Mr Ball

Mr Ball. Unfortunate name for a teacher at a school with a thousand sniggering adolescents. He floats gracefully down the corridor like the proverbial swan - head tilted slightly to one side like an attentive robin - legs mincing madly in the melee of teenage pushing and shoving. 

“He used to be a ballet dancer y’know” my mate informs me conspiratorially. 

“No! Really?” 

“Yeah! Look at him! Haven’t you noticed how he walks!” 

“Who Ball-y?” asks another joining our group tucked away by the lockers, “Pink shirt and cravat...he’s definitely a pouf!" 

Despite his wobbly head and the pale pink handkerchief, carefully tucked into the breast pocket of his tweed jacket, his wispy white moustache and his penchant for humming Amen Corner songs as he walks from the staffroom to his classroom, Mr Ball has a menace about him. New students, full of nervous bravado swaggering around, mistaking being at ‘big school’ with being ‘grown up’ are soon blasted with a stern voice and, sometimes melodramatic, reprimands “You boy! Why are you talking? Turn this way and pay attention!” It’s all a bit old school, very few of the other teachers take this tack and even at 13 I sense a trace of irony in his performances.

It seems that nobody likes Mr Ball, he’s not in with the kids like other teachers and moreover he doesn’t seem perturbed by his lack of popularity. He minces from classroom to staffroom on a continual loop, occasionally acknowledging a colleague or a long-haired sixth-former as he passes, other than that he very rarely strays out of this orbit.

And yet when he leads an assembly the whole school is on the edge of their seats. He is a nobody but his delivery of a tale with a moral packs a punch. The senior management, sitting high in their huge oak thrones - each slightly smaller than the Head’s seat to denote status - can only dream of engaging the audience like Mr Ball does. Mr Dooley's dry monologue on Douglas Bader had us gripped us alright, but only because it was so dull it was funny and we were gripped with fear of being caught being amused. Mr Ball tackles the subject of manners, impersonating a Y9 girl who he has described as generally graceful in demeanor, greeting her friend; and the lower school are in tears as he writhes around on stage imitating her leaning out of a window screeching and flipping the bird. His point is well made and much more effective than the constant beseeching of Mrs White for the girls (who roll their heavily-lined eyes and their cigarettes) to be more ’ladylike’ as she confiscates necklaces and dangly earrings. He clarifies the art of a joke, leading us to the point where he explains that last week someone left a pair of knickers on his car and that because the had been a clean pair he could appreciate the humour but had they not been that would be quite different. The senior management harbour various expressions of being unimpressed mostly at the stifled laughs, snorts and uncontrolled shoulder shaking amongst the rows - it is not appropriate behaviour for assembly. But Mr Ball is in fact laying the foundations of our understanding of acceptable behaviour and, without realising, his status of living legend.

In lower sixth, our second bout of growing up, when we are no longer obliged to wear uniform and now have our own common room, we are none too impressed with Mr Ball. The class collectively take against him after we are berated, no, given an unholy bollocking for leisurely strolling to English sometime after the bell in our first week as sixth-formers. Unlike our other English teacher who speaks to us as equals and launches straight into the syllabus Mr Ball makes us talk about other books we’ve read and we have to make notes on a comprehensive list of literature terminology. We privately share our concerns about his ability to teach A’level English over sandwiches at lunchtime but it is difficult to maintain our stance of no confidence or to suppress a smile, in spite of our determination to be sulky teenagers, in class. “Repair to the ladies powder room and obtain a small quantity of toilet tissue” repeats Mr Ball warming up for the delivery of ‘alliteration’ with a flash of euphemism. “G’down t’the bog and gedda birra bog roll!” he instructs in his best Black Country accent and without a flicker of a smile! He makes us read Sean O’Casey in Irish accents and, although we don’t believe him he points out the gaps between the paragraphs where Paul Morel has sex with Mirium. He never tells us but always asks us what we think. We privately wonder whether he should be teaching sixth-form - shouldn’t he be telling us what the texts are about!  We are eager to capture every pearl of wisdom and hurriedly record every word in our whacky sixth-from folders, plastered in children’s stickers in a, grown-up, ironic kind of way. The folder, like a comfort blanket, sees me through through my English degree.

Before final exams we invite Mr Ball to take us to see Rozencrantz and Guildernstern are Dead at the Birmingham Rep. In complete contrast to seeing Coriolanus with Mr Harris, where, like frightened sheep, we bolted into the seats as fast as possible the slowest - Vanessa - having to sit next to him, we gather around Mr Ball like demented groupies. We forgive him for not being able to drive the minibus and enjoy the adventure of the journey by train; we jostle to offer him sweets, chip in to buy him a drink and are genuinely thrilled by our trip to the theatre to see not an exam piece but one related, it seems somehow more mature. He tells us about his wife and the time when his daughter learned to drive.

As nerves begin to fray in the final weeks, I ask Mr Ball whether I might take his pink handkerchief into the exams for luck. I am surprised when he graciously hands it over and somehow having it on the desk calms my nerves. Mindful of good manners I decide I cannot part with the charm and travel to Beatties department store to replace it with a leaving gift of another pink hanky - this time in bright magenta. He looks genuinely taken aback when I present it to him at our class party.

Over the years the folder has become redundant and the handkerchief faded, but his biggest gift has metaphorically grown and blossomed and regenerated. 

Mrs Wilcox

I have come to watch Mrs Wilcox teach one of her GCSE English groups. She is at the door, greeting her ‘guests’ and directing them to their -allotted - places. “Blazer on Mr Squire!” she calls to one of the latecomers, a tall lad who has thrown his jacket over the back of a chair and missed. Immediately his face screws up in a frenzy of irritation. “What!” he shouts. “Argh! Why? It’s stupid. It’s pathetic!” He glances around at the gathering interest and feels a surge of power, “I’m going to make a complaint to the Head about you!”  Mrs Wilcox is unfazed. Her tirade of verbal herding continues unabated, firmly but calmly guiding the group into their places, passing out books and writing the date on the board. “Are you?” she asks absent-mindedly, “Off you go then Jake. I’m not sure I’m going to lose my job for asking students to follow rules though. Better straighten your tie up before you get there and get your blazer on, Mr Pryce won’t be pleased to see you without it.” The humour is lost in the general melee to all but a couple of members of the group who smile across at each other. Jake stands outside the room for a minute then slopes back to his place. 

I look at the poem she has to teach today and shudder at the thought of how, in just forty minutes, she is going to manage to get them to fathom the synthesis of complex feminism with the tradition of the fairy tale let alone to reflect on how as a society we continue to conform to convention, although she has  already, albeit unintentionally, stumbled across conformity and convention in action in the prelude to the lesson. She reads through, Rapunzstiltskin’ by Liz Lochhead, a poem positively aching with enough meaning to fill a dissertation to bulging, but when she has finished she looks up to a bank of blank faces. She takes a deep breath and the analysis commences:

“‘& just when our maiden had got good & used to her isolation, stopped daily expecting to be rescued, had come to almost love her tower’ What do you think about that then Serena?” she asks. I know Serena from my previous school. With her long dark hair and gorgeous eyes she could be that princess. 

“Do you fancy that? Stuck up in a tower? Is that something you’d like do you think?” 

Serena was a long-term school refuser and part-time selective mute and the look on her face is masking any clues to the thoughts she might have. For a moment, she looks as if she might be readying herself for an answer but her expression seems to indicate that she still either hasn’t a clue what she has just been asked, hasn’t a clue whether she’s like to be ‘stuck up in a tower’ or, in fact, quite fancies getting away from it all in a quiet tower and hasn’t a clue why anyone would think it anything but desirable.

“She’d probably like it...” chips in Jake, “...wouldn’t have to talk!”

“No T.V.” points out Mrs Wilcox in an attempt to prompt further contemplation, “No music, no mobile phone...” 

“No homework?” ventures Gethin “I’d like it!”

“Would you Gethin? Perhaps we can arrange it for you! What about you Nikita? You’re a girl who knows her own mind, would you like to be trapped up in a tower, no friends to talk to?”

“Dunno.” Nikita muses. “Not really I suppose.” she adds helpfully.

“So there she was, humming & pulling all the pins out of her chignon, throwing him all the usual lifelines’ Do you think she wanted to be rescued? Why might she want to be rescued? Would you want to be rescued?” Mrs Wilcox probes.

“Not really though; she probably liked being away from her parents, no nagging or washing up.” Jake offers.

“That might be true yes,” Mrs Wilcox concedes, then introduces the idea she’s pushing for via a third party opinion in the form of an anecdote: “I know my son might say that but he wouldn’t like to be alone, he hates not being able to go out or play computer games or text his friends or listen to his iPod. Most young people like to be with their friends don’t they? Do you think she wants to be rescued?” she appeals again, scanning the room hopefully.

Gethin’s hand shoots up.

“Mrs Wilcox?”

“Yes Gethin?”

“How old is your son?”

“My son, he’s fourteen”

“Fourteen? Does he go to this school?”

“No he doesn’t.”

He pauses for thought. “Where does he go?”

“He goes to St Alfred’s thank you very much!”

Gethin considers her answer further, his face puzzled momentarily then animated. “Why doesn’t he go there?” Gethin continues, convinced he’s on to something. He’s found an angle - the teaching here isn’t good enough for her son.

“Why doesn’t he go there?” she echoes “Well, we live in the boundary for St Alfs and are on the bus route, if that’s alright with you Gethin!”

“No, it’s not!” says Gethin smirking at his peers.

“It’s not? I didn’t think it would be - for you - somehow!” she counters.

Gethin has run out of steam, his shoulders droop and he slumps back in his seat. He has been steam-rollered by Mrs Wilcox who seamlessly returns to the job in hand.

“soon, he was shimmying in & out every other day as though

he owned the place, bringing her the sex manuals & skeins of silk...”

Jake’s hand shoots upwards, Mrs Wilcox braces herself for the inevitable.

“Yes Jake?” she asks resigned.

“What’s ski...skens...ske-ins...oh, I don’t know, whatever it is...of silk?”

She raises an eyebrow then looks down at the book and takes a breath. “Skeins? Skeins are coils of...”

“Why does he bring her sex manuals?” Gethin overrides

“Glad we’ve got your interest back Gethin.”

“Is this poem a bit rude for school Miss?”

“Is it too rude for you Gethin?”

“No!”

“No? Well what are you moaning about then?”

“It might be for Serena Miss.”

“It might be Gethin, yes. ‘All the better to see you with my dear?’ he hazarded. She screamed, cut off her hair. ‘Why, you’re beautiful?’ he guessed tentatively.’ ‘Hazarded’ ‘Tentatively’? What do you think the poet is saying about the answers given by the Prince?”

“Errr. Is he trying to guess the right answer?” hazards Jake with no trace of irony.

“Yes it sounds like it doesn’t it?” Mrs Wilcox says encouragingly, shunning the opportunity for a bit of sarcasm. “What do you think the poet is saying about modern relationships between men and women?”

“That she don’t know how to do it? She needs a manual!” says Jake shooting a glance over at Nikita.

“That men are pathetic losers who don’t know how to treat a woman and all they’re after is sex.” retaliates Nikita meaningfully.

“Spot on! Well done, that’s just what Liz Lochhead is saying, now back that up with the evidence” says Mrs Wilcox, indicating the text in front of her, “Find a quote Nikita.”

“Look around you! The room’s full of them Miss!” she narrows her eyes at Jake. 

Mrs Wilcox hurries on. ‘No, No, No!’ she shrieked & stamped her foot so hard it sank six cubits through the floorboards.’” 

“That sounds like my mum!” Nikita mouths to Serena. 

“Sounds like you more like!” quips Jake

“Fuck off you retard!” Nikita suddenly roars.

“Settle.” instructs Mrs Wilcox “We’re nearly finished.” she pushes her glasses back up her nose and returns to the poem.

“‘I love you?’ he came up with, as she finally tore herself in two.’”

“Miss?”

“Yes Gethin.”

“How did she tear herself in two?”

“That’s a good question Gethin.” says Mrs Wilcox, staying - somehow-  perfectly intact.

Lance - part 2

It isn’t long before Lance is transferred to my tutor group; we are moving to a vertical grouping system for Year 7-9 and the fact that Lance doesn’t seem to have encountered much trouble in English has prompted the Head of Year to suggest he is taken under ‘Beth Werrett’s wing’. And so, ironically, having managed to keep Lance out of detention in my subject I end up having to keep him in detention as one of my tutees Chantal. This is not school policy, it’s my policy. I have communicated to his teachers that if he is too disruptive to teach he is to be escorted not to Time Out but next door to me. And, in turn, my tutees know that if they end up coming to me and ‘wasting my time’ in following things up they will do the time after school.

And so it is that Lance is with me on a Friday after school, alongside a couple of Y7s who haven’t done their homework and ‘My Boy’ Jack a Y8 with potential to go either way. I call him ‘My Boy’ because he has been with me since Y7 and I have tried to foster a sense of belonging and responsibility in him. He came up from his primary school with a terrible reputation and so far I have, with the support of his teachers, managed to keep him on the straight and narrow. Tony, my colleague and friend next door,  and I have embraced the strategy of familiarity through semantics. It is amazing just how effective it is. We always call difficult pupils ‘our’ as is the West Country way and we have incorporated it in to our banter with the children. “Ms Werrett, I’ve had ‘Our Josh’ this morning and you wouldn’t believe the amount of work he did - you’d be impressed.” says Tony, beaming at ‘Our Josh’. Or on duty, as a group approaches, ‘Here she comes! It’s our Michaela! Nice to see her smiling!’ Michaela smiles on cue, out of embarrassment if not secret delight. 

‘My Boy’ Jack slinks in to the room, throwing Lance a sideways glance. It’s interesting body language, not direct, confrontational eye contact just a shy ‘shufty’. Lance is top dog. Lance is just the sort of role model Jack has been waiting for a personal introduction to and I am wary of them striking up any kind of allegiance. They get on quietly with their tasks and I work my way through a list chores until I have run out things to do in the classroom and have a stack of things that need delivering elsewhere, photocopying or picking up. I look at the boys working and am reluctant to leave them but I must get on. Eventually I decide to take Lance with me. I ask Jack to help the Y7s if they get stuck and instruct them to ask him if they do and then set off up to the Maths corridor with Lance in tow. 

“So what are you doing tonight then?” I ask “Anything exciting lined up?” He looks a bit taken off guard and then composes himself and replies “Oh, you know, I’ll probably go down the pub with me bother and his mates.” 

“How old’s your brother?” 

“Eighteen.” 

“Oh yes. Do you like going out with them?” 

“Yeah.” he says unconvincingly “We’ll probably get drunk and have a laugh.” he continues. He is grinning but his mouth is weak and his pale blue eyes are flat. I get a flash of him in the pub, the butt of his brother’s mates jokes and pranks, drinking a shandy perhaps, a Billy Casper to the big bad Judd. I don’t know where it comes from but the vision and the feeling is fast, almost blinding like a sudden shaft of bright sunlight or even the sudden burst of noise and light through the heavy pub door on a cold dark night. And then the door closes. Lance bolsters his reply with further tales of boys bravado but I sense he knows I have seen his vulnerability.

In English, by contrast, Lance seems more settled. He has stopped his silent, observation of my every move and has joined Danny and Chantal in answering questions though he doesn’t share their conscientious note-taking. He can be king in my class, not the little brother, he knows his stuff but likes to pretend he doesn’t, he stretches and postures and tries to feign nonchalance but his eyes twinkle and he can’t resist to tease. 

“There's been a death in the opposite house” I read

“As lately as to-day.

I know it by the numb look

Such houses have alway.

Let’s just look at the opening what’s happening here?” I ask.

“Somebody’s died...?” David postulates.

“Yes...and...”

There is silence

“Why are the houses described as being ‘numb’, that’s an usual description for a house isn’t it, ‘numb’,why has Emily Dickinson chosen that word do you think?”

“I know this sounds stupid but...” starts Chantal

“Yes?”

“No!” she folds in embarrassment.

“Go on, try it out.” I coax.

“No, it’s stupid Miss.” she says, peeping from behind her fingers “Forget it.”

“I said lots of stupid things in my English lessons.” I admit, “Don’t worry.”

“Well, is that, like how the people are feeling, numb? After the person dying like?”

‘Good!” 

It’s hard to believe how far this class have come, from raving madness to my mini scholars.

“And what about the next section...

The neighbors rustle in and out,

The doctor drives away.

A window opens like a pod,

Abrupt, mechanically;

Somebody flings a mattress out,--

The children hurry by;

...what’s going on there do you think? Lance?”

“Err...” he takes a long pause. “...are the neighbours looting the place because some bloke has died...?”

I look at him and know he knows, then have to turn to the board to suppress a smile under the guise of adding another note to the class brainstorm. His wit has bypassed the new-found seriousness of the class but it’s all I can do to hold in a blurt of laughter.

On Monday there’s a message from the office to see whether Lance is in registration. It’s not unusual for him to be late and so I am unconcerned until I find out that his mother has been in to the office and the police. Lance hasn’t been home all night. 

At twenty past ten, as Year 7 are settling down to writing their Lighthouse poems up for display, I spot Lance moseying past my “In” door, on his way to the refectory. I slip out quickly. “Hey! Come here!” He diverts my way. He looks tired and even more pale than usual, his eyes are dark and slightly red. “Where have you been?” I ask “Everyone’s looking for you. What’s this about you not going home last night?”

“Oh, I stayed over Toby’s”

“Didn’t you think to tell your mum? She’s been worried sick.” 

“She didn’t even know until this morning, she wasn’t even there last night, she staying over with some bloke”. And now he doesn’t seem vulnerable, he doesn’t seem angry, he seems just resigned to life. His mother coming in has been an embarrassment, an unexpected and inconvenient intervention.

“You had better get up to the office and at least tell them you’re here and safe.”

He wheels round and starts towards the office.

“Oi!” I call, he stops and turns around, his rucksack sliding off his left shoulder.

“Wanna hug!” I smile.

He smirks and then trots off.

Lance - part 1

It’s October when I find out that I’m going to have to accept Lance into my English class. It’s not the best news. For a start I have just settled my lively Y10s into something resembling a routine and they are now able to work in silence for a sustained period and are beginning to take a pride in their work. Secondly, the teacher who is refusing to teach him is a very experienced and very strict member of my team who not only has a reputation for discipline amongst the students but actually took a very difficult class from me in order that I teach a neglected top set. He was the only member of the team I felt would be up to the job and Lance must have really upset things to be ousted from his group.

I have seen Lance around school. He isn’t big for his age but his manner commands a presence amongst his peers. He is pale and blonde and not a natural looker and has a squeaky voice that sounds desperate, almost too afraid to break. And yet Lance seems to attract the popular girls. There is an air of menace in his swagger and I suspect that it is the words he chooses to use amongst his mates and hangers-on that provide the real power. He knows more than a boy of his years should and I get the feeling that his barbed comments keep the girls in check and the boys trying to stay in favour.

In my group Chantal and Danny are ticking time bombs - both have a reputation for being very difficult students but a combination of pacy lessons allied with a respectful but firm approach seems to have kept things under control. They have both witnessed my fire last year but have, so far, been wise enough to stand clear and let others take the burn and - while elsewhere in school they are still causing trouble - they have been model pupils in English with only the occasional over-the-top laugh from Chantal before she is tempered back to work. My concern is that Lance will be the catalyst and if those two go, the rest will follow.

For a couple of weeks Lance keeps a low profile. He sits smirking at the back, answers when prompted and does the work set. “He’s like a shark...” says John at our English meeting “...he sleeps with his eyes open - he’s just sizing you up!” I am all too aware that this might be the case and the lessons go by with an air of uncertainty. It’s like a game of chess I am anxious to keep my class working at the level they have attained and so I stalk around the room keeping a tight check on any hint of fuss. Lance watches my every move. 

One afternoon I am heading towards my vantage point at the back of the room, having set the group on a writing task, when Lance catches my attention. I look back at him, straight into his blue eyes. His expression is what teachers often describe as a ‘stupid smirk’. “Yes Lance?” I ask, on alert, hoping to head off any potential disruption. His reply floors me. “Wanna hug?” he fires back, his high pitched voice rising and resonating across the room. It’s not the type of question I was anticipating and I sense the collective stare of the class on me. I see Danny glance over, I see Chantal suppress a smile by chewing the end of her pen. In a fraction of a second I detect a change in the air. It is not a question I know the answer to and as I pause to think I delay with an ‘Errrr’. I sound calm, as if I might actually be weighing up whether I would like a cuddle from this 14 year old but I am frantically assessing my options in order to not lose face: To tell him to get on with his work may be what he wants - a reaction, trying to avoid the looming question and he’ll see he has me rattled. Perhaps I should tell him that kind of comment is inappropriate but that will confer an air of embarrassment - a vulnerability my class have not seen in me. That is not the position I want to be in either. Neither is anger - there are too many teachers in this place who yell and scream - it’s a student past time to bait teachers and I am neither angry or prepared to perform as if I am. ‘Mmmm...’ I stall as if still wondering whether I would like to take up Lance on his offer of a hug, time is running out. Against my better judgment I go with my gut reaction, the words spill out without thought. ‘Do I want a hug? Errrrrrrr....yeah! Go on then!’ I reply in a ‘‘Why not!’ tone of voice, as if I’ve been offered a guilty slice of cake I feel I shouldn’t take but can’t help myself. 

The focus shifts back to Lance whose ‘stupid smirk’ now seems to be showing a tinge of ‘nervous anxiety’ or perhaps it was always that in the first place but was never perceived so. What will he do now? I mentally run through all of the options - will he assert I’m being inappropriate? Will he now spurn the idea and leave me like Charlie Brown damning himself for once again believing that Lucy would hold the football for him to kick? A desperate female. I have heard awful tales from a colleague and good friend at the school of the teenage sexual harassment  she endured when she first started and am beginning to regret my response. Lance’s expression is difficult to read - does he look equally uncomfortable? Or is he pumping himself up for the lethal blow?  Chantal and Danny are swapping glances across the room. Lance stretches his arms out and pushes himself away from his desk, he shuffles out of his seat, past a frayed and well-trodden rucsack and towards me. Facing me he lifts up his arms and gingerly places them around my shoulders taking care to avoid bodily contact. 

For a moment I have my head on his shoulder and he has his on mine. Chantal smiles. Lance returns to his place. “That was nice!” I say, “Am I going to get used to this every Friday?” 

“If y’like!” Lance mumbles, smirking now weakly but not - as I’d anticipated - swiveling round to accept peer accolades. Instead he has his head down and is focussed on his work with a renewed earnestness. “I AM lucky!” I say, determined to have the last word. The group return to writing their essays. 

Direct Speech

It is the second Monday of the autumn term and I am sitting on the bus next to Steven. The whole of Y7 have spent the first week in a flurry; smart haircuts and delighted squeals of reunion; it has been a blur of holiday stories, new uniform, fresh books, timetables and meetings, and preparation for our time away, bonding in the Quantocks. In striking up conversation I mention Steven’s Midland accent and ask him why he’s moved south. “Because my dad kept trying to kill my mum so we had to come down here.” he replies. His voice is both quiet and so matter of fact that I am not sure that I have heard what I think I have just heard and as the words sink in I find myself both alarmed but desperate to communicate calm and so we continue the conversation earnestly and honestly. He tells me, with a glint in his eye, that at his primary school he was naughty, ‘really naughty’ and we discover that we have something in common - we are both Wolves fans, in Steven’s case in spite of the rest of his family supporting West Brom.

When I look back I realise that almost the very first sentence Steven utters to me sums up his writing - disarmingly simple but devastatingly profound. At first he refuses to write at all. He tells me that he can’t write more than two sentences and seems to think that now he has cleared up that little issue that I will leave him be. It would be quite easy to do that! With constant squabbling between Kirky and Dylan to deal with and a group of very motivated girls to keep going, Steven’s non-conformity is at least quiet! So quiet that I have him sit next to me - literally next to me - so that I can actually sense if he slips off to do something else which he has a habit of doing.

The strategy of encouraging writing by giving a target number of sentences works well with Steven. He is sporty, competitive and up for the challenge. I am not too worried about what he writes for the time being I would just like to see words, lines, a page maybe. Paragraphs I can live without, spelling mistakes I can accommodate – the aim is to get him engaged. The trick works - in focusing on the sentences he gets hooked in to the story and before he knows it he has produced a page - only two full stops - but an A4 page of writing. He is eager for me to like his work and I have determined that after so much effort I will! Steven is the only child in the class who I will not ask to read aloud on the spot - his confidence is too fragile and my confidence in his writing and how the class might respond is not yet galvanised. He reads his work to me quietly in a corner and I realise that my concerns have been needless.

Of all the writers I have come across in my teaching career, Steven - to me -is the truest. Unscathed by reading, he doesn’t ape a style; go to town with adjectives and metaphor; contrive meaning and emotion, he just writes from the heart. And somehow his writing is gentle yet pulls no punches. One story I recall is about a man who is out walking in the park when a ‘lady’s dog falls into the lake’. Bravely he takes off his coat and wades in to rescue the dog. With mild thanks from the owner, having returned the dog safely, the man turns down the offer of money and heads off home. Back in his house, Richard describes very simply how the man dries off and sets about preparing supper. At first the attention to detail – hanging up a coat, laying out knives and forks, washing up - seems pedestrian but somehow Steven has evoked the loneliness of the man, an unsung hero, just going about the business of life. Effortlessly he has portrayed the enormity of one man’s solitude.

I see Steven about ten years later in Sainsburys. He is with his girlfriend and I would not have recognised him, his thinning red hair tucked under a baseball cap, but for his cheeky grin. He tells me that he is working for a landscaper, laying turf and patios and children’s playgrounds. He mentions proudly that his little brother - who was in my class the following year - is now at university. “Do you remember going on camp Miss?” he asks. “You got me to do the abseiling remember?” It is not the most vivid memory for me, I have to admit, over the years I have coaxed and reassured many a pupil down rock faces in Wales. ‘Oh yes...” I reply, mentally limbering up for a warm reminisce about how I had talked him round to taking an opportunity while it was available, persuaded him that the dangers were limited, that the fear could be defeated, readying myself to hear how it is one of his fonder memories of school. I fish about a bit more “Really! How did I do that?” I ask. “You said ‘You’re coming with me!’ grabbed me and I abseiled down with you!” he replies.  Once again I am swept away by Steven’s directness but this time it brings not a tear but a warm smile.

Eric

As I am talking to the class I am aware that Eric is multi-tasking, fiddling around in his pencil case. He is trying to balance pens up on their end, or slicing a rubber with a blade unscrewed from his pencil sharpener, or exploiting the endless distractions provided by a compass with its scratchy needle and its arms that arc through 180 degrees to mesmerizingly meet and then back again and again. When that spell is broken the miniature nut and bolt separate to allow the compass to be divided into its constituent parts – from which state Eric will either reassemble them into a – wobbly – compass or transform them into a whole new structure incorporating any other stray components - damaged protractors, paperclips, springs - looking for a new home. Yes, Eric is clearing out his pencil case. When I say clearing out I don’t mean the kind of neat arranging of new felt tips, furry pen and matching pink ruler routine that Julia is fond of before she is able to put pen to paper, Eric’s decluttering is a league away from such tidiness and order. When he has finished sorting, all items – working or not - are jammed back in to the pencil case, alongside every last pencil sharpening and empty cartridge. The pencil case itself has been accidentally fashioned into a kind of punk statement  - rips and tears, a zip that has lost its raison d’etre since it became unstitched providing a useful gap to squeeze pens through. In fact I have witnessed him search for his only working pen by laboriously hawking the contents of the pencil case individually through the gap rather than the more conventional method of unzipping then rummaging.

Time is of no consequence to Eric. He inhabits a number of worlds from day-to-day occasionally surfacing to make a contribution from the deep thought of Planet Eric or taking a break from the private world of Eric and Mark, his partner in obscure humour. Such involvement in the lesson is usually prompted by a question from me; the question itself is often irrelevant, certainly to Eric and quite often to me, but it’s nice to know that we can connect, at some level, from time-to-time.

Eric does not function at macro level. Every task is subdivided into a series of micro tasks each with their fair share of barriers and entertaining diversions all of which contribute to the failure to reach the desired outcome as outlined by me. If writing a story were a computer game Eric would be much faster at learning how to complete each level but as it is he is still stuck at ‘Stage 1: finding his English book’ which is easier said than done when – to put it into context – you think of his school bag as being a scaled up version of his pencil case, booby-trapped with small games and toys, books that look like an English book but turn out to be a Geography book and fragments of what appear  to have been, in some previous era, a packed lunch.

Without seeing the ‘bigger picture’, that is when faced with Eric’s activities on a case by case basis it is almost instinctual to start thinking that he is taking advantage of your good nature in order to simply waste time. He is a bright lad, chatty and quick to quip - how can it take so long to just get organized?  Gut reaction might have you thinking that a stern word will be enough to get him to buck up his ideas or perhaps a spell in at break time will wake him up to reality. The sad fact is that punitive actions will most likely be of no consequence -if you want him to focus, to produce anything like what you have set the class to do, you need to cut through the organization for him. Provide him with his book and a pen – preferably open to the correct page. Or, even better, teach him how to be organized, spend that break time detention helping him streamline the contents of his bag, show him how to fill in his planner – it will all pay off in the long run.

And it is a long run! And a difficult one. And when Eric finally brings his story to me my heart sinks. Spidery scrawl is positively legible compared to Eric’s handwriting. I know that it will take forever to decipher, fear that it will crush his spirit every time I have to ask ‘What’s that word Eric?’ (which would be every other word) while his peers queue up behind him and his self-conscious voice becomes softer and less audible. In addition to that I know that while I am battling my way through, Dylan and Kirky will start a small skirmish that will escalate into a full on grapple and even the most patient pupils, quietly waiting, will invariably begin an inoffensive, quiet chat which will soon build, spread and corrupt the hard won atmosphere of diligence! And it’s not difficult to somehow feel resentful that Eric is at the root of this disorder with his reluctance to get started and his impenetrable writing holding everything up.

Early in the autumn term – having held Eric back while I deal with a few other students, whose work can be rapidly scanned and responded to – I take a look at his page. The words are as closely crammed as commuters on the Northern Line at rush hour. He appears  to have saved energy by not actually lifting his pen away from the paper but weaving a continuous line of blue ink circling and looping into loosely-formed letters. It seems that he has taken my September ‘lecture’ - on not using a new page for every new piece of work and using the space in your book wisely - a little too literally and you could be forgiven for thinking that I had suggested that an English book should last not for a year but an entire school career. For an inexperienced NQT it is tempting to pretend to read the story, say something like ‘What a great idea Eric!’, plant a huge tick on the page to acknowledge his efforts and send him off to choose a game as a reward, safe in the knowledge that Mrs Fairchild will sort him out in his Extra English session. I have, after all, 24 others who don’t get 1:1s. But even as an NQT under pressure I can’t bring my self to do that and in a flash of exasperation and - as it turns out - inspiration I take a deep breath, smile and say ‘Read it to me then Eric!’

Eric looks a little taken aback. The deal is that he hands over the work and stands impassively, enjoying a bit of downtime while I edit furiously, humming the words under my breath. The standard practice is that while I get busy with the green pen the author has a moment to gaze around the room silently nodding, winking and smiling at peers like a bride arriving at church. The more indecipherable the writing the more time the author gets to chill out. The longer the queue of children the more likely the writer is to be packed back off quickly. Eric, who has done his best on both accounts, is expecting me to keep my half of the bargain and is already mentally selecting his game. He has not banked on today’s special - a new strategy of reading your work aloud.

As Eric starts reading I have half an eye on Dylan and Kirky and half an ear on some gossiping going on in the corner so it takes a while for my brain to catch up with the words then try to match them to the chaotic prose on the page. Sheer poetry is flooding through Eric’s lips with a lilt and a rhythm and some well timed pauses which are not at all indicated by the two full stops and one comma which have managed to gain a place in the one and only paragraph.  The variation of verbs would put my ‘best students’ to shame and the way Eric has built a sense of tension is enthralling. I look at the book again, suspecting that Eric is employing the creativity of toddlers who play ‘let’s pretend I can read’ and tell a story with great authority, using the pictures in a book as cues and turning the pages with an assured air of confidence.  To double-check, and because I feel guilty that I was only vaguely paying attention I ask Eric to read it again. I receive a well-deserved, irritated sigh and then Eric begins to read his piece again to me...and then again to the class.

I cannot believe that I have stumbled upon such a genius strategy - so simple but so effective on many levels. Children reading their work aloud are engaged with it and able to spot their own mistakes and hear for themselves where punctuation is needed. Teachers listening to work hear how a piece is intended to sound with intonation and dramatic pauses. Children hearing each other, learn to develop their own style, understand what level they should be aiming at and have the pleasure of listening to lots of work rather than just reading that of their closest friends. We all get to indulge in the joy of listening to stories.

Over the rest of the year Eric gains a new respect from all members of the class, a new-found celebrity amongst the older children in Writing Club and his voice develops a more purposeful, slightly more confident edge. In school he becomes less shadowy.

Eric’s parents only seem mildly impressed that Eric has been invited to the Writing group for ‘Gifted and Talented’ writers. Dad says ‘But he writes like a six-year-old!’ and mum tells me that Imogen is the bright one in the family ‘Wait until you get her’. Eric doesn’t appear to have heard these remarks, he is focussed - or pretending to be - on detaching a torch key fob from its silver ring. In fact Mr & Mrs Lamb seem more interested in running me through their day, their respective visits to the doctors and their ever-growing list of ailments. Eric stands by abstractly jiggling and flickering the torch, his face pale against his dark spiky hair, his demeanor timid but not cowed.

By chance I do get to teach Imogen some years later at another school when she is in Year 10.  She is bright, top set and sits looking loftily at tiresome boys, her eyes heavily lined with smoky kohl. By contrast, her younger sister who I have picked up in Y8 struggles but has lots to say. Her first writing chronicles the medication and conditions suffered by every member of the family - including dogs, cats and rabbits - and, as her TA points out to me, in spite of her reading difficulties, she has no problem with the complicated pharmaceutical names of the remedies. Suddenly I gain a retrospective insight into the life of Eric: bobbing about in a sea of indifference; lost; taking refuge in his own world; building his own boundaries. 


‘I used to teach your brother...’ I tell Imogen, ‘...he was an amazing writer!’ She looks surprised. ‘Was he?’ she replies.