Education

Once upon a time, a long, long time ago, lived a little girl called Susan.

At school, when she was 5 years old, she would hand her workbook in and then notice the teacher wrote 'V.Good' on her story page.  She didn't know what 'V.Good' meant and thought that the teacher must have written it on all her little friends books too.  No-one took her by the hand and explained, no-one spoke directly to her about her story.  She felt that it was a 'classroom' thing; she was just one of many, she soon forgot it.

When she was 7, or maybe 8, she was sent to see the headteacher for not being able to recite a poem.  It was about ducks dittying - she didn't understand the poem and so the words wouldn't stay in her brain.  It certainly wouldn't come out of her mouth when asked to stand up and say it out so the whole class could hear it.  She understood standing outside the headteacher's office was a form of punishment for doing something wrong so waiting there made her worried.  The headteacher called her into the office and she stood at one side of the desk and Miss Swan (yes, that was her name) sat on her chair the other side.  The headteacher read the first line of the poem and asked little Susan to repeat it and so on until the end of the poem.  It wasn't too bad a punishment.

At 10 years of age Susan was the youngest in the class; one more day and she would have been the oldest having been born on 31st August and the school year started on 1st September.  Susan was the only pupil in her Junior School to fail the 11plus examination.  Her mother visited the school to ask for an extension in primary education, but it was not granted.  Susan had a taste of rejection and failure which became a reinforced message at senior school where she was placed in a 'B' stream and, having been unable to read out aloud had to stand outside in the corridor.  The second time she couldn't read out aloud she had to walk around an empty playground 10 times.

She actually loved reading, silently in her head.  She went to the library very often on a Saturday with her father and brother and would return with a lot of Enid Blyton books and in her teens read mystery and crime books.  She loved the words printed on the page, the chapters, the excitement, the different world she entered between the covers of her comfy bed and the picture on the cover and the words 'The End'.

At 12 Susan came top of the class in English, her favourite subject.  She hated history and geography.  She was teased and bullied in P.E. and found science scary - cutting up a sheep's eyeball and using a Bunson burner and test tubes for experiments.  She was rewarded for her work in English by being 'put up into the A stream' where the pupils had been learning French for nearly 2 years which she was unable to join in with.  In this class Susan was bullied some more and became fearful and anxious of school hours.  At home she could escape into books which was calm and fed her love of stories, libraries, the smell and feel of books.

At 14 nearly 15, she was introduced to a classroom full of typewriters and a spark of new life came into her education.  The printed word was hers to create.  Memorandums, letters and making the school newsletter on a stencil 'skin' and running copies off on a Gestener and having it read by other pupils in the school was thrilling, rewarding, satisfying.  However, no-one said "Well done; you write well; you have a talent/gift."  No careers person told her she could nurture this love of words to become a writer, a journalist, a proof-reader or magazine editor.

Susan left school at 15; her parents wanted her to earn money rather than have any more time at school, after all she was just an average child who failed her 11+ and barely scraped through her CSE's.  She was best at typing so into an office she went.  An older cousin had exceptionally high speeds at typing and shorthand so Susan's parents took her out of the workplace and set her on a path that would enhance her career - full time secretarial college.  It was a government scheme that gave students a job at the end of the course.  Susan loved it.  Being taught the one thing she felt good about - creating works of art with an Olivetti typewriter.  She passed all her grades with high marks and sometimes a 'distinction'.  A sense of pride and achievement formed.  However, shorthand wasn't quite so quick as her cousin but it was 'good enough' to secure her a job at the City of Birmingham Water Department, where at 18 years of age she met a man and fell in love.

45 years wed this year

You will have guessed that Susan is Sue today.  You may be wondering why I am blogging about this part of my life.  Well the Education system failed me - I didn't fail.  It has failed, and still fails children today.  Ok, some fit the mould and do well, very well in fact.  They go onto university and get great jobs.  Others hate school and rebel against getting it by getting into trouble, being excluded and punished for not complying to rules that every teacher needs them to.  Don't get me wrong - I salute teachers, they do a sterling job with their own constraints of targets to meet, OFSTED to please etc etc.  I could teach 6 or 7 pupils at a time but classes of 20-30 children, no way.  How can teachers spend quality time nurturing them and finding out what they are naturally good at and enjoy?

I recently met a young lad, about 8 or 9 years old, who, every time I saw him told me interesting facts about insects, animals, dinosaurs, birds etc.  I told him he could be the next Chris Packham from the television when he grew up.  One day he had lost his smile and no facts were forthcoming.  I asked him what was wrong, he replied, "I have to learn stuff I'm no good at."   My heart melted, it resonated with my childhood experiences half a decade or more ago.  How sad.  I encouraged him to learn at home - write about the animals, draw the insects, read books from the library.  I have moved away and no longer see him but I do hope he doesn't loose his passion for nature.

I did have a good career.  I took pride in my work, marriage and motherhood.  In my 20's I wrote poems, in my 30's I had self-published a children's religious book but that was a bad experience with vanity publishers who vanished with the money I paid them.  The book was cheaply and badly produced and so my writings went into a drawer for 30+ years.  But now in my 60's the passion for writing is back with a vengeance.  In the mean time I have educated myself.  I gained an 'O' level English in my 40's and spent the last decade attending workshops for writers, courses on-line and attended Swanwick Writers Summer School annually.

It is no good saying "If only...." we have to live with what is, not what isn't.  We can make dreams come true no matter what age.  We can encourage others where we weren't encouraged.  We can be the best we can, with what we have, we can tell ourselves "I am good enough" and "I can do this."  We can forgive our past and concentrate on the present.  We can do our best NOW for tomorrow isn't promised.  Do what makes you happy, nurture your talents.  Don't tell me you don't have any, they are there waiting to be discovered, to be said out aloud, acknowledged and enjoyed.

As annoyed and helpless as I am that Education is doing some youngsters a disservice I only have energy for one passion.  That passion doesn't lie in the belief that I have the power or energy to change the system but I do have the will to change me.  I am investing my time and energy in something I should have done many moons ago and hoping I see myself reach this goal.  I have written 100,000 words of a novel and have two others in mind.  When my novel is published I will have a pseudonym because I will have a new chapter of life.  Watch this space!