Gabbie Stroud - Teacher

Watching children learn is a beautiful and extraordinary experience. Their bodies transform, reflecting inner changes. Teeth fall out. Knees scab. Freckles multiply. Throughout the year they grow in endless ways and I can almost see their self-esteem rising, their confidence soaring, their small bodies now empowered. Given wings.

They fall in love with learning.

It is a kind of magic, a kind of loving, a kind of art.

It is teaching.

Just teaching.

Just what I do.

What I did.

Past tense.

GABBIE STROUD was a dedicated teacher with over a decade of experience. But she resigned in frustration and despair because NAPLAN standardised testing and My School were preventing her from doing the very thing she was best at: teaching individual children according to their needs and talents.

This powerful memoir explores what it means to be a teacher: what makes a great teacher, and what our children need from their teachers. It tells the story of Gabbies clear gift for teaching and what it was that finally broke her. Already being hailed as a work of national importance by educators, Teacher is a brilliant and heart-breaking memoir that cuts through the platitudes and statistics to show that our current education system is failing our children and destroying their teachers.

Certain names and details have been changed to protect the innocent and guilty alike

First published in 2018

Copyright Gabrielle Stroud 2018

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publisher. The Australian Copyright Act 1968 (the Act) allows a maximum of one chapter or 10 per cent of this book, whichever is the greater, to be photocopied by any educational institution for its educational purposes provided that the educational institution (or body that administers it) has given a remuneration notice to the Copyright Agency (Australia) under the Act.

Allen & Unwin

83 Alexander Street

Crows Nest NSW 2065

Australia

Phone: (61 2) 8425 0100

Email:

Web: www.allenandunwin.com

ISBN 978 1 76029 590 5

eISBN 978 1 76063 649 4

Set by Midland Typesetters, Australia

Cover design: Lisa White

Cover photo: Lisa Valder / iStock

For Yaya and the Boph

And Jess

Always Jess

Contents

The class sits in a circle. Little legs crossed, each rounded knee gently touching the persons next to them. Proximity doesnt bother them.

So, today for Circle Time, our sentence is When I grow upLets think about that for a moment. I demonstrate our thinking pose and they join mefrowning and stroking their chin. Okaywhen youre ready. I nod at the first child.

When I grow up I want to be a race car driver.

When I grow up I want to be a famous singer.

A builder.

A mummy.

An illustrator.

Around they go, sharing their dreams.

And then it is Saphrons turn and we are all a little quieter. I find myself leaning forward. Shes shy, softly spoken and from the Yuin Nation. She looks at me, eyes uncertain. I smile and gently hold her gaze. She takes a breath.

When I grow up, she says, still looking at me, I want to be like you.

The key to the door of my classroom is unreliable. I turn it oncetwiceand each time I feel resistance, the impossible pressure of an obstructive lock. A thought twitches: Maybe you shouldnt go in.

The kids are in a jumble behind me. Week two, day three of Kindergarten and we still havent quite got the knack of lining up. But thats okay. Its a small battle and Im yet to be convinced that the straighter the line-up the better the learning.

Its forty degrees. Lunchtime is over. It had been a disappointment. The playground equipment had been too hot to touchthe bright-yellow slippery dip like a river of lava. The undercover area, although shaded, had been oppressivethe heat thick and heavy under a grey tin roof. And the Library had been overrun with bigger kids also seeking sanctuary.

Now my little ones are wilted and frustrated. They didnt get to play out their restless energy. Instead it was leached from them, absorbed by an unforgiving sun, like some strange kind of evaporation.

The key refuses to turn.

Two boys jostle at my legs, like pet dogs, anxious to be first inside.

Line up, I say. But they dont know what that means yet. Its a school language, a convention they are just beginning to experience.

My shoelacer is too tight. It is Grayson, hopping towards me, foot outstretched.

When we get inside, I tell him, Ill fix it for you.

I twist the key again. No response.

But my foot cant breathe, he wails. He kicks at me. Twice. On the third attempt, he meets my shin.

Stop. I feel the twitch again. Grayson. The one whose name you learn first.

I slide the key out, then in, trying not to let it slip through my sweaty fingers. The sun bites at the back of my neck and a cicada starts up. Its loud and close and insistent, like the buzz of static on a radio. Some kids press their hands over their ears, while others imitate the sound, their voices competing with one another, with the cicada, with the heat.

Two of them run down into the garden, trying to locate the insect.

This will shut him up, one says, stamping his shiny new school shoes on the plants and shrubs. The other one is on all fours, pawing through the grass.

Back to line, I call. Come on.

Back to the lion! shouts a child. I want to smile at the words, to laugh at the echo chamber. But Grayson has kicked me again and the two puppies are back underfoot, while three more kids have joined the hunt for cicadas.

I want the door to open. I want to be inside.

Click.

The door lunges forward and children surge inside like shoppers at the Boxing Day sales. They tumble onto the mat, rolling and lolling and flopping.

My am just so tired, says one and she pushes her sweaty fringe away from her eyes.

The room is old, large and stifling. The smell of wood glue saturates the air. I find the remote control for the air conditioner and frown, wondering why the screen is dead.

Want me to turn it on? asks The Helpful Little One. I know how.

I can do it. I force a smile and slide the plastic panel off the back. I roll the batteries back and forth before replacing the panel and pressing the button again. I sit the remote on my in-tray and make a mental notechange batteries.

I pick my way through the pile of children, each of them deflated on the vibrant coloured mat. I watch for tiny fingers, like landmines that mustnt be detonated by my size-eight shoe.

Grayson is sitting in my seat and I let him stay there while I hang up my hat and sunnies and key and first-aid kit. Choose your battles.

The air conditioner bursts into life and a dull hum pervades the room. I remember the cicada and return to the door to see two students still outside, jumping and pawing at the earth.

Come on, guys! I call. Inside. The lap-dogs circle me again.

INSIDE! one of them bellows.

The cicada hunters run towards us.

Okay! I say brightly, picking my way back to my seat. Everybody sitting on the mat. I say it again, clapping my hands with each word.