Well, hello everybody, it is Paul. Apologies that we don't have our usual podcast for you this week. Unfortunately, in recording the live cast, the audio didn't come out particularly well, and we didn't think we could really use it here in the podcast itself. You can still listen to that or go and watch it on YouTube, and you might find it's easier to do that with the images on the screen as well. Although obviously the downside is you have to look at us as you do that. But we haven't got that for you here on the audio. So what we've done is we've taken the audio of one of Glenn's interviews from the reset series, his interview with Catherine Birwell Singh, who's the head teacher of Michaela, one of the schools in London. And we'll give you the entire audio of that here during this track a little later on. Just to flag up a few things to you, we're still uh raising money for our Christmas video this year called Let Me Go There. We're doing well on that crowdfunder, but we still need a little bit more. And so if you could give towards that, please head over to speaklife.org.uk forward slash Christmas, and you can actually find out a bit more about the video there, and there are ways for you to give. We'd love to help uh have you help with that if you can. Also, of course, please do you know give us a like or a subscribe or whatever the kind of term is on various social medias if you haven't already. You can find us on YouTube and Twitter, Instagram and Facebook by SocialSpeak Life UK. And by uh giving us a like or follow on there, you'll be able to keep up with all the things that are going on uh with the life of Speak Life. Apart from that though, I will leave you in the capable hands of Glenn and Catherine. Enjoy.
SPEAKER_05Today on Reset, we are going back to the beginning with Britain's strictest head teacher, Catherine Burble Singh, the author of many books, including Battle Hymns of the Tiger Teacher, and her latest book, which she has edited called The Power of Culture. She is the founder of Michaela Community School in Brent. Uh, thank you so much for joining us, Catherine.
SPEAKER_01Well, thank you for having me.
SPEAKER_05So, strictest head teacher. Um, sometimes it's your critics that call you that, but something in me tells me that you quite like being called Britain's strictest head teacher, do you?
SPEAKER_01Well, I find it quite funny, really. I mean, I think people have images of me marching around and shouting at children. And and actually, I just I run the school, so um, so I tend to deal with staff more than with the children. You know, I do my assemblies and um and I might see them at lunch and at break and so on, but I'm not in the classrooms uh delivering the lessons like the teachers are. Um and um so it's not about me being super strict, it's about the school and the culture that we have created. And um, I would say that we have one that has very high standards of discipline with order and structure, which it keeps children safe. It means that when they're in the classroom, they feel secure and safe enough to put their hands up and answer questions. Too often I would say in classrooms, uh, children are intimidated by their peers and by the culture that gets created where you're you're considered to be a nerd, you know, you're considered to be uh uh uh just not very trendy to be putting your hand up and that your teacher's pet. And everybody will know that that that that feeling. Well, I think that's increased over the years. So your viewers might remember what it was like 20, 30, 40 years ago. Well, it's a hundred times worse now. But our culture here is one where the children can explore and be creative and be independently minded and not have to be part of groupthink in order to belong to the crowd. And um, I I think that that really is the purpose of education.
SPEAKER_05What time did you get to school this morning?
SPEAKER_01About six forty-five.
SPEAKER_05Six forty-five. Okay. And and your teachers kind of get there similarly early?
SPEAKER_01Uh well, I have a meeting with my senior team every morning at 7 a.m. Yeah. I'd say the teachers come in anywhere between 6 30 and 7 30, something like that.
SPEAKER_05Yeah. Very very devoted.
SPEAKER_01Um what what committed to the the cause of transforming the lives of our children who come from the inner city and wouldn't otherwise have a chance because they come from disadvantaged backgrounds. You know, their parents don't necessarily speak English or they don't have books at home, uh, their parents don't understand the dangers of smartphone. I mean, their parents don't really know um what they need to do to be able to uh allow their children uh the opportunity to change their stars. And so that's what we try and do here at Michaela is give them that opportunity.
SPEAKER_05Yeah. So why do you get out of bed and do what you do? Because you you haven't always had these sorts of views about the the the importance of culture and discipline and that sort of thing. It's it's been a bit of a journey for you.
SPEAKER_01Well, yeah, but I mean I'd say over the last 15 years I've probably understood about culture. I mean, it was working in a school that taught me the importance of culture and how you can change things. And every teacher knows how she and her classroom can um can can change things depending on the kind of culture you encourage. So if you are super strict as a teacher and you insist that all the homework be done, then guess what? All the children do their homework. If, on the other hand, you say it's okay and you let them make excuses, then lots of them won't do their homework. We are in charge of the kind of culture that we create in our organization, not just in schools. Um, and you need to think about all of the details. I think often what's missed in organizations is that people don't realize that the details make up the whole. Um, I often talk about the frog in boiling water. You drop him in boiling water, he jumps out. But if you turn up the heat slowly, you put him in cold water, he will boil to death. Um, and that's what culture is. Uh it it it encroaches bit by bit. And sometimes it creates a wonderful culture because you're thinking about the details and managing those, which is what I would say I do at Michaela. I mean, we all do at Michaela, but I specifically really think about culture for my teachers and feel that that's part of my role as head as headmistress to make sure that um they are not just able to teach. People just think, oh, it's just about discipline, and that's it. It's about a culture where the children won't misbehave in the first place. People often think, oh, you know, strictest headmistress, etc. We give out loads of detentions, and we do give out detentions, but that's only one bit of what we do. The children simply don't do those bad things in the first place. And that's because of the culture that's created of an environment where it would just be um completely unacceptable. The children wouldn't do it, you know, in the same way as that in any school, uh, a child would never take off all his clothes and run around naked. It just wouldn't happen. Um, and then you say, well, why doesn't he take his clothes off and run around naked? Well, it's not because he would be given a detention if he did that. It's because it's unacceptable. Nobody behaves in that fashion. And so you need to think about behavior in the same kind of way. You need to make it unacceptable for a child to swear at a teacher. I mean, that just wouldn't happen here. It just wouldn't happen. And uh you will find in lots of schools where that happens all the time. And that's because they haven't clamped down on that culture to make it unacceptable for a child to do it.
SPEAKER_05So, I mean, you've you've founded this school and and sort of built it from the ground up. Um, what what would you say to people who who might be teachers uh listening in or involved in education in in lots of different ways? Or perhaps they're parents and they're like, well, little Jimmy, he's running riots in the house. Um how do you actually go about changing a culture?
SPEAKER_01Yeah. So, and that's a good point because um uh there's one thing that you do when you're building it up. If you go into take over a class and it's a failing class, you need to turn it around or a failing department or a failing school, or with parents, you've established the wrong kind of um uh standards and your child is is behaving in a way that you would rather he didn't. Uh, you need to go in there and just change, change the way that it is so that the child at first is a bit shocked and thinks, gosh, who's this new mother? You know, you might even want to narrate and say, There's a new sheriff in town. You may have things went this way before, these are the new rules. Sometimes you might want to even write out a contract. I'll say this to parents write out a contract with this is these are my expectations of you, these can be your expectations of me. I mean, it's fine to say that, you know. It helps the child not take for granted the things that you do for them. So, look, I I give you food every day. You need to be grateful for that. I work so that I can pay for your uniform, I can pay for your clothes, um, I give you a roof over your head. There are all sorts of things that children just take for granted. They need to be grateful for these things. And then you are expecting certain things from them. And then, as part of the contract, you can write out and say, okay, well, now uh if you don't do this, then I'm gonna take away this. And that there's a series of things that they really like. So they like hanging out with their friends, they like uh uh speaking on the phone to their friends or going on. I mean, if you have a smartphone, often children who are um who are naughty unfortunately have a smartphone, so you might negotiate around that and allow them a certain amount of time on there. Um, and so you have a system where they understand. I mean, we do this with our year sevens when they first arrive here. Uh, we do a behavior boot camp for a whole week where we're simply teaching them how to behave in a Michaela way. And that's important because if you don't teach children what your expectations are and then show them how to meet those expectations, if you then punish them, it's very unfair. Once you've taught them, then you recognize and you need to recognize that children have agency. So uh too often people talk about children as if they're not in control of what they're doing, but they are in control, they make decisions. So you then need to pay them enough respect to allow those decisions to have consequences. And you've then made it clear to them beforehand look, if you choose to do the wrong thing, this happens. If you choose to do the right thing, this happens, and that's important. You've got to have the praise in there, they've got to know that, oh, I can impress mama, dad, or I can impress my teacher by getting this right and doing this well. And so you make a big deal, you catch them doing something right. Well done, that's so brilliant. I'm really pleased with you. You have a system of merits or points. You can do this at home too. Once you get to ten points, then this happens. And it doesn't have to be something big. You don't want to indulge the children. You might give them an ice cream, you might um uh watch a movie together, whatever it is, and all the better if you can do it with them as a parent. Parents don't understand how much children want their attention. Children misbehave because they want attention. So if you're not giving them attention, they'll do something naughty and then they get it. You need to give them attention doing stuff that they that you want them doing. So, what I mean is you spend time doing the maths homework together. You go and buy those books at Waterstones on English grammar, and you do those grammar exercises together. And when I say do them together, I mean do them together. I mean they do a question, you do a question. They do a question, you do a question. You read with them, reading out loud, paragraph after paragraph, especially if you catch them young. Of course, you want to read to them all of the time. And when, you know, with three two-year-olds, three-year-olds, four-year-olds, you should be spending, you know, an hour a day reading. I mean, uh honestly, at least. Um, and you just get loads and loads of books, and you go to the library, and you because hardly anyone goes to the library anymore, so there's loads of books for you to get there. And you take out loads, you take, and you take your child with you. You're going to the library today, and on the way to the library, you're counting. And once you figured out how to count, you're counting by twos, then you're counting by threes, you're counting by fours. So when they eventually come to learn their times tables, it's it's relatively accessible. You know, you are thinking constantly about the future and how you're preparing your child for that. Um, it's uh the thing is that as teachers, we sort of know this stuff, and um, parents are often thrown into the deep end. It's really hard for them to figure out how to support their children at home. Um, the best thing to do is to spend time with them doing stuff that's good. Think of watching TV, using your smartphone, sort of like smoking. So, what I mean by that is you don't do it in front of your child. When your child is asleep, watch as much TV as you like. Go on Snapchat, have a ball. But when your child is awake, you're not doing that stuff because it will harm them. It will harm them watching you do things that are bad for them because they will copy you. And we are role models. And that's what I mean about the culture that you create, both in your family and in your classroom. In your classroom, you're not uh shouting your head off and losing your temper and losing control because you're trying to teach the children how to have self-control. So it's always about modeling what you want them to see.
SPEAKER_05That's brilliant. Um so we've got into lots of areas of discipline there. And um, we put out on Twitter uh, if people had uh have questions for you, there's a lot of love for you out there, Catherine. Um things like, will you please run for Prime Minister? Uh is there anyone on Twitter that you'd like to take as a second husband's hint hint? Um would you date a 50-year-old from Worcester? I I think Worcester Worcester might have been the deal breaker there, probably. Um But uh one of the great questions that um people have asked is um what about special educational needs? Um in particular, one person asked about those who are uh non-neurotypical, so those on the autistic spectrum, those sorts of things. Um of their issues manifest in behavioral problems, for instance. So is there a particular Michaela way of addressing special educational needs?
SPEAKER_01Well, you'll find that uh order and structure are the best antidotes for those situations. Autistic children do very well here because they love the clarity, they love the order. Um they do better here than they would do elsewhere. Um the key thing with S EN is not to uh label a child so that they only perform to their. What I mean is if you set your sights here for a child, they'll go there. Set them here, they go there. Um and too often with S EN children, because we think we're helping them, uh, we give them a label of whatever it is that's supposedly wrong with them, and then we expect less of them. Naturally, we expect less because they have a label. But if you don't think about the label and you just keep expecting more of them, and you do so in an environment that supports them and is orderly, where you narrate what you want from them. Uh, and this is for all children, by the way, but it it helps SEN children all the more so. You narrate what you want, you explain it, you create a culture where they can achieve it. Too often we expect children to do things that are impossible. You want them to be quiet, but everybody else is talking in the classroom. Well, the the the temptation is too great. Um, you want them to do their homework. That's just my phone. Um you want them to do their homework, but uh there are too many other children not doing their homework. And because you're not consistent about making sure you hold everyone to account about their homework, then of course the more vulnerable, the weaker children in the classroom end up uh end up falling apart. Because they're the ones that are gonna go first. The ones that have the best support at home are the ones that hold it together in chaos. So if there's and when I say chaos, people say, what do you mean by chaos? I mean kids chatting in the classroom, kids not doing their homework, kids not wearing the right uniform. So the ones who end up falling by the wayside are always the most vulnerable kids in that situation. It's the ones who have the best support at home that can manage to withstand that cultural onslaught that encourages them to follow their peers. And so who is it that loses out? The S E N kids in that environment, the vulnerable kids, the the the disadvantaged kids, the ones without the support and structure at home. So you're hurting the very kids that you're trying to help by not giving them that structure and order around them which would support them.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, yeah. So there's there's actually a lot of flexibility. But I I I do sense that there are some very strong convictions, for instance, the conviction in the power of culture, the power of discipline, the power of aspirations, and people will um uh rise to the challenges that you set them. Um I thought one way we could maybe get at some of those um uh deeper beliefs is um I've arranged a little pop quiz for you, Catherine. Um here here are here are five quotes about human nature and education. Um and uh let's see if you can guess who said it and then get your response uh from it. So here's here's the first one. Uh man is born free, but is everywhere in chains. Uh who said that first?
SPEAKER_01I think it was Rousseau.
SPEAKER_05It was. There it was. Jean-Jacques Rousseau, in indeed. Um and and that that sort of doctrine of the human person that we are kind of free spirits, um that uh and therefore that it's the systems that need to be dismantled to release the the true spirit of the human individual. Um how do you how do you respond to that?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, well, um I mean before we came on, you mentioned original sin. And um I do think that that is uh probably the decide the biggest difference uh between how we think here and perhaps how some other schools, because there are other schools who would think like us, uh, think, which is that if you believe that um children are just naturally good inside, and that all you need to do is release the goodness by freeing them up, so not giving them rules, not teaching them right from wrong, not expecting homework or whatever it is, that they it will just happen naturally because they are they are good inside, then that's how you'll do things. You'll be more of a progressive. If, on the other hand, you believe in original sin, meaning that man is flawed, and that we need to teach man, a child, the difference between right and wrong, uh, otherwise they just won't know it. And that we need to do more than just teach it to them. We need to give them a structure around them to support them in doing the right thing so that eventually it becomes a habit and it just becomes part of who they are, and that without that structure around them pushing them on, that they won't become a good person, that they will become bad people because the original sin will just take over and the flawed nature of man will not be contained, as it were, and and will not be uh developed and shaped in so that the child can be somebody, a good human being. Um, you see, traditionalists believe that. And so traditionalists know that without that kind of structure when they're young, they will turn out to be uh disappointing adults, essentially. And when I say disappointing, people who will commit crimes, who will do bad things, who won't know the difference between right and wrong.
SPEAKER_05Or perhaps, yeah, uh or perhaps people who are told that their job, even educators might tell them, their j their job is to disrupt the systems out there and and to follow their own spirits in in disrupt disrupting the cultures out there because it's the c it's the culture that's going to oppress them. Um yeah, we might we might get to that in in in in a second. Um uh pop quiz number two, uh here's a quote. Um Education is not the filling of a pail, the filling of a bucket, it's it's the lighting of a fire.
SPEAKER_01I don't know. I I can't I I should know this, but um Correct.
SPEAKER_05I think you had it on the tip of your tongue.
SPEAKER_01I did say yates.
SPEAKER_05Yates. Correct, yes.
SPEAKER_01I'm managing to answer your question.
SPEAKER_05100%.
SPEAKER_01Um Yes. Oh, right, so I meant to answer it. So um It sounds inspirational, doesn't it?
SPEAKER_05It's the it's lighting a fire, it's igniting the, you know.
SPEAKER_01Look, I mean, to be honest, I think there's some truth in that, which is that when you light a fire, you you light some inspiration. You know, you you get them interested. And uh, and of course we want children to be interested, and we want to light something inside them so that they're they they they're they're curious about the world. But you know what lights that fire? It's filling the pail. That's how you light the fire. You know, by giving them lots of knowledge, by teaching them about the world, they become really interested in the world. You know, uh I always say, look, uh if you asked me about astronomy, um, and uh, you know, I'm slightly nervous about your quotes, and I'm like, I don't know, will I be able to answer these? Um and if you asked me about astronomy, I wouldn't be able to tell you anything. And I don't have any creative ideas about astronomy, I don't think independently about it, I haven't rejected what the norm is on astronomy and come up with something radically different because I don't know anything about astronomy. Um, and so I can't be creative and independently minded about it. Uh, but education now. I have been very independent about education and radical, and I've thrown out things that have been done for many years and done things in a completely different way. I've questioned the norms and the so-called truths about education. Now, why have I been able to be such a radical? I've been able to do that because um I know it inside out. And and I know it because I've spent a lifetime doing it. I'm passionate about it, I read about it, I think about it, I think about it all the time, you know. And so that's why I can be radical. If we want our children to be revolutionaries, we have to teach them loads of stuff. Nelson Mandela went to a traditional school. Stokely Carmichael, who was uh Black Panther, who coined the term black power, he went to the Bronx High School. It was a it was a traditional school. If children don't know very much, they cannot be radical, they cannot be revolutionaries. Now, I don't want all my children to become revolutionaries. I suspect many of them will become dentists and doctors and just be accountants, you know. And that's fine. It depends on their personalities. You know, each of them are individuals, they're gonna be different things depending on what they want to be. Our role as educators is to give them lots of knowledge in a culture where they can. Feel safe to pursue more knowledge and be interested in it. And so you fill the pale, but you don't just fill the pale, you also create a culture where it is okay to pursue more knowledge, where children are competing to be the best and to be the most ambitious and the most resilient. If, on the other hand, you indulge them and say, poor you, you know, you you grew up in a council estate, we can't possibly expect homework from you. Poor you, you know, we're not going to give you a detention because life is difficult for you at home, then the child will just will not perform. They just won't. I mean, and what I don't understand is if you've been in a classroom, isn't this obvious? I mean, I am not, I I am not a great, I don't read all of these books. I've read a few, I've read E.D. Hirsch and William, and you know, I've read some of this stuff about evidence-based learning, but lots of it I haven't read. I mean, the stuff that informs me is what I see in front of me. It's what I see with the kids. I've spent a lifetime teaching. I'm I and I've learned over that time. What works doesn't work. Not all of it, because I'm still learning, but show it to me. You know, you say that there's certain things that are are are I'm I'm certain about. Well, I'm certain about it because I've seen it thousands of times, over and over again. Now, look, if somebody were to come to me and say, but look at all of this evidence, let me demonstrate, come and see my school, and you're going to see something different with us just igniting the fire and not filling the pail. Well, show it to me. More than happy. I mean, I'm always saying to people, you tell me that your children are perfectly behaved, you tell me that your children know all this stuff and are brilliant, independent-minded thinking. Well, invite me in.
SPEAKER_05Okay. Show me the bonfires. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01I'm more than happy to be convinced, but they never invite me, right? They uh they stop talking at that point. They say, Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no. Actually, we don't want you to come. Well, I I I I uh look, I I make the argument and I say, come and see. I open the doors. We get over 600 visitors a year in this school. Wow, wow. And they come from all over the world, and I let them go into any classroom they want. Let me stress that. They can go into any classroom they want. And I don't take them round, the children take them round. The children can tell them anything. The people who come here eat with our kids. They sit in the lunch hall and eat. How many schools have you? Anyone who just signs up on the website can go and sit with the children at lunchtime and eat with them and talk to any child they want. You do that for me, and you invite me in, and you show me that actually your progressive methods are getting your kids to be more resilient than mine, more uh ambitious, more knowledgeable, more independently minded, more creative. You show me that, I will change my mind. Nobody's managed to show me that yet.
SPEAKER_05You mentioned uh you mentioned creativity there, and that that's that's often one of the one of the pushbacks on a sort of a knowledge-based filling the bucket kind of um approach to education. And and another another sort of pushback is often um, well, the jobs that you're preparing people for probably don't exist yet. You know, when when someone who's 13 years old is at school, you know, what what kind of what kind of workplace will there be when they're 23? Um and therefore we can't we can't just give them knowledge because we don't know what the knowledge is. We need to help them to learn to learn. What do you what do you say to that?
SPEAKER_01Well, you know, it's funny, uh, on Twitter uh someone posted yesterday this video, which again, I mean, I was learning things, um, uh of of of the traditionalists versus the progressives, and this was made a long time ago. And there was footage of John Dewey in there saying exactly what you've just said. Okay, and um people have been saying that for centuries, you know. Well, the television is now here, things are gonna change, everything is different. Oh, the telephone is now here, things are gonna change, you know, computer is now here, etc. Look, children learn in in similar ways. Um subjects need to be taught differently. So if you're learning to drive a car, that's when kinesthetic learning works, because you need to actually do it. But when you're learning history, dressing up as historians and wandering around the classroom in slave outfits or whatever it is that they do is not gonna teach you history. Actually, a teacher standing up at the front and having class discussions and you reading stuff about it, that's how you're gonna learn history. People have got that mixed up and they think that each child, I'm a kinesthetic learner, I'm a visual learner, and so on. No, it depends on the subject, not on the child. Um and so when you understand that, you can then teach according to what's the best form of teaching for that subject. And how can you figure that out? Well, try out different methods if you're not sure. That's what we've done here, and we've figured out how to teach our various different subjects in the optimal way by what we've tried. Um, you know, the what was it you said, learning to learn? Oh my goodness. I mean, look, I when you're when you're with your toddler at home and you want to teach him things, you teach him uh how to walk, for instance. Do you sit down and teach him how to learn, how to learn how to walk? Is that what you do? Or do you just teach him and you do it? That's something like driving. You need him to try it. You wouldn't sit down with a board and show him legs and how they move. That would be really weird, you know. But similarly, if you want to do his uh uh counting, for instance, you're going to count out loud. You're not going to um and you might eventually, when you're showing him numbers, you'd be writing those on the board. And you'd be writing them on the board because you need him to see the numbers. And so obviously, all of this stuff should be obvious. I mean, I don't know why it's not obvious. Depending on what you're teaching them, you do it according to what makes sense to the subject. But um, too many John Deweys, actually, too many so-called experts have got into are in the field of education, telling people what's what. I always say to people, just trust your common sense. I run the school on common sense and I run it in the way of changing my mind and seeing what's in front of me and so on, because that's just common sense. Um you're learning how to learn. Well, why don't you just teach them what they need to learn and then they learn it? That's what we do. I mean, why would you want to waste time doing something else? Um, I find it, I find it really bizarre. I don't teaching is actually pretty simple. Um, and um just trust your instincts, and parents should trust their instincts. I mean, repetition is good. Why is repetition good? Because you forget if you don't repeat. Well, there's stuff to do with brain science that comes in there and says, well, space it out. And that kind of is common sense too, because if you just repeat, repeat, repeat, well, it it's easier to remember. But if you leave it a day, leave it two days, leave it a week, well, obviously it's more difficult to remember. Um these are all just common sense, aren't they?
SPEAKER_05Yeah, yeah. I I would have thought so. I would have thought so. Um here's here's another quote, and it's uh this is from one of the most famous TED talks ever. Um we should be waking children up to what's inside themselves. And then later on in the TED Talk, um, most great learning happens in groups. It's called collaboration. Um what do you what do you what do you think about that?
SPEAKER_01Well, what's the greatest? I mean, is i i I'm trying to remember the Ken Robinson talk, thinking that maybe that's what you mean. Right.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_01Um and God rest his soul.
SPEAKER_05Uh right, yes, because he he he passed away just last month. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Terrible, terrible, terrible. Um anyway, uh so what was the quote? What was the thing? What did you say?
SPEAKER_05At one point he says we should be waking children up to what's inside themselves.
SPEAKER_01Um, isn't it? So it's the same researching point, isn't it? Yeah. He thinks it's inside as opposed to it being outside. It isn't inside the children. I mean, once you get that it's not inside the children, um I mean look, you could take that, you could, you could interpret that differently and say, well, you're waking them up to they have the they have the ability to be able to do this. You're supporting them in making them feel their self-esteem and you're helping them grow. Um, but that only how do you build their self-esteem? Not by having self-esteem lessons. You build their self-esteem by teaching them lots, they then feel successful by knowing lots of stuff. When you know lots about something, why am I so confident in education? Because I know lots about it. I've been doing it a long time. I if you if we talked about astronomy, I wouldn't feel confident at all. Um, you know, when you were just quoting, and I was thinking, oh my goodness, am I going to be able to answer him?
SPEAKER_05Um which you have perfectly.
SPEAKER_01Because I'm not, because I'm not much, I'm not, that's not my expertise. I'm not somebody who hears quotes and goes, bam, bam, bam. You know, uh, I've got some of my teachers here who could do that and they do it really well. I I'm just not that person. So, you know, I say I'm not that person. I haven't made myself into that person because I could have been. I could have been somebody who spent my time filling my head with that kind of knowledge, and then I'd be able to come out with it. Instead, I spent my time filling my head with lots of educational knowledge, you know, like, and of course your quotes did have to do with education, that's presumably why I was able to answer them. Um, you know, the the the fact is that um whatever you teach a child is what's in them. We look, you know, you said advice to people earlier. What we must always remember as adults is that we have so much power uh in terms of shaping that culture around the child. The child will expect of himself what we expect of him. The child will get interested in things that we give him. So, as a parent, if you give your child loads of video games, he's gonna get really interested in video games. If you give him a violin, he's gonna get really interested in violin. People often think just leave it up to the child because it's inside them and they can decide. No, you decide, and you decide by what you give them. So we mistakenly think that the child has so-called absolute free choice to be able to choose whatever they want from anything, but they only choose from what they've been exposed to. And so if you expose them to violin, piano, maths, uh, grammar, then they're gonna choose one of those. If you expose them to television, video games, Snapchat, and Instagram, they'll choose one of those. So we mustn't underestimate how much power we have to shape who a child is, and that it's our duty to shape them into good human beings. We have, we use as our uh motto, work hard, be kind. We want them to work hard, we want them to be kind. We have the power to shape that. Often people say things, and that's why I caught myself, because even I made that mistake. I said, I'm just not that kind of person, not the kind of person who remembers quotes. And I stopped myself and said, No, no, no, no, no. I haven't made myself into that kind of person. Because we can make ourselves into anything we want, right? Now, look, I might not be able to become an Olympic basketballer right now, but I can become a really good basketballer if I wanted to. I would go out there and I'd play basketball for six hours a day, and I'd dedicate myself to it, and I'd become really good at it. We decide, we have, we make our own destinies, right? This is not set in stone. And um, and and that that ultimately, I mean, you know, the the Christians would say that man is born flawed, he's flawed. But what is so interesting and exciting about life is overcoming those flaws as much as you can. All of us have them, and we'll always have them. But every day that you live, you try and be a better person. And you try and learn and develop every single day, which is why the concept of me just having a particular ideology that I'm imposing on kids is just bizarre. Because I wouldn't be living a fulfilling life otherwise if I didn't think in this way of always developing, always trying to be better, always helping children to be better, and that you dedicate your life to trying to make the world into a better place. Now, that doesn't mean that everyone has to become a social worker or a teacher. You know, I'm not saying that. Um you might become somebody who earns a lot of money in the city, but then you spend uh you give to charity. Maybe you uh help in a soup kitchen on a Sunday. Uh maybe you are a good father or mother, and you give all that you can to your family so that your children can grow up and be good human beings, and that you understand that part of the they're only going to become good if you make them good. And you make them good by understanding that man is flawed in the first place, and that Ken Robinson's uh uh basic mistake there, and which is why I think he's wrong about education, is because he doesn't understand that it's not inside the child that we need to put it there first.
SPEAKER_05Right, right. Um you've uh you've already we've got three-quarters of my final quote. Um, and I I know I know you like at least three-quarters of this final quote, which is work hard be nice. Um and that was that was the origin of you you sort of adopted that phrase. Where did it originally come from? The work hard be nice?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, so we copied it essentially. Um, like I said, we get all our ideas from other schools. You know, it's not that I've got some ideology from a book. I honestly have just taken loads of ideas from other schools and put them in here. Um and and and not just me, my teachers have done that as well. Um so uh KIP, uh the charter uh school, you know, there's lots of them, there's hundreds of them across uh America, uh who are very inspirational and part of the traditional movement in America, in the charter schools, uncommon schools, the Success Academy in uh New York, and KIP. And they had this thing of work hard, be nice, and this motto. And we thought we'd be slightly different because we couldn't have exactly the same motto, so we did work hard, be kind.
SPEAKER_05I like I prefer kind. I think that's yeah, I like that. Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_01Well, I mean, I I suppose it's more British, whereas, you know, the nice thing is more American. Anyway, um what is really sad is that because of the recent Black Lives Matter stuff, that uh Kip have actually rejected their motto now of work hard, be nice because they believe that this is an example of systemic racism.
SPEAKER_05That it's it's centering whiteness to believe in meritocracy. That's that's apparently a white idea, meritocracy. And that playing playing nice and not disrupting the system will just allow that whiteness to develop. Whereas we want to raise shall I just uh let me let me read um what they what they said. I know. I know. So the Washington Post reports um uh it was uh a former Knowledge is Power program, that's what KIP stands for, student, um, said that asking us to be nice puts the onus on kids to be quiet, to be compliant, to be controlled. It doesn't actively challenge us to disrupt the systems that are trying to control us. The slogan supports the illusion of meritocracy. For example, in the words of Orpheus Williams, who leads the Foundation's equity program, the slogan passively supports ongoing efforts to pacify and control black and brown bodies in order to better condition them to be compliant and further reproduce current social norms that center whiteness and meritocracy as normal.
SPEAKER_01It's funny, because the last bit of what you were saying there, I just thought, isn't it funny about oppressing black and brown bodies, you know, and and it say the bit say the say just comes after that because it applies to me. What I mean is the left have oppressed me in exactly that way. Go on.
SPEAKER_05Yes, the slogan passively supports ongoing efforts to pacify and control black and brown bodies in order to control me.
SPEAKER_01That's exactly what they're trying to do. Go on.
SPEAKER_05Apparently, in order to better condition them to be compliant.
SPEAKER_01And they want me to be compliant with woke ideology. And because I've rejected that, they hate me and they have pursued me for years. Um, that's exactly what they do, okay? And that's what I mean about the dishonesty. They are the ones doing that to black and brown people, like me. Um and and yet they then say that the the school system is doing this. Now, look, I I get where they're coming from, and what I mean by that is they imagine that this is what they imagine, you see, it's not real, but they imagine that Michaela is just full of robots, and that we're making the kids all think in exactly the same manner, uh, and that they will never be able to be revolutionaries and reject the status quo because we've all made them think in the same fashion. And I would argue that in fact it's the woke brigade that make everybody think in the same fashion. And I I think the evidence is in my favor. So, what I mean by that is woke people all think in exactly the same way. They are tyrannical on Twitter and so on. Um, they march into uh, you know, restaurants and make people put up the black power sign or they're gonna do something to them. They get on Twitter and and cancel people and and destroy their jobs and their livelihood. Um they have sent me death threats and um and all sorts of threats, and uh they've protested outside and shouted obscenities at me and sent me rape females and all sorts. I mean, we could go on. So, you know, I think that's what they're doing. Now, why is it that we're not doing that? Because if you were to come here and see our children, you would see that some of them would vote Labour, some of them would vote conservative, some of them would even vote, I mean, very few, but there's a couple of them who would vote UKIP. Um, and we know this because when we do our mock elections, we see what the results are. Um if you ask them about Brexit, some of them are uh pro-Brexit, some of them are anti it. Now, in a woke uh situation, well, nobody would be pro-Brexit. Uh there is no diversity of thought in wokeism. Here, the the children think in a in a variety of ways. Sorry, that's our our pips that go off of the changing of lessons. So um uh and the thing is you won't hear right now, because the lessons are gonna change. You're not gonna hear huge amounts of noise, you're not gonna hear uh children going crazy. And what you don't hit see is me running out the door because oh my goodness, kids are in the corridors, I gotta get out there and make sure everybody's okay. I can be in here talking to you, and it's fine. Because I know with 100% certainty, not 99, I have a hundred percent certainty that the corridors will be orderly, that the children can go to the toilets without any bullying, that the children will eat their break food, and that with the little year sevens, in fact, you know, I saw them yesterday, they were picking up crumbs on the floor. Not their crumbs, other people's crumbs, you know? Like, why anyone would not want our children being kind and decent in that way? And this idea that black children can't do that, I don't understand. And I don't understand how people don't realize that that is just racism. If white children can do it and it's somehow oppressive to then ask black children to work hard and be nice, I don't understand. Now, it's because they then think being nice means being compliant. Look, I am very nice. You will see me on Twitter. I am extremely polite.
SPEAKER_02Yes.
SPEAKER_01In fact, I kick people off my Twitter all the time if they are impolite and if they're rude to and and mean to other people. Um, I always, you know, it's interesting because when people say it's talk to Twitter is so toxic, I'm going off. I always think, well, actually, I find Twitter quite nice these days, and I have quite a number of people who disagree with me, and I have quite a number of people who follow me who don't like what I do at all. Um but they're polite. And that's because on my Twitter I have made it, so people have to be polite. I am very polite to people and very nice. Am I oppressed? No. Am I not a radical? No. I am a radical. Uh uh, I'm a revolutionary who is fighting the system and I'm doing it in a polite fashion. Um, it is not the case that if you're nice, you are therefore some kind of wallflower or you're some kind of dummy who people can stamp on top of. I mean, I'm living proof of that. So it is, people just don't understand. I don't, I don't understand what's wrong with everybody. I mean, what I don't understand it. I I every day I sit in my C team and I say, I don't understand what's wrong with everybody, everybody's mad. And then one of my deputies says, Okay, Catherine, that's 10p, because he's got this system of if you use the word mad, 10p into a pot because all I ever say is everyone's mad.
SPEAKER_05That's your swear jar. Yeah, swearing is mad.
SPEAKER_01I don't understand. Why can't you be polite and be revolutionary at the same time? Right. Why can't we have, you know, people always say, you know, you don't want to fight with swords, you want to fight with the written word. You want to, you want one of my one of the, you know, obviously it's very sad that Ken Robinson has died, and I'm, you know, my heart goes out to his family and so on. Uh, one of my own personal disappointments on that is that I will never be able to debate him because he and I disagreed fundamentally about education, and I would have loved the opportunity to have been able to debate him. You know, that is what life is. Yeah, yeah. And um life is about learning and growing. And, you know, I've got this quote here from I've got lots of great quotes in my office. I've got one here from Muhammad Ali, the man who views the world at 50 the same as he did at 20, has wasted 30 years of his life. You know, it's what's exciting. Um, another quote I'll tell you here by Thomas Sowell, uh, who is wonderful and all of your audience must read him, and he's just brilliant. When you want to help people, you tell them the truth. And when you want to help yourself, you tell them what they want to hear. And that that, that for me is what education is what is wrong with education.
SPEAKER_02Right, right.
SPEAKER_01Too many people are telling everybody what they want to hear, and they're not interested in truth.
SPEAKER_02Right.
SPEAKER_01And um, and and the truth is right in front of them. It's right in front of them. I'm not gonna give you a book to read. Just look at the kids in front of you, right? Try out different ideas and see which one is better and. Be honest with yourselves. And that's the thing that too many people struggle with.
SPEAKER_05Yeah. Yeah. There's so much there that that overlaps with my own Christian beliefs, including the whole preference for kind over nice. You know, I I read my Bible, and Jesus was not nice. Like no one would describe. And look, try and try to point to any biblical character and describe them as nice. I defy you. He is described as kind.
SPEAKER_01In fact, um So what do you see as the difference? I mean, that's interesting. What do you see nice being and kind being?
SPEAKER_05Well, nice, I think, is politeness, it's manners, it's s you know, smearing on the grin when underneath you might be thinking something totally different. It's it's the opposite of Thomas' Sowell. It's it's not loving you because I'm not going to tell you the truth. Jesus told the truth. He was blistering in his rebuke of the religious and th and then at the end of you know Matthew chapter twenty-three, where he, you know, he calls them whitewashed tombs and um he they are the blind leading the blind and all these phrases that we've we've inherited. And he at the end of it he he said, uh If if only I could um gather them as a mother hen gathers her chicks. Um and he kind of turns on a dime in order to, because he's for them, therefore he is blistering in his rebuke of them. Um and you mentioned something else very, very Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_01So if you don't care, then you're not gonna hold your standards high. You just let them do whatever they want, right?
SPEAKER_02Right, right.
SPEAKER_01If you care more about what you look like, if you care more about how things appear, and it makes you look like you're a good person, makes you look so the black boxes on Instagram, really good uh example. You put them on there and I look like I'm anti-racist. So there we go. Um I mean, one of my mixed race uh teachers, she was saying to me um how her friends were policing her and saying, How dare you not put a black so her white friends telling her how awful she is for not putting a black box up on Instagram. Meanwhile, not only is she black, but she's also uh working in the inner city with black children all her life. And these people are swanning around in the city with their night, whatever jobs, drinking their lattes, saying how brilliantly anti-racist they are because they put a black box up on Instagram. I mean, you know, and the problem is that somebody like Thomas Sole has been vilified all of his life because he speaks the truth and he's willing to come out there and say it. He's just written a wonderful book, uh, Charter Schools and their enemies. The man is 90 years old, and yet he's just come out with this book, um, and he he talks a lot about the Success Academy in in New York and looks, compares the results from that with the results from uh schools that are in the same building as the Success Academy. You know, it's um and he's just got wonderful data where he's analyzing this, but people don't want to hear it. And that's what I mean about if you ignore the outcomes and you just have an ideology that you place on on your school or on your kids. Well how aren't you interested in the truth? I don't I don't get it. Don't you actually want to help kids, or do you just want to make it look like you were helping kids? Right, right, right. And that's that's what I find uh shocking. Too many people are like that. Yeah.
SPEAKER_05And um it's uh we want we want virtue signaling without the virtue. Um and you know, and if you were to boil down the Sermon on the Mount, I would basically say it's virtue without the signaling. You know, you you you you give without your left hand knowing what your right hand is doing. You go into your room, you you you do things, you know. We we always want to keep our our sins private and our righteousness public. And Jesus says, do the exact opposite. Wear your mistakes on your sleeve because that's how you're going to improve. But but also um keep keep your righteousness to yourself. You know, if you if you want to help a certain disadvantaged community, get on and do it. And I and I do see that with what you're doing, um, Catherine.
SPEAKER_01And well, and the thing about admitting mistakes, you know, uh just on Monday this week, you know, I went into briefing and I said, look, various things went wrong yesterday, the buck stops with me, I'm the leader, I made certain mistakes, I made the bad, wrong decisions. This is my fault, it's on me, it's not on you. This is what we need to do today. And um, you know, and that was true. I mean, and it didn't mean that I didn't lose face. I mean, it was fine. If anything, people respect me for it. Yes. And it means that we can all believe in the same in what we're going out to do, and we're all a team.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_01And that I'm not busy trying to cover my tracks all the time. Um, I'm just honest. Right, right. And that that's the thing ultimately that I think makes makes our school different from not all schools, because there are other schools that are like ours, but um that from lots of schools, I would say, is that we're fundamentally honest and we look at things and we admit when we're wrong, whether that's as an individual or as a school. Uh and so there are things that's something I gotta put my hand on my heart and say, actually, maybe I'm responsible for that, and I'm really sorry about that, you know. Uh people make mistakes. It's okay as long as we're all trying to reach the truth. Sadly, I think too many of us don't even believe there is a truth. They believe in this subjective kind of way of thinking, which is, you know, what's true for you isn't true for me, things are different, you know, depending on which point of view you see it from. And um, and they think that that's being tolerant. And that's actually just to throw away hope. It's to throw away hope for a better world. Um, because there is a better world and there is a truth, and we should all be pursuing that. Right. But but we're not, because we we want to give we want to give value uh to all these different ways of being. And there isn't. I mean, I saw this most awful uh video this morning, uh this cuties on Netflix.
SPEAKER_02Oh, right, yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_01I mean, I cannot believe that this is where we've got to, that the telegraph gives it four out of five stars, that it's become mainstream, that people think that children gyrating round and putting their fingers in their mouths and behaving like a porn film, that this is acceptable in our society, and that we encourage this kind of behavior. How am I meant to protect my children from that? How am I meant to, you know, how? Because they're all gonna have seen it and they'll all want to be it. And so all of our girls will want to be like that now, and all our boys will expect their girlfriends to behave in that kind of fashion. It's disgusting and it destroys the community. And why people can't see this, you know, the rap artists and the drill and the grime and so on that that use wear stab vests and use disgusting language and encourage my boys to join gangs, and then you've got this kind of behavior that encouraged my girls to put on lipstick and pat out their bottoms and and and and and look much older than they are and sexualise themselves so that they can never be a person inside, you know, so that they can love Roman history over medieval history, or that they can love, you know, scientific inquiry, or or become mathematicians. I just don't understand why we've how we have come to a point in our society where we admire that kind of thing like cuties. It's grotesque. And I I just I I again I just look at it and I think, what's wrong with everybody? I mean, I just don't understand what's wrong with everyone.
SPEAKER_05You're a prophet, you're a prophet, Catherine. And and and again, I I do you'd make the best Christian, you really would. Because that's just the I think so many of what you're saying, you know.
SPEAKER_01Well, people often say, I went to this um Catholic schools conference once, and I was talking to them and lots of Catholic schools there, and the woman who introduced me said she that I was the most that I was of all the non-Christian uh head teachers she knew, that I I was the most Catholic in in, you know, and that and that in many ways, I mean there's some people who say to me that and I think in many ways there is truth to this, that we are more of a Christian school than many Christian schools are. And look, apologies to Christian schools out there, but um, you know, I have a friend who's very, you know, a a Christian, and he um he says that we get uh all the the nature stuff right. We we understand human nature, and he says that for Christians there's the nature bit and then there's the grace bit, and we don't do the grace bit, but that we really get the nature bit right. Um, and that too often in Christian schools um they don't get the nature bit right at all, and that they might get the grace bit right, but the thing is the grace bit is dependent on the nature bit. And if you don't understand nature and that that there are too many people, I mean you will know more about this than I do, but he would say that there are too many people in Christian communities that don't believe the stuff that we believe, which is that man is flawed, and you need to teach right from wrong, that um, that you need to hold children to account, that you know what you said about Jesus, about uh rebuking them precisely because he loves them, you know. That kind of thing has disappeared in parts of the Christian communities. And um and that, and look, I'm no expert, I'm just quoting my friend here, but he really is an expert. And um, and and that we get all of that. And so that you will find in our school, while it is very much a secular school, and um we don't, you know, we will we will talk about Eid and we will talk about Diwali and we will talk about you know uh uh Christmas and so on, uh that we push a uh um a certain kind of Christian culture far more than than than Christians do.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, I think I think we we might even know the same person who you're referring to, but um I I do think there's just so much overlap even in the culture that you're trying to build in the school, like the the idea that teachers eat with their pupils, the the the idea that those who rule would actually commune with those who are ruled, you know, put themselves under the the own the the same laws.
SPEAKER_01You speak about you know on that point, it's it's a really good point because you see, what we would say is that the teacher is in a position of authority. And that one of the problems uh with modern education is that we've forgotten that. And that progressive teachers, sorry, it's our pits again, they just did break, they're now going back in. Um and progressive teachers would say that um uh, you know, I learn just as much from my children as they learn from me. We're all just the same, we're equal. And we would say, no, no, no. Obviously, the children should be learning a lot more from you, otherwise, there's kind of something wrong with you. You're not a very good teacher, and uh they are 12 and you are a grown-up and you've been doing this for many years, um uh, and you are in a position of authority, and therefore, it is right that you should set the rules and that you should lead the learning and that you should be in charge. And that is because we believe in your authority. That does not mean, and this is why they reject authority because they think that means that we then overpower the children and we want to control them in a kind of negative way, as opposed to we want to bring order and structure to their lives. And the point about lunch is a really good one because yes, we can go and eat with them. We are still in a position of authority, but we can eat with them and be with them and not feel that we're better than them, because we don't feel that we're better than them. We feel we're in a position of authority, and that's very different. Um, whereas often in these schools, they won't eat with the children, they don't necessarily mix with the children. In fact, they're rushing to the staff room at any break point that they've got because they're desperate to get away from them because it's so chaotic and it's so difficult, and I don't blame the teachers. They're just trying to get away. Whereas we're with the kids all the time. And that's because we are in a position of authority. So there is order and there is structure which allows my teachers the freedom to be able to go and have lunch with them, and allows the children the freedom to be able to demonstrate self-control. They've just got freedom all upside down, they just got it inside out, and um, and that's why they then do not have an environment where they can build relationships with the children, where they can be friendly. And I say friendly because I think one of your questions asked that about uh on Twitter. Um, asked about, well, do you want to be friends with the kids? No, of course you don't want to be friends with the kids, but you want an environment where it's it's understood that the teacher is in a position of authority, where there is some deference from the child, but where the child and the child knows that they put our hand, their hand in ours, and we walk out together with the teacher leading. And that's right, and they trust us, and that we trust them to be children, so that means they're gonna be naughty sometimes, and that we then need to fulfill our role as people in authority to help guide them, and that then allows us the freedom to be able to have a lovely school where children are joyful and happy and they want to come to school. Our kids are just so great, you know. And when you come here, everybody says it. Everybody says, gosh, they're so ambitious, they're so resilient, they're so happy, you know. Why wouldn't you want that? And it's just that there's so many layers where people can make mistakes in misunderstanding, and it comes from a good place. Those people want the child their children to have good lives, they just don't understand what's going to make it happen.
SPEAKER_05Yes, yeah. And as your friend says, there's nature and there's grace, another way of putting it, is there's law and there's gospel. Um, you know, and and the law is here are the rules, and here is the good life, and here's what it looks like. And if you want to break those rules, the rules break you. You know, there there is a nature to you, there is a nature to the world, and um, yeah, if if you go against the grain, you're gonna get splinters. And then and then there is and and there is forgiveness for when you mess up, you know.
SPEAKER_01Yes, actually, one of your Twitter people said, or my Twitter people said, um said exactly that, you know, well, how does Christianity come into this? And you know, if if we're not Christian, then why are we Christian? And I'd say, and I and I immediately thought, the thing that people always forget about Christianity is forgiveness.
SPEAKER_04Right.
SPEAKER_01And so the woke mob are marching around, you've got to be fired, you've got to be cancelled, we've got to stop this, we're gonna do this, we're gonna pull that statue down, we're gonna you know, where is forgiveness in all of this? You know, it's just yes, you want to have that. And so with the children, we're forgiving all the time. You know, you hold them to account, yes. You you insist on them meeting your standards, you might give them a detention, but you forgive, and then you start again. And that is what is that is what's so beautiful about life. It's that in our own personal lives and so on. You get into arguments with people and then you forgive each other and you start again. And that, and through that forgiveness and through that discussion or argument or whatever it was, you learn something, and you come out on the other side having decided actually, no, we need to do it differently next time. Let's do it in this way, and you become better people. That should be our goal in life. Two things, uh for me anyway, is that you try and be a better person every day, and you try and make the world into a better place, you know, so that when you're 85 and you're on your deathbed, you look back and you can say, I lived. Because what I always say to the children is everyone dies, not everyone lives, and you can only live by doing those things. If you spend your life working in the city, earning lots of money, taking cocaine, and you know, driving a BMW, you haven't lived. Now, what I find the left their obsession with is money all the time. You know, the only thing that makes life worth living is getting more money. So you give, you know, just give them money and they'll be okay. Um, give schools more money and they'll be okay. You know, it's about so much more than money. And I will never turn down more money. Let me just make that. You know, if the DFE want to give me more money, please, I'm way ready and waiting. But the fact is that what is so much more important are the ideas inside a school, it's the commitment of the staff. We don't have a car park for the staff, we don't have trees, we don't have grass, we don't even have a sports hall for the children. Our building is awful, okay? It's awful. But our school is wonderful because you take what you've got and you make something of it. And that is the case for so many schools across the world, in in African countries, in India, in Caribbean countries, where they have nothing. And yet you go inside the school and there is joy. That that and that joy comes from your values. Okay, and that is what we try and get across in the power of culture. The difference of values that we've got in this school is that if you believe in agency, I spoke about that earlier, in ownership of your life, in ownership of your school, where everybody buys into the same goal and vision, and that you can all deliver it together. You know, you my teachers come to school and they feel, and not just my teachers, my support staff. Same thing. I had a meeting with all of my office staff and caretakers yesterday, and I said, Look, you know, we this is what we're about. And I said, we've got to remember, why are we here? We're here to transform children's lives. And I said, the reason why you work at Michaela and you don't work somewhere else, even though we may we insist on you being on time, we insist on you dressing professionally, we insist on all sorts of things. And they were all going, Yeah, yeah, yeah, you do insist on all of this. I said, Why do you do it? I said, Because at the end of the day, when you go home, you know you've made the world into a better place for being here. And it gives you a reason for living, you know? It means that you can look back on your life and say, I lived. And and that, and and and that's what I say to all the staff here all the time. You know, each of us has a role to play. You know, and my role is no i i do what I do, and so does my caretaker when he was there this morning putting out the chairs, because we don't have uh lots of holes. We have to change, we have to use the hall for the dining room, and then we have to change for assembly, and all he's doing is moving chairs constantly. All he does is doing moving chairs. If he didn't do that, the school would fall. We wouldn't have a school. Each of us has a role to play, and um and and you want to be part of something bigger, and and that, of course, you know, the thing is is that religion used to play that part for people, you know, they were part of something bigger, and because religion has has washed away to a certain extent, um, not all in the West, but yeah, yeah. It isn't what it was, yeah. People are a bit lost, I would say, in life. That they need, and I think that's why the woke stuff has happened so much, because they're then part of a cause, they believe in something, they they feel part of a family, you know, because we've lost that that side of religion. And um, so and that is something that we have very much here, which is why, again, I would say that we are more Christian perhaps than elsewhere. Um, you've got to believe in something in life. Otherwise, why do you wake up in the morning?
SPEAKER_05You do, you do, you do. Um, this has been so helpful, and I do need to get you uh let let you get on and uh and teach your classes. But this has been absolutely fascinating. I'd love to come and and check out Michaela School.
SPEAKER_01If um I mean, of course, with this COVID situation, we're not sort of having guests at the moment, but in January, we we will you you just well, with you obviously, you just need to write to me and we'll sort that out. But for your listeners, they go on the website, they just sign up, and then anyone can come anytime. I mean, we do it over lunch so that you can have lunch with the children and you have a tour with the children and you just see what we do here. And um, you know, I I would say talk to the children about their knowledge of, you know, I don't know, uh anything, really, any subject. Just ask them. And they'll be so knowledgeable. And then ask some other children elsewhere what they know about the world and what they think about it. And if it doesn't impress you enough to just ask them what they know, ask them what they think about it. Ask them their opinions. Their opinions, I've never heard in my life anywhere, children that are so articulate, that are able to have their own opinions about things. And that's because they're able to form their opinions with all of the knowledge that we have taught them.
SPEAKER_05Amazing, amazing. Well, um, people can check out uh Michaela Community School in Brent in London, and they can check out Catherine Burbel Singh, author of many books and out now. She has edited The Power of Culture, and I do recommend it uh for all our viewers. Catherine Burbelsing, thank you so much for joining us.