The head almost invariably took assembly in our school. Only rarely was he away, or, as we now say, “off-site”. On those occasions, the deputy head, Mr Clay, a man of scary aspect and icy demeanour, took assembly, always pointedly keeping it very short.
One memorable day, he excelled himself, with a reading which many of us, over half a century on, still remember word for word: “The apple tree shall not tell the pear tree how to grow.”
Whether or not it’s a quotation – and if it is I cannot track it down – the message is clear and offers enough discussion material to fuel a whole CPD course.
I thought of Mr Clay’s assembly when I began to realise, from conversations and social media, just how angry many teachers have become at being told how to do their jobs by people who have never worked in a classroom.
Apples lecturing to pears, you might say, or you could have fun with fruit selections of your own choice. You can even wear a badge now that says: “Those who can, teach. Those who cannot, pass laws about teaching.”
The perceived problem, of course, is the one we have always had, which is that everybody’s been to school, so everybody knows how to teach. “How difficult can it be?” They say. “I’m pretty sure I could do it.”
Other professions don’t suffer from this do they?
“I had a cataract op on my left eye, and it seemed easy enough, so I’m going to have a go at the right eye myself with a shaving mirror and a kit I bought off the internet.”
At this point, though, we need to throw in some caveats.
For example, the badge I referred to is specifically aimed at politicians, and there’s no doubt that many teachers, particularly since Jim Callaghan’s 1976 Ruskin College speech, have had a real aversion to any kind of “how it should be done” pronouncements coming from Whitehall.
But what about other sources? Is guidance from academics acceptable? Or from the people who write and speak at what we might call the inspirational level?
There’s less of a consensus here, but many will say the answer is no. They hold to the truth that if the person preaching to them is not baptised in the holy reality of Year Nine on a Friday afternoon they are mere “educationalists” – a term that some use with contempt.
A post on one discussion forum says, of those who describe themselves as educationalists, “real teachers would just say they were teachers”. Another, in a tweet about a well-known consultant and author, writes: “Have I missed the bit about where (he) has taught children – like ever?”
A particularly well-known educationalist (and he does call himself that) is Sir Ken Robinson. As well as devout followers, Sir Ken has his share of fierce critics who quite legitimately address his ideas. Too often, though, they cannot resist the temptation to slip in his lack of a school teaching background. So, for example, a review in TES by author and behaviour expert Tom Bennett of Robinson’s Creative Schools: The grassroots revolution that’s changing education, is headed: “Man who doesn’t teach kids or run schools tells us how to teach kids and run schools”.
So is that what really rankles?
In vain do consultants, speakers, academics and writers point out that they work closely with schools, teachers and students across the country and often globally, soaking up the knowledge and experience of a diverse mix of teachers and learners. No matter. They are still often seen as apple trees talking to pear trees.
Now that, I’d say, is a shame, and I’d like to offer a shout-out for the non-teaching educationalist.
With apologies to Karl Marx, the world of education is – or should be – a community where all contribute what they have, and take what they need. Classroom techniques and “tips for teachers” surely have to be supported by the work of thinkers, writers, speakers and academics who have the capacity and time to study, travel and develop their ideas.
Whether all these “educationalists” agree with each other, or with us, or whether or when they ever breathed chalk dust in an inner-city classroom is less important than what they currently do, which is try to raise the big questions – what do we mean by a good education? And is our current school system the best way to achieve it?
If teachers do not engage with such questions, the job becomes a dull business of techniques and strategies carried out in acceptance of the status quo.
Some have called ideas like Sir Ken Robinson’s dangerous. But we need dangerous ideas don’t we? In 1971 Ivan Illich, who never taught in a school, wrote Deschooling Society, with the message that “universal education through schooling is not feasible”.
Today, he would be sidelined as a dangerous non-teaching educationalist.
In the end, I guess, we can blame the politicians. The educationalist who proposes solutions, invites debate and disagreement. Governments, however, are largely bent on closing down any counter-argument. As a result, teachers wear their defiant badges and circle their wagons against all comers. And that, as I wrote earlier, is a shame.
- Gerald Haigh was a teacher in primary, secondary and special schools for 30 years, 11 of them in headship. You can find him on Twitter @geraldhaigh1. His previous blogs and articles for SecEd can be found via http://bit.ly/1UojJ5B