From Resource Queen to Year 2 Scene: An Accidental Love Letter to Supply Teaching

So, here’s the thing. I left teaching in further education to become a full-time entrepreneur. The vision? Clear. I’d create inspirational, downloadable resources for teachers and youth leaders worldwide. I envisioned steady sales, global reach, and the quiet satisfaction of seeing my creations make a difference.

My reality was slightly different. After selling just enough for me to still think that this was a good idea, but not quite enough to cover my car finance, I turned to the next best thing: supply teaching. My life went from “educational empire” to “do you know where the glue stick lid is?”

My first few placements were in secondary schools, my comfort zone. Teenagers may be moody, but at least they don’t cry because someone used the red crayon they were thinking about using. Then came Year 5, where despite my degree and a reasonably functioning frontal cortex, I still left the building googling what an expanded noun phrase was.

Naturally, I was then promoted to Year 2.

Let me tell you, Year 2 is its own habitat. These miniature humans are raw, unfiltered energy. No one warned me that six and seven-year-olds are part angel, part whirlwind, and part snitch. Their handwriting resembles the aftermath of a muddy squirrel tap-dancing across a postcard. They’re full of curiosity and surprisingly deep questions that range from “Did you watch the new Minecraft movie?” to “Do worms have birthdays?” They are chaos wrapped in kindness, with a splash of Pritt Stick.

It was when I was asked to mark their homework that I felt truly trusted.

“No answer sheet needed,” I said, with the quiet confidence of someone who has spent years teaching algebra and trigonometry to teenagers. “I’ve got this.”

Reader, I did not have this.

Knowing the answers wasn’t the issue. Reading the answers was. I squinted at the page like a pensioner trying to read a nightclub menu. One child’s handwriting looked like it had been written during a minor earthquake and some of the letters were upside down. At one point, I mistook a drawing of a dog for the number 39. And yet, it was kind of beautiful. Every scribble, every backward 'b', every enthusiastic full stop floating in the middle of the page was proof that they were trying. Learning. Growing.

What blew me away was the class teacher. Let’s call her Miss Calm-Energy-Tamer-of-Goblins. She doesn’t shout. She doesn’t bribe. She probably wouldn’t even flinch if a child wiped their nose on her cardigan. She just... leads. With kindness, patience, and the steely focus of someone who’s seen things in the playground and lived to tell the tale.

She instills obedience, patience, and values in a room full of six-year-olds who mostly just want to play, compare belly buttons, and snitch on each other with Olympic-level commitment. It’s easy to forget that six-year-olds are learning everything all at once; how to read, write, wait their turn, tie their shoes, and sometimes, how to politely tell you that their tooth just fell out and is now in their pocket. It’s a lot. And yet, there they are, sitting (mostly) still, learning (kind of) quietly, and reminding you daily that there is joy in their chaos.

Despite the career detour, and the fact that I’ve started saying things like “good sitting!” with genuine admiration, I am enjoying the journey. I still have an entrepreneurial dream. I still believe in the power of a good worksheet. But maybe, just maybe, I needed a break from the spreadsheet to remember why I wanted to make resources in the first place.

Also: I now tie shoelaces like a ninja. So there’s that.

And that, my friends, might be worth more than a sale notification.

(But if you do want to buy a resource... click here)

 Chapter Five: coming soon.