On this, the last day of September, I look back to the first
day. Firstly, I recoil at the thought of
how long ago that seems. Then I take
some time to consider what a good start that was, and how that in turn has led
to a really good … start.
Back on (what seems an epoch ago) the opening day of the
school year, when the staff all crawled back bleary eyed in to the hall for our
opening inset day, we had our usual day of strategic craziness planned. I took great delight in sharing the successes
from last year for both centre and school, and discussed how I planned for us
to grow more and more, and achieve more and more, all underpinned by our vision
of aspire – achieve – enjoy.
So wide ranging is our organisation now that we do not spend
the whole day together – we can be more strategic if we work in specific
groups, and therefore this is what we did.
However, as the staff all know, I always like to put an aspect of
teamwork and / or new learning into the proceedings – if teachers themselves
are not real learners, how can we ever empathise with those we seek to
instruct?
Therefore, the afternoon opened
with a sense of forbidding – what idea would he have this year?
Those colleagues of mine who’ve been on this journey for a
while will recall teamwork of insets past: the day I taught them all the
ukulele, the group dance, and the radio adverts. How does one top that? You don’t, you just seek to develop it.
So, as the shadows grew longer in the hall and new staff a
little more worried, I got them started.
Assigning our three new teachers the roles of team captains, I asked the
staff to get themselves into teams and charged each group with designing a
representation of either aspire, achieve or enjoy. They had an hour. Go!
For forty minutes, frenetic energy was all around, as
creations took shape. Odd music made a cameo,
thankfully fleeting appearance, and a few minutes before our time the creations
began to take the stage. Aspire took the
form of arrows and stars, photographs and positivity, all made from a cone, a
rounders pole, and little love. Achieve
took on weightier metaphors, with hearts and brains balanced by maths scales,
and surrounded by tempting presents or the rewards of your labours. Enjoy was more of 2 dimension affair, taking
the form of a character full of the wonders life has to offer, and looking like
she had the time of her life. “This is
Joy”, her team announced.
And I thought to myself, you know what, it is,
actually.
Since then, I have been a little overwhelmed with the
quality of the start we have made this year, and extremely proud of the work
already created. Our wonderful children
are back, and have been for four weeks, and all we’ve had is a really lovely
time, thank you. And there is no secret
to it, it’s really quite simple: our children are having a super time because
they’re being super – conscientious, friendly, fun, enthusiastic. In fact, you can see the joy. (And can I all remind you, I have on more
than one occasion penned blogs about how much I want September over and done
with…)
Our new staff have all contributed enormously to our school
with their enormous work rates, and have already established themselves as
super team members, evidenced not a little by today’s feast of a Macmillan
coffee morning. Thanks to Miss Beeks
organisation, two tables in the staffroom were groaning beneath the weight of
all the goodies. It will come, I am
sure, as no little surprise that joy was all around us.
The governors have been in, working as hard as they always do,
and they too noticed it: “it’s so calm” they told us, “so happy”. When you’re sat in the meeting room trying to
negotiate the minefields of the budget, it makes life so much easier when you
can hear coming, from outside, the sound of dedicated, hard working children
failing to allow any of the challenges they encounter to dampen their amazing
spirits.
All of this means that you can literally see and hear the
joy.
And this is none of my usual hyperbole, no lily gilded to
make a crass point – it’s scout’s honour.
Not that I was ever a scout, mind, I was in the Boys’ Brigade for an
afternoon because their football team was short, and I had to tell everyone my
name was Sunil Plaha, but anyhoo. No,
you can literally hear and see, sense the joy around the place. It’s abundant, it’s everywhere, and it’s
great.
Once again, I am left to ponder the true nature of what it
is we do, and to consider are we actually looking in the right direction when
we set off on the year’s journey. We set
of with laudable goals about targets and standards, about quality and about improvement. We never set out with the target to make the
school more joyful, but that’s what’s happened.
And the irony is, would we have actually achieved it so well
if that’s what we’d had planned?
So, sat here at the desk in the corridor surrounded by too
many pieces of stray paper and the remnants of a certain (secret recipe it will
go with me to the grave) cheesecake, I have no feelings about September being
over and done with. Far from it – I’d do
it all again given the chance.
And its all down to a character called Joy – after all, that’s
what we said right at the start – “This is joy” – and, boy, were we right.
Excited for the year ahead, and once again humbled by the efforts
of the adults and children I get to spend my days with, that is all.
