It was his eyes I noticed first, the clear, stunning blueness and openness of them. He was youngish, twenties or thirties, and quite alone. His complexion told me he lived a life outdoors, in nature. A traveller, perhaps. Our town…
It was way back in the 1980s. The National Curriculum (government imposed) was in full swing and they’d started to send out OFSTED inspectors to check that we teachers were dumbing the kids down to a suitable degree — teaching…
I’d been wondering recently. I’d acted in good faith. As a teacher of small children with speech and language difficulties, it never crossed my mind not to try to ‘improve’ their verbal communication skills. I thought it was my job.…
Asher didn’t talk a lot, back when he was six. There were several reasons for that. The most obvious was a condition called oral dyspraxia, which meant he had difficulty controlling the movement of the muscles in his mouth and…
This is a true story. I suspect every teacher has a few like this. It happened around 25 years ago. Long ago, I got the job of running a special class for children with communication difficulties. I loved the job…