Kids are observant. The girls, at least.
The Law at school when I started teaching there about 7 years ago was that staff had to be suited and booted. I hate that. I am someone upon whom clothes come to die. I am a natural scruffpot. I could captain the Inter Galactic Scruffpot team any day of the week.
None of my shirts fastened easily at my neck. I would sit in the car before entering the school and struggle to fasten the damn thingy, add a tie, then loosen the neck button so I would not pass out. The look was hopeless but nobody ever challenged me about it.
Eventually, I bought a 'school shirt'. The damn thing is huge but does at least button at the top. I would wear it to school then remove it and hang it up the instant I returned home. I was never wearing it for more than a few hours, so it would do the whole three days without turning into a health hazard.
I noticed early last week that many of the staff were dressed more casually than usual. In fact, they had been doing so for several weeks but I am a man and we all know how unobservant is your usual man. I mentioned this to the impressively casually dressed Miss. She came back with, "Yes. More casual dress is now allowed. Don't take the piss; just look decent."
Bliss. I arrived home, dumped the tie and tossed the shirt into the washing basket. I arrived at school the next day, tieless and in one of my other shirts.
Julia walked in for her lesson. J now trusts me absolutely and knows she can say pretty much anything without a worse sanction than being threatened with torturing slowly to death. She did an exaggerated 'double take' and said, "You are wearing a different shirt." I explained and the lesson continued.
Come the end of the lesson and J was heading towards the door when she stopped and turned back to me. She asked, "If you do not have to wear a uniform any more, then why do we?"
This was me she was asking, so I could not resist. "Because we teachers are Superior Beings whilst you kids are merely peasants required to do our bidding."
J thought for a couple of seconds, then stuck her tongue out at me and fled.
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Back to the concert. Without reading back, I am fairly sure you met Matti at the Christmas concert. He is a member of the Motley Crew but does not tend to feature here as he needs a piano and so gravitates towards The Dungeon; the other kids try to steer clear of that space.
He has a wonderful sense of humour. The Motley Crew have become almost as familiar with Julia's concert piece as J, so often has she played it - frequently with Lilly supplying an extra melody line higher up on the piano and split between her two hands. I have heard them singing along at the same time.
Matti was the only one of the pianists to take lessons outside school. Come the concert, he played beautifully and I will praise him massively next time we meet. Prior to the actual event, we all trooped into the hall at the end of the day for a rehearsal.
First up was 'here is what is going to happen'. Each child was called forward, played/sang the first few notes then was shown how to bow to the audiences ecstatic applause. Matti stepped up. Instead of playing the first few notes of his piece, he played the first few notes of Julia's. You had to be there and know the kids to understand how funny this was. We gave him the biggest applause of the day.
Then came the rehearsal where all the kids performed everything they were presenting. Julia got about three quarters of the way through then went wrong, fumbled around for a few seconds then dissolved into helpless fits of laughter. I have always told her to laugh when thingies go wrong. We all love to see kids laugh. We hate to see them cry.
The Motley Crew were magnificent. With one voice they sang the rest of the piece. During the evening, Miss introduced Julia as playing, "The most famous year 9 piece ever performed."
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Head of performing arts ambushed me by asking me to play as the audience entered - without prior warning. I am not the soloist I was 30 years ago when I was performing works of a complexity that most of you cannot imagine. I still have a teensy repertoire of stuff I can turn out at the drop of a hat, but I prefer that the drop of a hat happens after a little bit of warning, so I can play through them first.
No such warning, so I was playing stuff I last played at Miss' wedding last August - i.e. 8 months ago. I was dreadful. Of course the audience did not know, so I received a warm round of applause when I finished. I announced that I am the school's piano teacher and invited the parents of my pupils to come to me at the end of the evening so we could meet. Most of them did so.
Julia had gone wrong once. She never missed a beat and carried on as if the error had not happened. She exclaimed to me, "I was nearly at the end when I made one mistake. One mistake." Not in despair - she was rather proud of herself for not showing a thing, especially after the rehearsal.
"You handled it like a pro - just like me." Then I realised that all but one of my pupils was nearby so I called them to me. "What you do not know is that playing whilst the audience was taking their seats was sprung upon me without warning. I had no preparation time. I have told you that I play fist fulls of wrong notes. I did this evening. Did any of you notice?"
Heads shaken in disbelief, or maybe they were just being kind - they are, after all.
Anyhow, point made.Lots of kids went home that night feeling 10 feet taller than when they arrived. That really is education.
