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EDUCATION TO UNDERSTAND THE WORLD & CHANGE IT FOR THE BETTER

‘I’m not committed to love, I’d be fine with war’

16/9/2018

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Picture
I return to the Tallis Hug. For new readers, this quite a feature. Students here hug each other desperately as if waving goodbye to an émigré, when they part for a lesson. They hug when they reconvene in sheer relief that the loved one is safely returned to whichever draughty part of concourse or canteen is home. This is inexplicable to the northerner for whom a raised eyebrow is an embarrassingly gushing show of affection. And they come pre-programmed. 

Directing canteen traffic in the early hours of the term small child rushed up to me with a story of lost bag, shoes and bus before leaving home, followed by confusion and excitement in school. ‘Now I’m FINE!’ she squeaked. ‘Can I get a hug?’ ‘No!’ I squawked, rearranging her outstretched arms and backing into a dinner lady. ’We don’t do that here!’  Which, as explained above, is patently untrue. What I meant was - you’ll find plenty people to hug here, but not adults and certainly not me. The exuberance of youth. 

In telling this rocket-propelled putative hugger something about the Tallis way I was – rather magnificently – following my own instructions. My theme for the year is Tallis as usual. We don’t want to invent any new ways of doing things this year, just to do everything we already do better, and more consistently. That’s not to say that we won’t have some creatively eccentric new ways of teaching, but we want our running procedures to be reliable, predictable and better.

Which subtle segue leads me into the general state of our education system. Not enough money, 40 000 fewer teachers that we need, exam system that can’t bear the weight put on it, financial scandals etc etc. My solution to most worries is reading so I’ve just finished Melissa Benn’s Life Lessons. Benn is a tireless campaigner for community comprehensive schools but in this little piece she also turns her attention to the state of adult education and the universities, as well as schools, proposing a National Education Service. (Before you reach for the pen to report me to the Secretary of State for contravention of Staffing and Advice for Schools September 2018 para 5:33 (expressing political views) this is not quite the same as the one that Labour talked about a bit at some point.)  It’s well worth reading, not least for this.
Why do we still know so little and celebrate even less the successes of comprehensive education? That a new generation of educational activists and administrators, including anti-grammar [conservative MPs] and many in the academy and free school movement now adhere to its principles so hard fought for half a century ago but rarely give it credit is not merely a form of disguised tribalistic discourtesy: it is also the result of a long-standing distortion of the historical record  
​She goes on to say:
It should not be forgotten that today’s widespread commitment across the political spectrum….to the idea of all children getting a shot at an ‘academic education is the direct result of comprehensive reform.  It changed our attitudes for the better and should be built on, not dismantled.
One of the things we often say at Tallis is that the comprehensive dream is a vision every bit as precious as the NHS, and every bit as complicated. Model communities of local young people taught with expertise and equity is a blueprint for a better society. There are other barriers, mind, and I’ll talk about my next reading book, Robert Verkiak’s Posh Boys next time. 

Reading was on the agenda in year 7 assembly too. ‘Reading makes you kinder’ said Ms R. ‘You all need to read more’.  Perhaps the year 11 boy who bizarrely told Sir in English that he wouldn’t need English after leaving school could be persuaded that he might need kindness? Not that the conversation I had with Sir didn’t have its odd turns.  It was in discussing the choice of poetry for GCSE that he gave me the title of this piece. Which poems would you rather read?

We are committed to love at Tallis in that we are committed to kindness and service. Part of that is to be reliable, predictable and better. War and love, love and service, expertise and equity, creativity and eccentricity: Tallis as usual, hold us to our promises.
 
CR
13.9.18
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The Golden Girl

24/5/2015

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Picture
Icon in Gold by Charlotte Williams, Year 13
We finish teacher interviews at Tallis with ‘What are you reading?’ It's sometimes a bit embarrassing, especially when a candidate gives the impression that they haven't read a book this century and hope fervently never to see one again. Worse when he or she tries to convince me that they live and die for the latest assessment controversy in the twittersphere or that their every waking thought is Algebra For The Reluctant. Teachers should be interesting people so that young people are keen to learn. It helps the world go round. 

My own reading is aided by electronics. As far as I'm concerned mobile phones exist to make sure I'm never without a book. If I was sufficiently coordinated to read while walking along the street without presenting a hazard to shipping I would do it. I try to have an educational book in my bag on work days so that the shining hour may be improved, though that rather depends on the quality of the book. 
I picked up two from a conference in March. You should read Steve Peters’ ‘The Chimp Paradox’ about human behaviour and self-control: it’s an engaging and interesting book from a witty and brilliant man. Or you could read Michael Barber’s ‘How To Run a Government So That Citizens Benefit and Taxpayers Don't Go Crazy’. I was at the conference with an old friend, a considerable thinker, who wouldn't even stay for the lunch in case he accidentally heard Barber speak. I thought he was so interesting that I bought the book. Call me dim, but I don’t think I'd twigged that it would be all about deliverance, and not in the theological sense.

Barber was Blair’s deliverer. He set and monitored targets so that public services could be improved in a principled, systematic way based on serious and sensible aims to improve everyone's lot. I'm entirely in favour of accountability, targets and planning. You'd imagine I'd enjoy the book.

Barber’s a brilliant man by his own admission, and I don't necessarily object to that. He often has exactly the right question to unblock a problem and the leadership to solve it. He recognises brilliance in others. His examples from world public service and history are diverting. He quotes Ontario and Adonis on making changes for the long run and seeing things through, on irreversibility, so that good change stays put and can't be unpicked. But I read his chapter on leadership with one eye while looking at another announcement about coasting schools with another (and poking myself in both in preference to either).

Deliverology (yes!) should build up our public services and reassure the taxpayer. However, I searched in vain for an analysis of Campbell's Law (the target is skewed by the pressure exerted on it). There was little on perverse incentives. Barber reflects on the success of the literacy strategy but doesn't consider the longer supply-side issue of de-professionalising teachers when they became regurgitators of processed materials. He doesn’t address and didn’t predict the current chaos over the mysterious number of teachers in training (we don't really know how many there are) and the huge issue with headteacher recruitment as football manager syndrome decimates our numbers.

Barber tells the bible story of Joseph to illustrate proper financial planning but the dichotomy between determining to achieve a thing and giving it time to happen remains. And don't tell me that children only have one chance at education. Do you think we don't know that? The Joseph story takes at least 14 years: it’s about violence, loss, reconciliation, faithfulness and joy in the beauty and gifts of a child. It might be about deliverance in the older sense and it’s just not that easy.

I stood in the drama studio on Friday morning and looked at 18-year-old Charlotte personally painted in gold leaf. She took my breath away.  The installation - for A level art, about purity and decay - is as good a piece as you'd see in the galleries of the world, as I told year 9 waiting to go in. Celia, giving out the information, is a writer of similar brilliance. Together they'll change the world. But it is their own determination and the depth of care their teachers have taken, over the years spent with these children and thousands of others that brought this wonderful moment. Deliverology stops you squandering public money, but it doesn't bring you a golden girl.

What am I reading? Barber and the Old Testament, Charlotte and Celia.

CR 20.5.15

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Thomas Tallis School, Kidbrooke Park Road, London SE3 9PX
T: +44 (0)208 856 0115   F: +44 (0)208 331 3004   E: headteacher@thomastallis.org.uk
  • Home
  • About
    • An Overview >
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      • Who was Thomas Tallis?
      • School Vision
      • Artsmark
      • Prince's Teaching Institute
      • International School
      • Ofsted
    • School Prospectus
    • Mrs Roberts Writes
    • Tallis Habits >
      • Tallis Pedagogy Wheel Guide
    • Tallis Character
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    • Secondary School Direct Hub
    • The Pupil Premium 2019-20 >
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