School Days Sophia Waugh

This may sound odd but, after nearly 20 years of teaching, I am suddenly feeling a new surge of love for the job. Gone are the bad old days in my last school, when I couldn’t drive past the building in the holidays without feeling sick.

With talk of a second lockdown around half-term, I am praying for that not to happen. The hacking cough I have bothers me not because it might be COVID-19 but because, if others think it is, I will be kept away from my Year 11s. I want to be in the classroom; I feel energised and optimistic. And I can’t help but wonder why. One reason is that when the Year 11s came back after their two-week selfisolation at the beginning of term, it was to new groups. It had been decided that, with so much time lost, setting the students would be the best for every level. I have always been an advocate of setting English for the benefit of every ability – so I seized on this news with joy.

I was even happier when it was announced that I was to be given the supergroup, the crème de la crème.

Having always seen myself as a bit of a Miss Jean Brodie, I couldn’t have been more excited. Even better, I was told that, as long as I covered the content, I could do it how I chose. All of them must get at least a 7 (an A in old money).

Universities complain that first-year students with good grades arrive unable to structure an essay. When I was tutoring children from the top private schools in the land, I found the same. They understood the texts but could not write a well-structured argument.

Even I, who am all about knowledgeled rather than skills-led learning, insist students must learn structured writing.

And, along the way, I have the joy of teaching Macbeth to students who understand, respond and question.

I have a Romanian boy who arrived in England two years ago who reads Shakespeare like a dream – a dream with a strong Romanian accent, and with understanding and intelligence.

At the other end of the scale, I have a year 7 Nurture class: the weakest of the weak, and alas often also children with terrible behavioural problems. For a moment this week, I faced 12 children whose communication skills are almost as limited as their writing skills. Four of them did not know the alphabet. I wrote it out on the board for them to copy.

These lessons are not their regular lessons; they are supplementary ones to push their literacy. Which, I have to say, needs pushing – along with their attitude and behaviour. By the end of the lesson, two of them had been sent to the withdrawal room.

Part of my problem had been that, having no idea of quite how weak they were, I had pitched the lesson far too high. And when they could not do the work, they retaliated by climbing the walls. Almost literally. These children do not have the skills to understand, respond or question.

So I tried a different approach. My having sent two boys out of the lesson before helped; they knew I meant business. But so did making a positive example of those boys, who came back slightly chastened. Every suggestion they made and every answer they gave was met with a merit point. And the public praise they received was met not with embarrassment but with smiling blushes.

Very few of these children had been read to when they were younger. Not only are they not readers; they are not used to stories. So I have a choice: death by worksheet, colouring sheets, drawing and labelling pictures … or a story. I am going to read them James and the Giant Peach and use it as a starting point for bits of writing and grammar.

And, as long as I can keep a lid on the behaviour, I will feel every bit as satisfied with their enjoyment of a story as I will with my Year 11s’ results.