The Office

Another nostalgia fest today and we went to look at the school where we'd both taught. It was, and still is, a three class school with about 70 children, right in the heart of a very attractive village famous for Anne Hathaway's Cottage, home of Shakespeare's wife. J had the small room, I had the middle lot and the headteacher had the big ones. I was there for 11 years and it really was a very happy time. I think we offered a very secure, creative little school with a real family atmosphere.  Much hilarity had ensued the day before remembering certain incidents- the time J locked herself and her infants in the boiler room (in itself an impressive feat as the room was tiny) whilst exploring the concept of dark; me  accidentally locking the dinner lady in my classroom (only one with a loo attached) and leaving her there and going off to the sports field - a passerby alerted the Head; me with a rather memorable lesson on burning involving a yogurt carton - so much smoke! The time we had to be evacuated as a live grenade had just been found next to the school. The days when the teachers could enjoy a bottle of wine whilst the children feasted on shrimps whilst youth hostelling! The stinkhorn mushroom being secreted onto the mini bus after a school trip! And so on - the bad lads, the good lads, the eccentric lads (I'm using lads in the Irish way here- it includes both sexes!)
A lovely building too - a 17th century barn that somehow was transported on the back of a cart during the 19th century and re-erected as a village school!
All good. A lovely few days away.