E.R. BRAITHWAITE. To Sir, With Love (1959). Chapter 3

Mr. Florian was sitting at his desk juggling with a small object. When I was seated, he extended it for my inspection —an ugly little nude statuette in green mottled earthen­ware. “Terrible, isn't it? Picked it up in Austria some time ago; been trying to break the damned thing for ages”. With a sigh he set it down with exaggerated care on his desk.

'Well, what is it to be?^” His glance was kindly but direct. 'I'll have a shot at it”, I replied, carefully moderating my enthusiasm.

“Good, now let's get you into the picture.” And with a crisp economy of words he outlined his policy for the school.

“You may have heard some talk about this school, Braith­waite. We're always being talked about, but unfortunately most of the talk is by ill-informed people who are intolerant of the things we are trying to do. The majority of the children here could be generally classified as difficult, probably because in junior schools they have shown some disregard for, or opposition to, authority. Whether or not that authority was well-constituted is beside the point; it is enough to say that it depended largely on fear, either of the stick or some other form of punishment. In the case of these children it failed. We in this school believe that children are merely men and women in process of develop­ment; and that that development, in all its aspects, should be neither forced nor restricted at the arbitrary whim of any individual who by some accident of fortune is in a position to exercise some authority over them.

‘The children in this area have always been poorly fed, clothed and housed. By the very nature of their environment they are subject to many pressures and tensions which tend to inhibit their spiritual, moral and physical growth, and it is our hope and intention to try to understand something of those pressures and tensions, and in understanding, to help them.

'First of all we must appreciate that the total income of many of these families is quite insufficient to provide for them the minimum of food, warmth and dry shelter neces­sary for good health. Some of these children are from homes where the so-called breadwinner is chronically unemployed, or, in some cases, quite uninterested in seeking employment. As a result, meals are irregular and of very poor quality. A child who has slept all night in a stuffy, overcrowded room, and then breakfasts on a cup of weak tea and a piece of bread, can hardly be expected to show a sharp, sustained interest in the abstractions of arithmetic, and the unrelated niceties of correct spelling. Punishment (or the threat of it) for this lack of interest is unlikely to bring the best out of him.”

While Mr. Florian was speaking, something was happening to me. I had walked into his office full of high regard for him and ready to fall in with any plan he was likely to propose, but I found I was becoming increasingly irritated by his recital of the children's difficulties. My own experiences during the past two years invaded my thoughts, reminding me that these children were white; hungry or filled, naked or clothed, they were white, and as far as I was concerned, that fact alone made the only difference between the haves and the have-nots. I wanted this job badly and I was quite prepared to do it to the best of my ability, but it would be a job, not a labour of love.

'The next point I want to make,’ he continued, ‘deals with their conduct. You will soon discover that many of them smoke, use bad language and are often rather rude. We try our best to discourage these things without coercion, recognising that it is all part of the general malaise which affects the whole neighbourhood and produces a feeling of insecurity among the children. Instead, we try to give them affection, confidence and guidance, more or less in that order, because experience has shown us that those are their most immediate needs. Only a small part of their day is spent in the supervised security of this school; for the rest they may be exposed to many very unsatisfactory influences. A quick look round this neighbourhood will show that it is infested with a wide variety of social vermin, prostitutes, pimps, and perverts.'

I sat watching him, carefully attentive, impressed in spite of myself, by his deep, enthusiastic concern and undoubted love for the children. My irritation passed, but a feeling of doubt remained. (…). Evidently Mr. Florian had the children's welfare very much at heart, but did he really believe all that he was saying about them - or was it all laid on for my benefit? Was every new applicant given this same sermon? Had Hackman received similar encouragement? I liked this man; his fervour and integrity gave him a stature which more than compensated for his lack of inches; his voice went on, deep, intense, spell-binding…

'It is said that here we practise free discipline. That's wrong, quite wrong. It would be more correct to say that we are seeking, as best we can, to establish disciplined freedom, that state in which the child feels free to work, play and express himself without fear of those whose job it is to direct and stimulate his efforts into constructive channels. As things are we cannot expect of them high academic effort, but we can take steps to ensure that their limited abilities are exploited to the full.' Here he smiled briefly, as if amused by some fleeting, private reflection. 'We encourage them to speak up for themselves, no matter what the circumstances or the occasion; this may probably take the form of rudeness at first but gradually, through the influences of the various Com­mittees and the Student Council, we hope they will learn directness without rudeness, and humility without syco­phancy. We try to show them a real relationship between themselves and their work, in preparation for the day when they leave school.

‘As teachers, we can help greatly if we become sufficiently important to them; important enough for our influence to balance or even outweigh the evil.'

He got up and walked over to the large single window which overlooked the churchyard and remained there in silence for a while, his hands clasped behind his back, his leonine head resting against the cool glass. After a little while he turned to me with a gentle smile.

'Well, there it is. I'm afraid I can offer you no blueprint for teaching; it wouldn't work, especially here. From the moment you accept you're on your own. All the rest of the staff, myself included, will always be ready to help and advise if need be, but success or failure with them will depend entirely on you. So long as you work within the broad conceptual framework I have outlined, I shall not interfere. Unfortunately, we have had a number of teachers at one time or another who, though excellent in themselves, were totally unsuited for this type of work; and, as you'll appreciate, too frequent changes of staff neither help the children nor advance our work. Anyway, on behalf of the school and staff, I welcome you. You will have charge of the top class, beginning tomorrow, and will share the boys' P.T. periods with the other men on the staff. Mrs. Drew, my deputy, will give you all the relevant information you need. I would suggest that you spend the afternoon finding your way about.'

He came towards me, hands outstretched. I rose, and he took my right hand in both his own with a firm, friendly grip.

'Remember,' he said, 'they're wonderful children when you get to know them, and somehow, I think you will. Good luck.'

I left him and wandered back to the staffroom. (…).

Date: 2015-12-11; view: 746