When I went into teaching, 15 years ago, I came at it from various angles. One was the love of my subject. Genuinely. I definitely believed that I could make people love reading and writing, and make the world a better place. I was old enough not to be so naïve, but still…
The other was a sartorial issue. I did an ill-advised massive spend on tweed. Mostly pink. Should have known better there, too.
I did not go into teaching because ‘I loved kids’. How can you love ‘kids’ any more than you can love octogenarians, or Poles, or pole-dancers, or any other group of people?
I left a good university with a good degree and no one suggested that I should go into teaching. In the 1980s, teachers were thought of as second-rate citizens. If you can’t do it, teach it, that sort of idea. The only people I knew who went on to do PGCEs immediately were those who wanted to be actors and knew they should have a backup plan.
Somehow in the last 30 years something has shifted. Fifteen years ago, when I said I was going to do teacher training, people nervously asked me if I was sure. ‘Think of the other teachers,’ they said with a curl of the lip. ‘Think of the staff room.’ But now there is a new attitude. ‘A teacher!’ they cry. ‘How marvellous! How brave! Is it frightening? Is it terrible? Tell me some stories… .’ It’s as good as being a prison officer or a doctor in A&E as far as dinner party response goes.
I have to admit that it is tempting to suck up the nation’s gratitude and begin to think that I and my colleagues are national heroes, new Joans of Arc suffering all for the state (not God, of course, he has no look-in in most of our schools).
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