AN INSPECTOR CALLS

When I was a special needs teacher we would all dread the Ofsted inspections when a small army of people would invade our school, watch us all at work, ask the kids what they thought of us and then mark our school on how good or bad we were.

It's not that we had anything to be ashamed of. We were proud of our efforts and scored well on the inspections. The reason we dreaded them was because of the stress which they induced because we were all understandably worried in case anything went wrong and we let the school and our colleagues down.

Does your job involve people sitting with clipboards watching you at work and then grading you?

Following this process, the inspectors would then meet with us and give us the benefit of their advice. 

The latest advice from Ofsted is that toilet roll holders, which have been used in schools for model-making since I was knee-high to a grasshopper, should be microwaved for 10 seconds before use to kill any germs they might have on them.

I wonder how long you need to microwave an Ofsted inspector for until they become sensible? 

THAT WILL TEACH HIS TEACHER

Notwithstanding the fact that hers are now mere sockets, Jane Austen and I never saw eye to eye.

At school I was once asked to read 'Persuasion' and then write an essay about it. I recall that I managed about half a page which basically said that while reading the book I spent my time either fighting sleep or wondering whether suicide might be a suitable response to the novel.

My teacher wrote 'D+ - a more reasoned criticism was called for'. He also gave me a damning school report which didn't impress my parents. Despite this, I passed both my 'O' and 'A' level English with flying colours.

I was reminded of this when reading of John Gurdon whose school report read:

'A disastrous half (term). I believe he has ideas about becoming a scientist ... this is quite ridiculous ... it would be a sheer waste of time'.

Luckily John wasn't put off. An Oxford graduate, he was knighted in 1995, is a fellow of the Royal Society,  a fellow of Churchill college and has a Cambridge research institute named after him. Just to finally rub salt in his teacher's wound, he has also just won the Nobel Prize in Science.

I expect the Nobel committee in Stockholm to be contacting me very shortly.

SCHOOL DAZE

When I was about 16, I tried out being a bully. I was feeling a bit big for my boots having reached 6th form and one day I decided that this particular 5th former needed my attention. The attention took the form of me grabbing the school cap off his head and holding it out of his reach. You will have spotted that my attempt at bullying was extremely feeble and indeed it is questionable whether it was actually deserving of the title 'bullying'.

It was a rather impromptu act for which I had made no preparations other than a cursory glance to ensure that the basic rule of bullying was being met - i.e. that I was bigger than he was. My first foray into being a bully would have benefitted from a little research. In particular, it would have been helpful to have found out who the lad was. This elementary exercise would have revealed that Stuart, for I believe that was his name, was considered to be very talented on the rugby field. Armed with this information, I might well have left him well alone. As it was, there was a blur of action, and some time later, I regained consciousness nursing a rather sore jaw. I was alone, and my embarrassment appeared to have gone unobserved.

I relate this unflattering episode from my formative years for one reason only. That is to reveal the point at which I learned that bullying was not for me. I am against it and would never condone it. Having made that clear, I will tell you a story about an experience of my daughter's where I hope you will agree that the humour of the event, eclipses the minor act of bullying involved.

She was teaching in a school for boys who were too badly behaved to attend mainstream school. The class that lesson, aged about 14 or 15, included a giant of a boy, well over 6 feet tall and with the build of a tank. Apparently anxious to please his new and attractive lady teacher, he offered to clean the blackboard. My daughter accepted his offer.

The gargantuan lad duly stood up and approached the front where he turned and bodily picked up a much smaller boy who had been sitting quietly minding his own business. Holding him horizontally, he proceeded to clean the blackboard up and down with his human board wiper. He then turned him to a vertical position and completed the job with a side to side action.

The entire class erupted with laughter, my daughter included. I am pleased to say that the board wiper was laughing as much as anyone.