Back in the jug again

School started again last Monday. I was dreading the swift transition from freedom and autonomy to the serfdom of employment, and it reminded me of Geoffrey Willans' wry comments on the return to school. The teachers and support staff came in for two days of time-wasting pep talks, the uplifting effects of which which were nullified by the news that our lunch duties, which I have hitherto used to supplement my lowly pay, are now to be unpaid - no, wait, we are to get a 'free' lunch in return. Shocked by this news, I blocked out the drone of the speakers, whose statistics on GCSE results sent the ICT teacher to sleep.

On Wednesday the shiny, squeaky 7s came in. They're taller than average this year. In fact, had the 11s of last year still been with us, they would have had a nasty realisation that their bully-boy behaviour was going to cut no ice with these lanky kids, up whose noses they would have to squint as they demanded their lunch-money/phone/ipod. (Not that that happens at my school, I hasten to add… since the expulsion of Fat-Fabio-who-had-unfeasibly-small-feet, we have had no student-on-student muggings).

The 7s dropped things all round school. 'Miss, I've dropped my pencil.' 'So you have! Pick it up then.' They got confused and lost. 'Everything okay?' I asked of at least five separate kids, whose sweaty brows and panicky faces gave them away. They twitched and fiddled in the effort of concentrating on the two days of talks, from the head, the deputy heads, the head of year, form tutors and eventually teachers.

I relish these early days. The headmaster reminds them that they have the opportunity to leave behind their old persona. Their primary-school self can be ditched in favour of a new, 'good' self. A clean slate, he says. It isn't that easy, of course, as any fule kno. The problems, whether at school or home, are often still present despite the move from little to big school. It takes a while for the dust to settle in a move like this. It's very easy to be kind to them. I don't know what they are really like yet. I have few clues as to which of them is spoilt beyond redemption, which neglected, or charming, confident or lonely. Most of them are sweet, eager to please, to settle in, to be liked, noticed and approved of. I'm hoping the best for all of them. The least likely can turn everything around in the course of the next five to seven years.

I am losing P, and gaining E. Also vision-impaired, there is a sharp contrast between him and my student of last year. But that's for another post.

Growl like a bear

It's the end of an era for me. M, my lovely year 11 student who is on the autistic spectrum, came in to finish his ICT course work. We have worked on it together since he was in year 9, and at times it has been a real struggle. Once he refused to talk to me for a whole week, because I had shown appreciation of another students music. Why were they playing music in an ICT class? Because sometimes it's the only way the teacher can get any work out of them. They put on their headphones and behave themselves! M has a hatred of all the other students in his year. He has thought for quite a while that they were out to get him. And perhaps they were, in a way. The noise level the created was certainly a big reason I found it hard to get work out of M. He himself, had to put on headphones very often, just to drown out the racket they made, and to find some peace, his ASD making him very sensitive to noise. Sometimes his own music was too loud. 'Turn it down,' I would mouth to him. His response was often to growl like a bear and turn it down…a bit.

So today we sat and finished off a little bit of writing. Three weeks ago the teacher told me that M was heading for a D, which is a fail. But today, although M growled at me (to show me that he didn't want to work), he completed the tasks and came with me downstairs to show the teacher, who on the spot told us M had achieved a C. Enough to pass.

At the end of the day I found him waiting for me to shake my hand - a line drawn under that particular episode of his life, and an acknowledgement that our mutual respect had allowed us to bob along together to get the work done.