Dancing on the Tables

When seven year old Pamela consistently forgets her PE kit, her teacher comes up with a novel approach to change her behaviour: he will dance on the tables if she remembers the next time. Drawing on thirty-eight years in primary school classrooms as a teacher and, for the last eighteen years, as a headteacher, Bartholomew Peters shares many of the amusing and sometimes strange things children say and do, as well as describing some of the fixes he and his colleagues have found themselves in. He's been the world's worst referee, a camouflaged pianist, Virgil from Thunderbird 2 and the man with a bucket over his head. Whether it's been restraining Margaret Thatcher's would be assassin, destroying the reputation of teachers with the Lady Mayoress of Solihull or failing miserably to become a TV star, life in the classroom has been interesting. His recollections, built around a series of themes such a residential visits, sporting triumphs and disasters, and the joys of teaching infants, were the basis for a talk he has delivered to many groups across the midlands. Now they are in print for all to enjoy.