Superheroes...

I had the pleasure of spending a lot of last week with groups of year 6 children from Castleford. The project was called Superhero and it involved feeder schools visiting the theatre in their soon to be high school, watching a piece of bespoke theatre and then engaging in a workshop about the issues within the play. The aim of the event was to prepare them for and equip them with the skills and understanding needed to deal with changes in their lives.

Obviously their imminent graduation into high school was at the heart of the project but both myself as the creator of the play/workshop and Targeted Mental Health in Schools as the commissioner wanted a wider focus for the work. There are so many life changes to be dealt with, sometimes on a week-to-week basis and that’s hard enough as an adult but harder for children who have often little say or control regarding the change. When you then start to think about children who are already vulnerable, expecting them to deal effectively with change seems like an almost impossible ask. As a consequence “Superhero” touched on moving house, moving schools, bereavement and family arguments, I realise this sounds utterly depressing but it wasn’t…promise…

Anyway the main point of this blog is almost a side issue to all of this. What I set out to highlight is how eloquent and insightful children can be when given the right environment. In fact I really wanted to say how brilliant children are. Now this isn’t news, lots of people have said this, lots of times…because it’s true. What it isn’t, however, is accepted, no matter how many times right minded people give examples of this eloquence there still doesn’t seem to be enough general effort made to create an environment where that eloquence is given voice. Similarly children aren’t given enough credit for being eloquent or brilliant, too frequently they are underestimated and underrated.

I’m spending this week analyzing the data captured from the project. This includes comments the pupils made on the characters and their situations and things they professed to have learnt from the experience of seeing the play and taking part in the workshop. Despite the tedium of the actual job of typing up far too many post-it notes I’m finding it fascinating. From the boy who promised to help his Mum tidy his room so they would both feel better to the girl who stated she realised that calling people names lowered their confidence there are so many insightful comments. What’s more they are comments from individuals who are open to change, who are up for the challenge of developing themselves. Impressive in any circumstances but breathtakingly so when you take into account they are growing up in one of the most deprived areas of the country.

To conclude, I’m making a stand for the 11 year olds of the world and saying surely it’s our responsibility not just as teachers but as adults too, to create an environment where children can be impressive, eloquent and brilliant…and yes occasionally breathtaking…