Self-care lessons will be about . . .

Self-care. On planes they tell me to fit my own oxygen mask before helping children. This is because if I die I can’t help the children. It’s the same in school. If the teacher is ill or stressed or dead then helping the kids can’t happen.

Teacher self-care lessons will be about: assertive communication especially with ninny parents, eating and drinking sensibly, maintaining professional relationships with the kids (be friendly, don’t be a friend), being organised and prepared, sleeping on a comfy mattress…

Drugs. Teachers should all be able to detect if their students (or their students parents, or colleagues, or the boss) is/are using drugs. Alcohol, marijuana, caffeine, nicotine and Ritalin are drugs too. Teachers, though, aren’t drug counsellors or the Narcotics Squad. Teachers’ suspicions should be passed to the appropriate person.

Multi-lingualism. I wouldn’t expect training teachers to be fluent in another language, but I would want them to understand that languages don’t always translate and that it’s not the words but the feelings that matter. If the Russian kids don’t say thank you it’s not because they’re rude. You can’t learn a language without learning its culture and so multilingualism will give teachers some understanding of some cultures which gives some understanding of some behaviour.

Bullying. I’d want teachers to understand the essence of bullying – why some kids are bullies, why some are victims, and why some victims become bullies. And I’d want teachers to have a deskful of strategies for dealing with this. Of course, like drugs, bullying is too big for one teacher, or even all teachers, to resolve. But if we play our part we can bully the politicians and the parents into doing more. Harry Potter stands up to Draco Malfoy and that’s a good start. It’s about courage.

Literacy. When I was training to be a teacher I hounded people with this question: ‘how do I teach kids to read?’ and no one would tell me. I even asked a group of primary trainees, but they were sitting on the floor beneath a ‘no-smoking’ sign smoking so I didn’t hang around for their answer. Eventually SPELD taught me.

I’d want new teachers to go into school with a gigantic trailer-load of humility too. Bring university-training and youthful enthusiasm but understand that the older teachers’ experiences can prove very, very useful.

Trainee teachers should also be able to spell because the older teachers, the ones who can spell and do apostrophes, are getting fed-up with re-writing the reports of those who can’t. Or at least bring food and wine to say thanks.

— Peter Giddens