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grahamyapp.bsky.social
Failed-to-retire headteacher, now teaching GCSE & A level physics & chemistry in Hertfordshire and lurking here. Groundhopper, Modus Hopper Random blog with #keepertopcolourstats. Born West Brom. Duolingoer.
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Taking a social media break, length unknown.

submitted 136 days ago • 0 comments

Hello once again from the hanging-on-to-speak-to-HMRC telephone dark zone where the dreadful hold music has started to decrease my resolve to pay my dues into the nation's coffers.

submitted 146 days ago • 0 comments

Offers from @selwyn1882.bsky.social have gone out today for undergraduate admissions this autumn. 85.5% of our home offers are to state school students, with the biggest group at comprehensives. In 2024 this kind of mix helped us be the highest-rated Cambridge college for good honours.

submitted 147 days ago • 2 comments

Splendid evening at the Uni of Herts at an IoP regional event with some Y12 students. Nick Evans of the Uni of Southampton making us think about quantum gravity with a romp through modern physics. Physics is bonkers at its margins.

submitted 148 days ago • 1 comment

Hello from Stamford Bridge where a dad next to me is teaching his daughter how to time correctly the We Hate Tottenham refrain during The Liquidator.

submitted 151 days ago • 0 comments

Treating myself to a day off tomorrow and heading for a WSL battle at Stamford Bridge as Chelsea host Arsenal. Last season's League Cup Final at Molineux (same teams) was not the greatest game, hoping for better (though weather forecast is not good).

submitted 152 days ago • 0 comments

My period 3 lesson with Y13 on Monday will be Period 3 in more ways than one. It's these little things that make the life of a chemistry teacher so worthwhile.

submitted 158 days ago • 0 comments

I'm at a particle physics lecture day... feeling more educated and more inadequate simultaneously! Will solve the internal conflict with chocolate shortly.

submitted 159 days ago • 0 comments

As you'd expect, I'm a big fan of decent people with the work ethic in leadership positions. Pleased to see Tony Mowbray back at West Brom.

submitted 159 days ago • 0 comments

A computational investigation into the inductive effect in aliphatic and aromatic hydrocarbons has generated fresh evidence that alkyl groups are inductively electron-withdrawing relative to hydrogen and that this effect is small compared to other factors such as hyperconjugation.

submitted 171 days ago • 2 comments

(calls up inner Fast Show Mark Williams) Tomorrow, I will be mostly wingin' it.

submitted 172 days ago • 0 comments

Big Jet TV on YouTube for entertainment this morning rather than the Vienna NYD concert. All about the physics.

submitted 176 days ago • 0 comments

Reunited today after over six decades. It seems that I am falling apart more than my childhood teddy bear!

submitted 181 days ago • 1 comment

Carbohydrates of the season to all our readers.

submitted 184 days ago • 0 comments

Heavy day of traffic on the new Pin Badge FC website yesterday. All 92 League clubs plus a quiz now up on the site. European leagues to follow. Thanks for popping in. 👊🏼 pinbadgefc.com

submitted 187 days ago • 3 comments

me in my headteacher years chairing a subject leaders' meeting before I learned about the dangers of Any Other Business on an agenda

submitted 188 days ago • 0 comments

My Autumn term is done. Tough (as ever these days) but also rewarding in many ways (also as ever) with plenty of variety and high points. A domestic to-do list now rises temporarily to the top of the pile. Good luck to everyone on their final day of term tomorrow.

submitted 189 days ago • 0 comments

It's my day off. Have arrived in Leighton Bromswold, country walk imminent. Four of us with >250yrs of wisdom, aches and pains. Expecting mud.

submitted 190 days ago • 0 comments

I have the tired-but-smug look of one of those teachers who has got up to date with the end-of-term mock exam and test marking.

submitted 192 days ago • 1 comment

Plug 1 of 2 : great people, supportive team etc etc and you might even bump into me on Friday mornings www.teachinherts.com/find-a-job/v...

submitted 197 days ago • 1 comment

OK, I finally accept that Spursiness is a measurable phenomenon which now needs an SI unit.

submitted 200 days ago • 0 comments

Refreshing my French on Duolingo and still get the urge to say "boop!" at the end of every sentence like in Longmans Audio-Visual French course of the late 1960s. (For youngsters: it meant move the filmstrip forward one frame.)

submitted 201 days ago • 0 comments

Marking a GCSE test this morning, energy stores and pathways. Anyone else of the view that the s&p model is struggling to get embedded? I still see lots of "converted into" ideas mixed in - maybe pupils using revision sources other than the school's? First year I've taught GCSE since 16-17. (1/2)

submitted 201 days ago • 1 comment

CPAC4 not yet met (one for A level practical endorsement fans) #iykyk

submitted 202 days ago • 0 comments

A level physics kinetic theory today. Anyone looking through the window would have seen me bouncing off the walls and miming some of the vibrational modes of carbon dioxide molecules. Love this topic, especially the final reveal of three-over-two-kT.

submitted 202 days ago • 0 comments