So close my eyes, and start again, anew....

Many people recently have been subjected to my theory on cultures.  I don’t mean the fungus growing in a cup on a window ledge, or the stuff they now spend millions on in order to make yoghurts more interesting. Sadly, nor am I talking about the review pages in the Saturday Telegraph.   I’m talking about social cultures, group habits and expectations, shared practises or established methods – those cultures.

My theory is simple: you can either change a culture, challenge a culture or establish an entirely new one.  Changing a culture needs subtlety, patience and time.  Lots of time.  Challenging a culture means difficult conversations and lines in the sand, having to stand and act as a barrier to the reluctant tides.  And it takes time.  Establishing a culture takes unshakable faith in a good idea, and energy.  But very little time.

It strikes me that – through a happenstance combination of design and weird science – that is what we are currently trying to do on several fronts.  Our success rate, the true markers, won’t be known for some time to come.  But the green shoots, if you’ll excuse me an early Spring metaphor, look promising.

Take social media.  Over the last three years we have taken a massive hit on Facebook and the like.  I have personally become a referee for fights between parents whose issue started on social media.  We have had to deal with children’s misuse of it, despite our frequent term 1 esafety curriculum.  Staff have been harangued, my decisions have been questioned and the school has been negatively portrayed.  So why on earth (or Cyberspace) should we enter into this fray?  The answer is simple: we could never reverse the damage done, nor challenge the negative press without resorting to similar tactics, possibly becoming embroiled in an e-argument that, as with so many arguments, never really has a victor.  Instead, we could create our own version of how to use social media, our own model of how to use this tool for good, our own code of conduct, and our own culture.  Now, our children can share with their parents what they have learned and achieved each day; many social media savvy parents know before they even collect their little darlings.  Teachers can use it as part of a topic or to get parents involved, and you can break new exciting ground at will: last night, we tweeted the results of our staff meeting.  You can’t always challenge, but you can always start anew.

We’re also trying to rebrand our pedagogy, our teaching and learning.  With the children’s centre at the start of its journey, and the school some considerable way into its own, reconciling the two may not be the easiest thing.  However, you know me – if someone says something is impossible, I generally peel a Satsuma, follow it up with a bag of crisps, maybe some chocolate then an apple, and consider the possibilities.  Far from sitting at the SIP writing table last summer and balking at the potential challenge, I lapped it up.  This was time to create a brand new culture, not try and challenge long standing notions or reshape tired efforts. 

Over many coffees and biscuits last summer the leadership team came up with our “phase planning”; an approach to key stage 1 and 2 pedagogy which really got me excited. It’s about  moving proudly away from the teacher-at-the-front model towards a class in perpetual learning model, it’s about learners taking responsibility, it’s about  building stamina, resilience, independence, and about having fun.  Above all, for me, it’s about teachers knowing their class well enough to design exciting activities to make our children think “Wow! I’m having some of that!”.  Okay, perhaps they don’t talk like me at a food market, but you know what I mean.

It doesn't stop there.  In discussion with the people who know me well enough, and those who can just about tolerate me, I knew I had to radically rethink my philosophy on early years to reconcile the good and outstanding practice within the school with that within the children’s centre, but I had to make one offer.  We had to start a brand new culture.

I had to go right back and recall what I had demanded not as a teacher but as a father, sending his young children to nursery and then to reception.  I had to examine my own feelings before I could consider how to articulate my desired pedagogy.  There was much car-thinking (that is very serious thinking, my second highest level).  It came to me in a flash – what do we want every child to have every day?  I want them to have what I demanded for my children every day: 1000 opportunities.  I wanted my own children to walk into a facility full of learning, excitement, vibrancy and (above all) the opportunity and the freedom to design it in their own ideal. What I wanted the practitioners to do was to follow the path, from a safe distance, and help reshape the learning with every new direction they took.  That’s what we’re now pushing across our 0-5 age group; that, in essence, is our new culture.

Regardless of what it is, we have to say one thing: this culture building is really exciting! It is also infectious – no negative comments on twitter; loads of followers for the school and individual classes; loads of school-to-school and teacher-to-teacher collaboration (and lots of children talking to children in a safe and productive way).  Our pedagogy has provoked masses of discussion, some wonderful planning, a real buzz of creativity and excitement and some of the most interesting staff meetings I’ve ever had the privilege to be a part of.

Therefore, I feel I am justified in my standpoint on cultures.  If in doubt, or if you’re short of time, start a new one, and see it flourish.  As the end of January approaches, I hope 2014 has started for you all very well.

With the exception of a little self-indulgence below, that is all.

PS See you Uncle Bill.  Thanks for all the laughs, for ever x 

Intrinsic Engineering - the true meaning of Christmas

Every partner, husband or boyfriend needs to be careful at this time of year.  If we do not tread a delicate course, if we fail to navigate a treacherous pathway, we hear the 5 words that can strike a chord of fear into the hearts of even the toughest man.  An even more terrifying 5 words than “Have you emptied the dishwasher?”, and carrying eminently greater threat.  Even more horrific than “Are those your toenail clippings?”, or the ever more spine tingling than “You leave the toiletseat up?”

Brace yourself. 

The sentence I refer to is “Shall we watch Love, Actually?”

Most of us can sneak through a yuletide without being subjected to this bloodcurdling 2 hours.  Some of you may think I’m being over the top in this (moi?), but I would also argue that there are other people out there – other men – who feel the same way I do.  We have to sit by and watch, generally covered in the debris of wet tissues and chocolate wrappers, as Firth and Grant look all sad and forlorn, as that cute little boy runs through the airport, as Firth makes that grating speech in cobbled Portuguese.  Yule? More like Yuk.

However, there is one bit I always appreciate and nod along to (thankfully, towards the beginning).  Richard Curtis’ words are correct: if you want to see the human race at its best, look at places of meeting, such as airport lounges.  I strongly believe in the sentiment that put so well: apart from a few faulty machines and some lingering problems, the human race is intrinsically engineered to good, and it’s probably our saving grace.

Christmas films are full of it.  When George Bailey “misplaces” that $8,000, people cannot help enough, except for one “faulty machine” (mean old Mr Potter).  Through the power of good, redemption is achieved and celebrated.  Intrinsic engineering.

My previous Christmas blogs are littered with Dickensian references, but you cannot deny it: upon seeing the error of his miserable ways, Scrooge becomes as good a man and as good a… you know the rest.  Simple really – intrinsic engineering.

The list goes on – Miracle on 34^th Street, Meet me in St Louis, and (for younger bloggers) Elf.  My children recently subjected me to Arthur Christmas – same thing.  Regardless of the issues, barriers and problems placed in our way, the human race will overcome – it’s all about intrinsic engineering.

This topples over into music videos; have you ever watched the vid for Pipes of Peace?  Based on a story as old as the hills, but even more monumental.  There, in the middle of the worst battleground in the history of war, intrinsic engineering.  If you watch the vid for Greg Lake’s I believe in Father Chirstmas right to the end, the last slides are of war and destruction, until the very, very last second, when the scene is of a soldier returning home to his son, both with arms outstretched.  Intrinsic engineering – we’re wired for good.  The ultimate Christmas song, the Fairytale of New York, is all about two people struggling in a foreign land which should have held promise and wonder.  Instead, what they have is no more than one another, and that is their key strength.   Intrinsic engineering.

I know what you’re going to say.  You don’t even have to raise that eyebrow of disbelief.  You’re about to counter with the simplest yet most powerful argument imaginable:  “It’s all fiction Chubs!”.

I would answer simply thus.  You are correct.

However, before you strode too far into the smug zone, I would call you back by saying that although I have only mentioned fiction so far, surely this year has seen more real life examples of this state than usual?

When we awoke a few Saturdays ago to the awful news of the helicopter crash in Glasgow, I was as sad and horrified as the rest of us.  My wife watched the news reports, clutching her mug of tea, with an attention bordering on the macabre; I had not the stomach for it.  Not that I didn’t care, and not that I wasn’t interested, but I could not (and I am not too proud to admit it) listen to the sad requiems for people lost without it tearing me to pieces. 

However, I ventured into the lounge at one point to replenish the tea (she’s less likely to want to watch L, A if she’s full of bromine) and stayed to watch for a few moments.  And in those few seconds, there it was.  The news reporter was appropriately sombre and dignified, but must have felt his heart lift when he recounted the incredible bravery of those people who had got themselves out, and then formed a human chain to help other survivors out of the wreckage.  When all around was despair, there you had it: intrinsic engineering.

Then, not a few days later, we heard the reports of the terrible weather hitting the coasts around the country.  The picture of the house that fell into the sea will surely be one of the abiding images of the year.  The house owner on the news, devastated of course.  Watching it on a handheld device, you got the option to watch the man’s full interview, which, entranced, we chose to do.

His full interview – full of hate?  Full of unfairness?  Bemoaning his fate?  Not a word, not one.  The man (who, a few Christmases ago would have been a candidate for one of my wise man blogs) first told of how he was sat in a local club, supporting a charity event, when a complete stranger came and told him that the weather was getting worse, and, if he lived on the coast, he needed to take care.  So he rushed home, and the impending ruin was clear. 

His first action?  He rescued his cats.  All life is precious, after all.

Next?  Well, what would you do?  I haven’t a clue.  Nor, by his own confession, did he.  Until he heard a noise on the other side of his house, the roadside.  His community, comprising his neighbours and total strangers, had come to lend a hand.  They each collected something from the house and took it to a local pub, many doing several journeys, to save the belongings of the man and his family.  Cynics might ask “what went missing?”  His answer – not a thing.  Not a coaster.  Not a flake of pot pourri.  When the situation had plunged into chaos, intrinsic engineering kicked in. 

I’m not one to jump on a bandwagon of emotion, but you have to take a few lessons from the recent passing of Nelson Mandela.  One lesson might be: don’t sit too closely to a strangely attractive Scandinavian politician.  However, I would rather hope that the lesson comes not from his death but from his life.

Having served 26 years in prison incarcerated at the behest of a racist regime for crimes that should not exist, he was released to great pomp and ceremony.  A celebrated figure, it was little wonder that he quickly headed into public service.  At his inauguration as president, he had the world at his command, and the guest list was the talk of the globe.  It was to be the most widely anticipated event since the queen’s coronation, or the reforming of Take That.  So who would he invite?

Other members of his party? Of course.  His supports?  Naturally.  Other African and World leaders? Without question.  His jailor?  Yes. 

That’s right: his jailor.  James Gregory oversaw the custody of Nelson Mandela for over two decades.  Far from it being a relationship of hate, borne of a power struggle , it became the epitome of a story of friendship borne of adversity.  Intrinsic engineering. 

I hope I have gone some way to convincing you that I am not merely some film-buff-sentimentalist, and that my argument carries some weight.  I genuinely and deeply believe in the power of the human race to effect good, even when some of our member may act to the contrary.  Furthermore, it is at exactly this time of year that we notice, appreciate and celebrate our intrinsic engineering, our pre-wired instinct to do good, on many fronts.

Still unconvinced?  Allow me to mention one more element. 

Whatever the true and deep nature of your religious persuasion and beliefs, surely a simple re-examination of the nativity, in whatever credo, would stand the test of this thesis.  Look at the evidence.

Joseph is engaged to a woman who is supposed to be pure, but he then discovers she is with child.  He has every right to jilt her, every right in fact, under Hebrew law, to see her punished.  Yet he does not.  When the census is announced, he fulfils his obligations, despite the protestations of others, and acts with decency and care.  Intrinsic engineering takes over.

Whatever possessed them we do not know, and shall never know.  Perhaps that is more romantic.  However, something convinced one business man or woman, one hotelier, to throw aside all convention and offer up his stable for human habitation.  After all, even the meanest heart has a rethink when he sees a pregnant woman.  Entrepreneurialism or intrinsic engineering?  You know my thinking.

On the birth of this baby, he is attended by the richest and most knowledgeable men imaginable, and the lowest social class in the entire continental region.  Does one spurn and mock the other?  Is there social warfare, snobbery or spite?  No.  Rich and poor alike may share this moment, because they know it is right to do so.  Intrinsic engineering. 

At times of great sadness, at times of despair, at times of need, even in times of rapture, our intrinsic engineering makes us what we are.

I hope in years to come, when my son is asked the question What was your first record?”, he will answer not with some of the bilge he has tortured us with, but will answer Band Aid 20.  He probably won’t, as he didn’t buy it. I bought it for him, 6 weeks before his birth.  I wrapped it for him, before he was born, and his Mum opened it, and we listened to it together.  Sentimental?  Of course.  Yet I really wanted my son to be born to the power of positive messages, and the human race putting aside their differences to attempt to do good has to be one of our most positive. 

Intrinsic engineering isn’t just our DNA; it’s our privilege, and aren’t we lucky?

As in other years, I shall conclude by apologising for any offence caused (although this year, I feel that - Colin Firth aside - I’ve been non-controversial), and I wish you and yours nothing but the most special of Christmases, and a healthy and happy 2014, during which, I have no doubt, our intrinsic engineering will continue to make our world the place we all know it can be.

For 2013, that is all.

In (occasionally) keeping with tradition

I’m a bit of a contradiction when it comes to tradition.  I am an absolute stickler for observing some traditions, and my Christmas Eve is rife with them.  Equally, there are some that I think are ripe for the breaking.  Ultimately, traditions largely fall into three categories: some you have to keep; some you feel duty bound to challenge, and that, frankly, you can do without.

As I child I stuck unfailingly to the rules.  I was (I know you will find this difficult to believe) never one to rock the boat, always a good guy.  I had to become an adult to know how to push boundaries.  It was during my first years of teaching that I began to ask “Why do we do it that way?”  You have to remember that we would still be stuck with laws that were, essentially traditions, had we not challenged the sense behind them.  Corporal punishment for children, anyone?

I left my first job for a number of reasons, one of which was that I refused to go along with certain things that my colleagues insisted upon because they’d “always done it that way”.  I left another job because people still wanted things done the way they had been in the 1860s – no, really, I’m not joking.  When one of the governors asked me at the end of a long and embattled Full Governing Body when I intended to sweep the car park (she stopped short of calling me “Sonny” as she peered at me over the top of her spectacles), I silently admitted that my time there was at an end. 

When I arrived at Badock’s, there were a few things I had to question repeatedly, because although people claimed that they were “for the good of the children”, it became quickly apparent (at least to me) that they were in fact “for the gratification of the adults”. 

Sadly, there were some traditions, or habits, that had been at Badock’s long before my arrival but had to go.  Theft, a daily occurrence once upon a time, is no longer a daily issue, but has reared its ugly head this year, with children’s coats going missing and never returning.  As tough as times get, surely this is a tradition no-one wants to see return.  Equally, aggressive attitudes towards staff – a daily occurrence on my arrival - has mostly, mostly disappeared.  It should disappear completely.  And soon.  The sub-culture (a part of tradition) of teachers being punch bags has gone – it left with the cane, school milk and the ink well, and, just like those artefacts, should be consigned to a museum specialising in exhibits from a golden era that never really happened.

You see, we ought to be extremely wary of trusting ideas, notions or procedures we are told are the right way to do things when we have an inkling that they’re wrong.  Adults are, by-and-large, not vey good at this.  Children on the other hand, seem to have this skill in spades.   

Although I enjoy pushing boundaries and exploring new dimensions, there are some traditions that must, must remain.  These are the few, the very few, that I will pass on to my own children and hope they pass onto theirs ad infinitum.  They are things such as:

·         -  You should always know the name of all the Dr Whos, in order;

·          - You should always be able to recite the 1982 Villa side who won the European cup in Rotterdam (including both goalies);

·          - You should know the perfect recipes for yorkshire puddings.

Furthermore, there are some traditions that simply help you to take your place in the human family.  Participating in Children in Need, Red Nose Day, Sport Relief, whatever it may be, should be a tradition that remains.  Offering support, whether you donate a fortune or simply adorn your proboscis with an irritating piece of recycled rubber, should be more than a tradition; it should be an obligation – an act where it feels more wrong to not take part.  I stress again, it matters not that you offer a shiny penny or a thousand pounds – it matters that you care enough.

Above all, one tradition that should remain unchallenged is the minute’s silence.  Every year, on a cold Sunday morning, I take my place amongst hundreds in our village who make the slow trudge up the (closed) High Street to the memorial park in order to listen to the Service of Remembrance.  The number of veterans slims each passing year, but the crowd never seems to decrease – far from it; for not the first year, they ran out of service books.  Although I had had to semi-battle my son to go, he needed no instruction as to how to behave when there.  This silent code, this feeling, this tradition speaks volumes for itself.  The following day, in our own remembrance assembly, you could have heard a stealth pin drop into a bed of cotton wool during our own silence, and at no point did I feel as if I needed to impress on our children the importance, the symbolism, or the (forgive me again) tradition. 

Of course, there is a fourth option: sometimes you simply have to start a tradition.  Who started singing “Happy Birthday”?  Who was the first person ever to say “Please”?  Someone, somewhere in the mists of time had to come up with the idea of a song at 12.00 midnight each December 31^st.  Why not start a tradition of your own.  “Flowers on a Friday” was one a former colleague of mine started in his house.  They smile a lot, his family. 

As long as I’m at Badock’s, some traditions will be welcomed, embraced and encouraged.  Some fads and phases will be … left in the dust of the past.  One tradition we should display with pride is our love of learning.  If we’re not learning, what are we here for?  Check out the nursery’s blog, and watch a group of three and four year olds as they, quite literally, reinvent the wheel.

Is it tradition, or is it breathtakingly new?  Or is it simply wonderful?

From me, but not from our amazing children, who both seek and challenge tradition on a secondly-basis, that is all.

I can see a ...

Rarely do terms go so well after such a massive staffing change.  There are always a dip in standards, communication issues, nervous people, and that odd someone who just doesn't quite get it.  No such issues here Sir.  We have continued seamlessly on, making sure we aspire-achieve-enjoy every day.

Actually, terms often go well, but first terms, well they are a different beast.  I may have written a blog at some time in the past about Septembers, and one of the issues I have about Septembers is that schools generally don't do honeymoon periods very well.  Either everything is rosy, and leads to a massive crash, or people take too long to get started and it's carol singing before you know it.

In fact, I would suggest that the success of term 1 has been almost exclusively attributable to three factors.  First, the efforts put into the school environment before it was unveiled.  Two, the creativity of the teachers and practitioners within the school, and the inventive ways they have provided learning opportunities.  Thirdly, but utterly invaluable, has been the almost insatiable appetite of our children for learning.

Now, I'm not saying these are the only factors.  There are others to add, such as the great support offered by our parents, and the amazing uniform standards maintained throughout the term.  There has also been the school's strange addiction to the songs of David Bowie.  But I feel that's another blog.

Briefly, I was concerned.  Could we really maintain our own crippling high standards?  Could we really push our outcomes even further?  Those worries soon disappeared.  From the first assembly with our wonderful year 6 (cool as cucumbers) , through our new reception children's induction (smooth as silk) all the way to our amazing harvest festival (as generous as.... I don't have one for generosity; maybe it shound be "as generous as the community of Southmead") staff and children have convinced me with ease that we are set up for another successful year, and more.

Our school, caterpillar like once again, goes through another regeneration, another metamorphosis, and comes out of the other pupae end a beautiful, winged creature of learning and achievement.  I'm just the lucky one who gets to watch it happening.

What will term 2 bring?  I am genuinely looking forward to finding out.  Have a wonderful break everyone.  Until we fly and share the skies once more, that is all.

I'm always happier to see the back of it.

September.  September and March.  I can't wait to see them come lurching to an end.  They both crawl interminably to a conclusion that delivers promise of more to come, reminding us bitterly how much they have kept us back.

March always dangles Spring in front of us, before ending our days with a spiteful hint of cold as if to say "No, no, no. Not yet. Only when I say so."  The lengthy depths of March span the time like a chasm, striding two banks of the seasonal tide.  Daffodils dare to show their face, scared of March's damning touch, only parading into greatness when April finally skips into view.  Lambs can barely ... no, wait, now I've just gone too far. A man like me does but one thing with lambs, and it involves garlic, rosemary and mint sauce.  I will conclude by saying March annoys me.  I'm just that kind of guy.  

September always crawls for me too.  I long for the school to get into some sort of pattern, some type of routine to kick start a new school year.  I am desperate for the established patterns of the year to become embedded and for our successes to start coming in like coins at the bottom of a one arm bandit.  (Yes, I was doing similes with a class recently.)

I've not felt that way this year, except for one thing.  More of this later.

I've not felt this way because of one important thing: the end of August.  When I first dared to venture into the school in the summer holidays after my various travels, I was anxious as to what I might find.  Schools in the midst of August can resemble building sites, war zones, meteor craters (too far? Again?) despondent of life form without more than six legs and a breeding ground for e coli.

Not this school.  Not this summer.

I walked in on that final Wednesday and was amazed.  I walked around and saw the same thing over and over again: colour.  I think I've already been ludicrously, almost embarrassingly prosaic during this blog, so I am not about to rummage through my bag of rainbow metaphors - you get the picture.  The entire school was awash with the results of teachers' and colleagues' efforts to preserve our school's status as a place of learning.  (I just mistyped and it came up palace of learning...or did I mistype?).

Once it was then filled with the most important thing in the world, it truly became the place we all know and love.  The uniform is mesmeric (a sentence never used before I believe - ever) and the work quite brilliant.  I took 72 books home last night to look at the quality, marking, range, you know the stuff, and I was humbled and very proud at how much our children and our school can produce.  And I haven't even started on our amazing new reception children.

So, no September blues for me this year.  In fact, I'll be sorry to see it go.  What we must do instead is ensure it has served as our foundation for what should be more success around the corner.

My only September blues this year have arisen from the fact that they offer us Strictly Come Dancing, then take it away for three weeks! Demagogues and dictators throughout the annals of history have as yet to devise a torture so cruel.  Once it's back on, I shall breathe easily again.

Whilst I slip into something a little more sequined, that is all.