make an outstanding teacher. “Maybe we will be judging her in that category in a few years time!”
