Your favourite website:

I'm a bit of a perfume junkie so I quite like sites that do decants and samples – scents with oud (argarwood), leather or fig notes are my favourite. I've been ordering from a US website and the merchandise is reaching me just fine.

It's also chilli sowing time again so I'm back ordering seeds.This year I'm ordering from a Finnish supplier – aji type chillies mostly as they're mild but fruity and we like chopping them up fresh and adding them in to just about anything at home.

A gadget you can’t live without:

Not my mobile phone – it hasn't got internet functions and in fact I don't even answer it most of the time. I believe the internet distorts our notions of space and self (needs to be handled carefully) and I sure as hell don't want to carry a distortion like that round with me 24/7.

In general I would say I'm not really very gadget orientated.

Something you'd never throw away:

I'd never throw away a Casio watch – even when the strap breaks – too useful for students to time each other on a range of classroom tasks.

The Casio F91- that could be my favourite gadget.

Who or what inspires you?

I like Spain. I like the Spanish. I like their way of relating to each other and of expressing themselves.

I particularly like paths that go through forests but I'll settle for ones that go around fields too.

In terms of thinkers, I've been looking at early libertarian writers recently and have found a couple of gems in Kropotkin.

In terms of more of a lifelong inspiration, for his pure drive and commitment, I'd have to mention the psychologist Albert Ellis, the founder of REBT (Rational Emotive Behaviour Therapy) who was still giving group therapy sessions from his hospital bed at 94 just before he died.

In terms of professional ability to deal with a technical hitch, there's a clipon Youtube entitled John Martyn - Solid Air (Germany 1978). The link is: . In it he busts a string on stage, restrings and delivers a cracking rendition of the song. It's a gutsy clip and not all roses by any means (John's clearly a bit wasted) but he gets there and something beautiful comes out of it.

Finally, I find the prospect of a good night's sleep inspiring (but I'm often still tap tap tapping away at the keyboard long after I could have gone to bed in time to get one).

Useful teaching tool: Unexpected imported novelty objects have tremendous value, I find. The hardware stockist chain Leroy Merlin is also a great place to get ideas – I could spend a fortune in that place. Letters of permission and consent forms also come in handy – whether it's for classroom research, photography or to clear slightly more 'wacky' projects or activities.

Your favourite lesson:

A lesson two or three months into the school year when the student who's been giving you nothing but attitude since the start finally realises that the class might not be such a bad place to be, nor you such a bad teacher/person and does something that they can actually take pride in.

Your favourite bit about your talk:

For the first talk, “Funky Stuff for Primary”there's a flurry of tricks for storytelling and captivating that I'm thinking of putting in at the start and an activity I call 'bean family' at the end. I'm looking forward to sharing those.

For the second talk “Structuring the maddness” there are three or four alternative ideas I cover for giving teenage students warnings, on an individual basis, without making an enemy of them. These have all worked for me and left me feeling like I'd won, as it were, so I'm also looking forward to showing these.

A lesson you've learnt while teaching: It's only an English lesson. It's great to learn a language but no language is objectively important in itself. No one language should be any more important than the rest and certainly not more important than the people in the classroom and their respective personality structures.