My personal blog can now be found here:http://www.philipwatson.co.uk

My professional, teacher oriented, blog can be found here: http://www.mrwatson.info

You’ve probably just stumbled here by mistake, so don’t worry – I won’t be offended if you just skip on to the next blog – thanks for reading!

Cheers,

Philip

Here you will be able to see news and views from Mr Watson, as well as (hopefully!) relevant content from YoutTube about the world of technology education.

Mr Watson is developing a range of educational DVD’s for use in the Design & Technology classroom, to support GCSE and A-level courses in the UK.

Basically, I got fed up with not being able to find interesting and relevant videos to show my classes. So, what did I do? I decided to do something about it!

My hope is that the DVDs will be available by September 2010.

I also plan to roll out several short films, posted on YouTube, that will support the work done in the DVDs, as well as developing materials for the primary sector.

Hope you enjoy – let me know if there’ any videos that you’d like to see.

Regards,

Mr Watson

Just a diary entry, this one.

Supply teaching still looks to be a bit thin on the ground, so I’m going to focus on getting my agencies to get me more work by hassling them.

Today, as it looks like I’m not going to be in schools, I’m going to pick up my mates’ scooter from town. He crashed it and broke his hand a week ago, and the scooter is sitting in a car park in Paddington. Pity its raining.

Also, some editing of the script for the first DVD might be in order, as well as a brief script for a ‘how to..’ video for sharpening a chisel. this one is interesting as i’m just trying out the short format video, as a sort of taster.

All that will go on the Mr Watson blog that i will be starting today. hopefully I’ll also be able to transfer both blogs to their websites, rather than have them here on wordpress.com. That is quite techy so fingers crossed. If i manage it, it means that I can have stuff like videos automatically posted ont he blogs, which I think will be  a nice touch.

Chasing a couple of inventions as well – an idea for eco toys and the back support. Just emails, keeping conversations going, you know.

Later on a friend of ours is opening her play, for which she has done the set design, so I’m looking forward to that, too.

All in all a busy day!

Cheers,

Philip

Rather cunning, i thought. And economical, too.

Let’s just hope that society doesn’t crumble and that we’ll never have to use these booby traps. Hmm, might just make sure that crow scarer is handy, though.

Cheers,

Philip

Click on the image to see it bigger

Great! So what?

What that means is that I can now confidently start writing about the project I am engaged in at the moment – the Mr Watson DVDs project! Hooray!

The project is picking up momentum now, so I am considering whether to start a separate blog on the Mr Watson website. This needs a new look, its true, so perhaps I will take care of that first.

Which of the following three headers would you recommend I use?

At present I’m leaning more towards the middle one. Who knows!

Anyhoo, There’s this private view at the Barbican tonight, which is going to be tricky, as the wife and I have decided to try giving up booze for lent! What can I say, other than its good to challenge yourself…

So, until next time – arrivederci

Cheers,

Philip

There’s a lot going on at the moment, so I thought I’d get it all out of my head and put in the compost bin to stew.

Projects-wise, we have the following:

• The DVD project – I’m in the middle of making a DVD for GCSE Design & Technology. This is probably the most fun and interesting thing that I’m doing now, and has some real long-term potential. The script is at the second draft stage, and just needs to be gone over with a fine comb to ensure it is free of nits, with a glossy coat.
• Tying up the ends of a website I’m doing for North Farm Cottages, I’m just waiting for better pictures of the cottages, then I can hand it over. Please – no-one make a booking, as it all comes to me at the moment!
• The Barbican’s Ron Arad exhibition opens on Wednesday, so the wife and I will be going to the private view. The first workshop that I’m doing isn’t for a month yet, so I have a few days to finish off the deliverables for that.
• The back support that I’m working on with a client has stalled a bot, so we need to get that ‘back’ on the go. [That was horrible, sorry]. Next step, I reckon, is to go speak to a lawyer about securing some IP. That’s a long road, but we need to get started.
• Tutoring is ticking along nicely, no problems there.
• Supply teaching has stalled completely – obviously, as its half term! Still waiting for a couple of CRB checks before I can start working for more than one agency, but they should come through soon, and then this’ll pick up a great deal.
• I really fancy making a set of bookends and putting them on Etsy. I don’t put a lot of time into this area, but perhaps I should… One of those things, I guess.
• I also want to continue updating the website, especially thinking about the ‘about me’ page. I just did this quickly when I first put this site up, and, also, I think that I was a bot ‘ooh, it’s a bit egoistic to write about yourself’, but my mind has changed on that one. It’s okay to just tell people who you are.
• A mate of mine spectacularly crashed his scooter last week, breaking three bones in his right hand, so I’m going to go and pick that up for him at some point. Probably not today, though. It’s pissing it down.
• And we need some shopping.
• And I just got a new computer (very nice) and it came with a load of software that i don’t know how to use. I should probably leave them alone, as it will just waste time, but I can’t help feeling that if I just spent time learning to use them, they could be really useful and save me time in the future… I don’t know!
• Oh, and I need to do the filing.

So what to do first? Well, I think this morning could productively be spent making some phone calls – lawyers, clients, collaborators. I’ll then have a coffee and proceed to stare at the script for the DVDs [should that be DVD's or DVDs?] to see what falls out. A spot of lunch (we’ll be having pancakes later!), and I might have a look at that page on my website. Or maybe I’ll go to the shed and make some bookends. Or maybe i’ll go to lynda.com to learn how to use all that software. We’ll see!

Hope everyone has a good day, despite the rain!

Cheers,

Philip

Click the image for a closer look

As a home worker, my routine usually runs to sitting in bed drinking coffee until 9, (don’t tell me you wouldn’t do the same!). But not this morning, oh no. this morning I would be the dynamic, assertive go-getting supply teacher that you don’t see in the movies [note to self: could be a new project in that?]

Sadly, the call did not come. Never mind. I was dressed, watered and ready to go. Thing was, the only place I had to go to was my spare room/office.

This was not good enough! Where was the dynamism? Where was the cold air on my face? Where was the struggle of humanity between the opposing forces of financial security on the one hand and the primeveal drive to stay in bed on a flippin cold morning like this?!?

Where was my commute?!?

My course of action was clear – I was going to have that commute whether it got me anywhere or not!

Togged up, I set off amongst the other commuters, winding their way towards the station. What bliss! What solidarity! We were here, we were cold, and we wished we were in bed! Again I felt as part of a group, part of the industrial work ethic, part of trekking through the bleeding frost to get to somewhere you’d rather not be!

But my enjoyment was short lived. After a street or two, I realised that, yes, actually, it is quite cold and that no, really, I did not have any idea what I was doing or where I was going.

My house lies equidistant between two train stations. I considered walking to one and catching the train to the other. This may legitimise my pointless wanderings, or so I thought.

Then the whole pathos of the thing struck me. What was i doing?!I was mocking these people, turning their daily run to the office into some sort of sadistic little smug-fest of my own.

Pausing at the corner, I turned to make my way home. I imagined my follow commuters glancing at me, jeering. “Home-worker” they would say. But it would be true.

Why is the vacuum of space -273 degrees C? Surely, with no atmospheric protection from the rays of the sun, one should receive the full heat straight away?

Indeed, should there not be a point where one can float, nearer the sun than we are, where space is actually quite hot?

This massive ball of gas, our sun, cannot just ‘end’ at a definite point, surely? It is, we are given to understand, a flaming ball of gas – surely it’s not a million degrees at one point and then, where ‘space’ starts, it’s -273?

I propose that there is a distance from the sun that one can stand, that is actually a comfortable room temperature. Beyond this point it gets progressively hotter, much like a terrestrial ‘barbeque’. Indeed, from this point in space, one could potentially offer a suasage on a stick in the direction of the sun, and in no time at all it would become a tasty, well-cooked snack. (space-chefs should note that, depending on the length of the stick, it may also become a, so familiar to the terrestrial bbq, ‘sausage-shaped lump of carbon’).

So confident am I of this prediction that I propose to send a dog into space on the next NASA mission, equiped with marshmallows, (to keep it simple for the dog), and a series of sticks of varying lengths.

Anyone who wishes to contribute towards the funding of this project, and hence share in the undoubtedly ‘astronomical’ rewards can visit our companion site, wiseacre.com

Cheers,

Philip