I am ze King of ze Divan/ Ooh ooh ooh ooh
Plastic Bertrand: Ca Plane Pour Moi

In 1978 many people in the UK were ignorant about Belgium. A popular joke went like this:
Can you name three famous Belgians?
No? How about Hercule Poirot, Tin Tin and Hertz Van Rental?

In that same year Margaret Thatcher was leader of the Conservative party, who at the time were Her Majesty’s Opposition. We couldn’t have imagined it then, but a few years later Maggie would be Prime Minister, and life in Britain would never be the same again. The Conservatives of late have become divided about whether the UK being part of the European Union is a good idea or not. In 1978 the Shadow Cabinet was very clear about the EU: certain influences from continental Europe were eating away at the very fabric of British society. The most serious European threat- and particularly to our youth- came from Belgium. He was called Plastic Bertrand, and he was a punk.

Bertrand’s song, Ca Plane Pour Moi was Belgium’s anthem for disaffected youth. It was their Anarchy in the UK. And it was in French. It was massive all over Europe, and apparently it’s still number 1 in Luxembourg. When The Beatles released Michelle, with its verses in French, Britain’s teens suddenly rushed to take up GCSE French. Learning French was suddenly very sexy, and you could argue that many of these youngsters were so enamoured by their second language that they went on to pass the ‘A’ Level and thus bolstered their chances of getting a place at a university (or at least a polytechnic), and eventually walking into a job and adding to the country’s economic wellbeing.

But Plastic Bertrand’s song was the very antithesis of the sugar-sweet McCartney number. At the time, it felt like you could walk down any British street and you’d hear the heady lyrics blaring out from squats and drug dens where punks were frantically pogo-ing along to the Belgian’s anti-social outpourings. He was Belgian, the song was in French, and it sounded dangerous. Suddenly every punk was alive to what he had missed at school, and was queuing up to do night classes in French. Everyone wanted to be talking like Plastic.

Plastic Bertrand: Ca plane pour moi!!

Secret minutes of Shadow Cabinet meetings in 1978, just released, reveal how close Bertrand’s song came to causing Britain’s withdrawal from Europe. The potential crisis began with an inexperienced teacher of French, working in an exclusive girls’ school (so sensitive is this document that the name of the school has been ‘redacted’). Apparently the girls found their French lessons extremely boring, so our intrepid young teacher, who was hip to the zeitgeist of the times, decided to play Ca Plane Pour Moi at the beginning of every lesson. His intention was to turn the girls on to the grooviness of the language, and make them hang on his every French word. He decided to ask the girls to have a go at translating the song. This was to be his undoing.

Maybe you could have a go. What do you think the phrase Poupe de Cellophane means? Well it seems that some of the girls thought it meant ‘Wrap your sh*t in cling film,’ and wrote these immortal lines in their exercise books. No-one involved is prepared to verify exactly what happened next, but the Head got to see some of the girls’ work and was so shocked that the unfortunate French teacher was immediately fired. And there the matter might have ended, but the damage had been done. Teenage girls (even the posh ones) are the same as teenage boys: once they got a sniff of something being classed as taboo by the powers that be, they just have to partake of the very fruit that has been forbidden.

At the time, it felt like you could walk down the corridor outside any British public school dormitory and you’d hear the heady lyrics blaring out, where posh teens were frantically pogo-ing along to the Belgian’s anti-social outpourings. I guess, like any craze that takes over a school, if you ignore it the kids will eventually get bored and move onto something else (whatever happened to ‘Clackers’ and ‘POGS’, for example?) But ‘Plastic Fever’ carried on unabated. Things came to a head in June 1978 when two public schoolgirls took their ‘A’ Level French oral exam. They were very nervous, and I guess the fear of talking in French to a stranger just completely took over their ability to think and act rationally.

So when the examiner asked, in French, a question about Madame Bovary, the girls’ minds went completely blank. The brain is a wonderful thing. No-one knows how it works, and to this day no-one has been able to explain what happened next in the girls’ brains. Instead of describing how Madame Bovary was deeply dissatisfied with her provincial life and marriage to a country doctor, which led her to become involved in reckless passionate liaisons, the girls blurted out the first thing that came into their heads: i.e. ‘Poupe de cellophane/ You are ze king of ze divan/ C’est un grand connard/ Oooh ooh ooh ooh/Ca plane pour moi!’

Both girls failed their French ‘A’ Level, and instead of going on to an exclusive finishing school in the Alps ended up going to Keele through clearing, and getting a 2:2 in Sociology. ‘Big deal’, you might say. And you would be right: it was a very big deal, because the girls’ fathers were none other than two members of Maggie Thatcher’s future cabinet. Thatch got to hear about the scandal of the terrible exam results coming out of the elite independent schools and decided, there and then, that if the Tories ever came to power, not only would they bring the unions to their knees and give away the nationalised industries for a pittance, but they would pull the UK out of Europe. The Iron Lady did two of those things, but Britain is still a member of the European Union… but the debate rumbles on.

So why are we even thinking about the impenetrable lyrics of a Belgian punk? Adults often feel under pressure when talking in public. I only have to think of answering a question in an interview and my mind goes blank. For young children learning a second language, or even developing their first, pressure can build up very quickly when we are talking with them. What we think is a nice cosy chat can suddenly become a bit strained and hard work for child and adult. Children, like adults, can panic and freeze up, if not given enough time to respond to questions. When we ask a child a question, he needs time to process what we have said, formulate an answer and then say what he wants to say. When I ask a question, I count to 10 in my head, and if the child looks confused or has not responded, I follow it up with another, simpler question or some other helpful remark that helps the child understand what I mean. This technique has helped me become a better communicator with young children developing language, and anyone learning English as a second language.

Plastic is still going strong, and spreading his ideas for anarchy and revolution, as you can see from this clip with Germany’s legendary country band, The Boss Hoss. Yee hah!!
By the way, in case you were wondering, ‘poupe de cellophane’ can be translated as ‘plastic doll’.

The Boss Hoss & Plastic Bertrand. Still rockin’ Europe to its foundations

Take care out there.

Michael

It was the Summer of 1975. I was 17 and my life was in freefall. Actually that’s possibly a bit over-dramatic, as I was really feeling just a bit sad. I had gone to the Surrey University Free Arts Festival with my girlfriend and she got cross with me for spending too much time examining ‘living exhibits’ in the art department, involving students posing nude for no particularly good reason that I could make out, other than to be slightly shocking, while I only have eyes for you by Art Garfunkel played over a loudspeaker. My girlfriend stormed off and I was left contemplating my navel (actually it was not mine but belonged to a complete stranger). I wandered around the campus searching for She Who Must Be Obeyed, and bumped into Phil Collins.

This was not as far-fetched as it might seem. Phil at the time was drummer and relatively new singer with Genesis: having filled in at short notice when Peter Gabriel left the band. Most of the band members had been pupils at Charterhouse school, just down the road, and Phil Collins had a house in nearby Godalming. At that time the Guildford area was teeming with rock stars who had sunk some of their money into buying huge houses set within acres of parkland. These superstars included Eric Clapton, Roger Daltry, various members of Fleetwood Mac, Joan Armatrading, and even John Noakes and Shep off of Blue Peter. Led Zep, Genesis , Bad Company and Fleetwood Mac had all recorded at nearby Headley Grange, and I recently discovered that a house across the valley from where we lived, where the lights were left on all night and strange goings on were to be heard, was home to Mike Pinder of The Moody Blues. He was genuinely very moody, and was often to be seen in the Staff of Life pub in Shottermill gazing forlornly into a half-empty glass of beer. The strange goings on were in fact the Moodys recording Seventh Sojourn. (Mike wasn’t seen looking glum around town for a while, and the house changed hands, with one Gary Glitter allegedly moving in.)

Back to the festival. I was a bit of a Genesis aficionado, so saw this chance encounter as an opportunity to get behind the façade and pump Phil with a few choice questions about the real goings on in what was to become one of the most successful progressive rock bands of all time. So I casually said, “Hi Phil” and amazingly he started to hum the refrain of what I later recognised as his classic 1983 hit In the Air Tonight. It was Phil who spoke first. “Excuse me mate, where’s the loo?” Fortunately I was able to point him in the right direction. Equally fortunately, I had recently read some advice in the Readers’ Digest that was to prove invaluable. In a piece entitled How to get an Autograph from a Star, it warned, ‘On spotting a famous person, carefully choose your moment to approach them. Never, for example, accost them as they are entering a restaurant, or when they are eating, and certainly never when they seem to be arguing with their spouse.’ Wise words. They didn’t mention whether you should ask for them to sign your book when they are heading for the toilet or, worse still, when they are in it, but I used my common sense and shyly asked, “Is it OK if I ask you a few questions when you come out?”

Phil didn’t bat an eyelid. “Sure,” he hastily replied (he must have been bursting), as long as it’s not about how the hell we pulled together The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway.” For the uninitiated (or uninterested) this was a very bad double album of prog rock twaddle that Genesis cobbled together before Peter Gabriel left the band, after a disastrous 102 date world tour where nothing went right (see Wikipedia for the grim details.) Writing in the NME in 1978, Nick Kent claimed the album “had a compelling appeal that often transcended the hoary weightiness of the mammoth concept that held the equally mammoth four sides of vinyl together.” I can think of one word that sums it up better than that (think Cockney rhyming slang: think pony and trap)

Genesis: The Carpet Crawlers. A decent song saved from the ashes of an awful album?

After what seemed like an age, Phil emerged from the toilet with a smile on his face. “Right then me old mucker, let’s get it over with. Fire away with the questions.” And this is what we discussed:

Me: I’m really glad you are singing with Genesis now. Your song More Fool Me on Selling England by the Pound made me cry when I first heard it. But will you be able to sing and play the drums at the same time when you are live on stage?

Phil: Do you know, that’s what I ask myself. I reckon not. Do you play drums? (I didn’t. The band later drafted in Bill Bruford as a second drummer, and shortly after that Chester Thompson, who did a great job.)

Me: Now that Genesis is playing to huge crowds, how do you make every member of the massive audience feel that you are singing just for them?

Phil: This is something I checked out with John Lennon a short while ago. He told me that back in the early days he used to look at the people in the back row and somehow everyone in The Cavern later claimed that he had been singing just for them.

I was just about to get in a third question about whether the band were glad that they were no longer fronted by a lead singer who dressed up as a flower, Britannia and a cross between Elvis and a garden gnome when Phil cut me dead: “Sorry mate, I’ve just seen Gary Glitter waving to me. We are off to jam with Jimmy Page, Roger Daltry, Eric Clapton and John Noakes and Shep off of Blue Peter. I hope that miserable sod Mike Pinder from The Moody Blues doesn’t turn up.” Then the lead singer with Genesis turned on his heel and left me standing outside the loo, thinking how my girlfriend would possibly believe what had happened to me shortly after she stormed off, and whether this amazing piece of rock happenchance would convince her never to leave me in the lurch again. (It didn’t. She did. Many times.)

I mention all of this because recently during training sessions we have been exploring the big question for anyone working with young children: How can we have a conversation in an early years setting or in Reception classes that is long enough and detailed enough to be satisfying for both child and adult, when there are so many children and so few adults? After all, we know that children learn through talking. We also know that children are involved in very detailed conversations at home, where their parents have the time to talk at length with young children, while in settings it’s much more difficult because adults are being constantly interrupted or having their attention pulled away from the child in front of them.

The answer lies in John Lennon’s comment about singing at The Cavern. Like his audience, children need to feel that even though they are in a group, you are talking with each and every one of them as if they were an individual. For me, two children together is a group, as is three, or even thirty. I believe our job is to help individual children enjoy being in a group with their peers, so that they can join in with a three-way conversation (or an 11-way one if they are in a group of 10 led by one adult). Very young children find this very hard, as they benefit most from one on one chats or one to two at the most. We can provide this type of interaction, for example when we have two children together sharing a favourite book with us.

One of the best ways to involve young children in deep conversation is to set up an exciting activity on a table; e.g. combining small world play with animals, natural materials and wooden blocks. If you cover the table with paper, and give the children marker pens, wooden blocks, pine cones, stones, twigs, leaves and dough, they will often become completely absorbed in their play, mark making and storytelling. The secret ingredient to really get conversation going is to plan for two adults to be involved in the activity: one to organise the children, and the other to stay put on her chair, so that she can engage the children next to her in uninterrupted conversation.

Consultant Debbie Brace and speech and language therapist Bhavna Acharya of Hounslow’s Let’s Talk Together project call this person ‘The Planted Adult’. If an adult is able to have no other duties than to engage children in conversation, as part of their free play or during a planned activity, children are drawn to that adult and can get very deeply and naturally involved in talking about what they are doing. This type of Sustained Shared Thinking is vital for learning, but can be very difficult to achieve in reality, unless it is planned for. Equally the adults need to be responsive to what the children are saying, rather than bombarding them with questions. I’ve been lucky enough to work with Debbie and Bhavna to see how this is possible, and to find out more about the planted adult in practice click here.

Unfortunately you won’t be able to book Phil Collins to help you, as he has now officially retired from show biz. Maybe you could book John Noakes and Lulu the baby elephant to come and visit your school, to give the children something to talk about.

John Noakes and friends with Lulu the elephant. They didn’t see that coming in the air tonight.

This is my last post for a while, as the wonderful Edmund, who looks after my website, is studying for his finals. In the meantime, please feel free to have a look through the 50 other posts on the site. Best of luck Edmund!!

Take care out there

Michael

The world of British popular music was changed forever in just 10 minutes in 1975, when Malcolm McLaren saw John Lydon walking down the Kings Road in Chelsea, sporting a Pink Floyd T-shirt. Lydon looked totally unexceptional, apart from a mass of spots on his face and the words ‘I hate’ scrawled with black marker pen above the words Pink Floyd. McLaren was very impressed and asked Lydon to audition as singer for a new band he was planning to put together. Lydon couldn’t sing, so was signed on the spot. He was renamed Johnny Rotten and the rest is history.

I never saw the Sex Pistols, bought any of their records or watched the legendary swearing match between the band and Bill Grundy live onGranada TV’s prime time Today show. I’ve always thought that, but for a cruel twist of fate, it could have been me fronting the Pistols. After all, I had spots and hated Pink Floyd. And the twist of fate? I lived in Guildford and never went to Chelsea.

I know it’s wrong to hate, but Pink Floyd really got my goat. Everyone I looked up to as a role model in my teens in the early 1970s had Pink Floyd albums. (We are talking here about my eldest brother and his cool university friends, and boys in the sixth form who had shoulder-length hair, wore trench coats and smoked Rothmans King Size.). The Floyd were cool: they never released singles, you knew they were hairy but no one knew what they looked like, and their albums had very weird names like Ummagumma and Atom Heart Mother. As an impressionable 14-year-old, keen to make an impression on my friends, I decided to pool all my pocket money and buy a Floyd album. But which one? Every Saturday I would head down to the local record shop and flick through the album covers in their plastic wallets. Everything was too expensive, so I’d usually ask if I could put on a set of headphones and listen to track one side one of Atom Heart Mother. It sounded awful, but at least I could say with sincerity, should anyone ask me what I thought of Pink Floyd, ‘Well Atom heart Mother sounds very…. progressive’.

My life has been full of fateful moments, and I still rue the day I looked in the window of the second hand shop and saw a copy of Ummagumma going for a quid. One pound sterling could buy you a lot in 1971: a box of bangers (the fireworks, not the sausages), a box of matches, a bag of chips, a litre bottle of coke, a Curly Wurly, a packet of Spangles, and an Aztec bar, and you’d still have change for a packet of 10 Players No 6 from the local sweet shop. So I lingered outside the pawn shop for a long time before I went in and bought what must have been the greatest bargain in town, because this was Pink Floyd’s legendary double album.

They say you should never buy a pig in a poke. Unfortunately no one had ever said that to me, and when I put the needle in the groove of track one side one all I got was the sound of crackling and white noise. Now I knew that Pink Floyd were ‘progressive’, ‘experimental’ and ‘a bit of an acquired taste’, so I presumed that I’d have to give the album a few listens before I got to like it and could hum a few basic riffs. It was an awful experience. To my untrained ears it sounded as if someone had spilled a bottle of wine all over the record and then taken a darning needle to every inch of the black vinyl. I wasn’t going to let on about my disappointment, so spent the rest of term with the album ostentatiously displayed on top of my locker, and steadfastly refused to let anyone play the album or borrow it.

I hoped that everyone would think I was dead cool and enigmatic, as I studied the album cover and stroked my chin, as if to say, ‘Hmm. This is a mighty fine album. A bit inaccessible in parts, but a classic nonetheless’, while in secret I seethed at the audacity of this massively popular band releasing a double album of complete awfulness, and thereby ripping off millions of poor teens like me. What really stuck in my craw was the photo on the back cover. There were two roadies (or were they in fact Dave Gilmour and Roger Waters?) standing in front of a large van, surrounded by just a fraction of the band’s equipment. That really took the biscuit. They seemed to be turning the darning needle in the wound, mocking us poor saps for buying an album that could only have taken five minutes to make, while the cover photo suggested we might be listening to music created by instruments.

(It was only recently that I discovered that my copy had in fact been covered in wine and attacked with a darning needle).

As soon as I left school and had my first job, I made sure the majority of my wage packet went on listening to real music and watching real bands with real energy and who didn’t need to have tons and tons of lights and special effects to keep the audience enthralled. No more Pink Floyd for me. Their deluded fans could trek to venues like Earls Court, Knebworth and even the Hollywood Bowl, to see a load of pyrotechnics like aeroplanes crashing into the stage while the band sang about the evils of having too much money. Pink Floyd sure as heck weren’t going to get any more of mine. Instead I used to haunt a disused bingo hall in Guildford every Wednesday night, as it was transformed into ‘The Gin Mill Club’, where for 50p you could watch the type of bands that were mentioned in the NME Gig Guide, but who hadn’t quite made it big enough to get a record deal.

Dr Feelgood in Southend in 1975. If you haven’t got 15 minutes to spare, watch this from 11 minutes in, to see the band in full flow.

And that’s where I saw Dr Feelgood. This band was a revelation. None of them had long hair or beards. They wore suits, played a strange blend of R&B and rock’n’roll and looked a bit seedy. Their guitarist, Wilko Johnson, regularly leapt in the air and used his guitar like a machine gun, spraying the audience with notes. And their lead singer, Lee Brilleaux, used to make cheeky comments to the girls in the audience in between songs, while waving his arms around as if he was holding a bottle of cheap plonk and a darning needle. I was smitten. This band were real grafters, who hailed from Canvey Island and would play anywhere they could. Their stamping ground was places like Hounslow, Portsmouth, Cardiff, Aberystwyth, Belfast, Swansea and Oldham. They travelled to gigs in a beat up van and slept in dodgy hotels and ate in greasy spoons up and down the UK. They were gritty and real. (Amazingly, after the death of Franco, they became the number one band in Spain, and I saw them in 1978 at the Plaza de Torros in Barcelona, on the same bill as XTC and The Police.) No flying across the globe in a private airliner and lounging around in swimming pools for Dr Feelgood. This was a real band, with a real message, and a faithful following of diehards like me.

What is all this about? Well, I’m writing this in a dodgy hotel, having just dined in a greasy spoon somewhere in the hinterland of the UK. I’ve been driving my van all over the country on a tour of training days and conferences. My theme is ‘Finding time to talk in busy settings’, where we explore how we can help children develop their language and learning through having conversations with adults and other children. We look at the role of the adult in helping children enjoy talking in groups, and how to support children who are vulnerable because they are shy, or learning a second language, or have additional language learning needs. We take part in practical workshops to see how we can help young children develop their language and mark making skills too.

Where have I been? So far, Hounslow, Portsmouth, Cardiff and Oldham. And where am I headed? At some point you will find me in Belfast, Aberystwyth, Swansea, and back in Cardiff for three days. And what am I listening to as I head towards a town near you? Everything but The Floyd.

On the road again.

Take care out there.

Michael

I have a bit of a fantasy that one day I will appear on BBC Radio 4’s Desert Island Discs, where Kirsty Young asks me about the eight records I would take with me to my desert island, along with my favourite book and one luxury item. During the programme Kirsty gently quizzes me about my life, in her beautiful Scottish accent, and I explain each record‘s significance for me and respond to her charm by revealing insights into my life and times.

Part of this programme’s appeal is that it is so well researched; where Kirsty Young’s questions are carefully chosen to help her guests give just the right amount of information. Some castaways are quite evasive, and by the end of the programme you are none the wiser about what makes them tick, while others seem totally and disarmingly candid. Actor and film director Tim Robbins seemed not to have prepared at all, and there were long pauses while he carefully pondered his answers, but it was a brilliant interview, as it gave the impression of being completely spontaneous. Kirsty recently got the most out of her 30 minutes with Damien Hirst, due to her detailed preparation and genuine insight into his art. She didn’t bat an eyelid when he recounted how as a young man he used to burgle people’s homes, described his vast wealth and referred to his art as ‘a type of criminal activity’. I’d have asked him if he ever paid back the victims of his crimes. She just said, “Let’s have another record.”

Soprano Elisabeth Schwarzkopf famously chose seven of her own recordings to take with her. Before I had heard about that I thought that prima donna referred to all pop music before 1984. Kirsty travelled all the way to Myanmar to interview Aung San Suu Kyi, and was so wound up and overawed that she almost forgot to ask the Burmese politician about the piece of music she would most like to take with her. Brilliant stuff.

The nearest I have got so far to realising my fantasy was when I was asked to appear on Michael Rosen’s Radio 4 Programme Word of Mouth. My role was to talk about selective mutism, where children who are confident talkers at home find themselves often completely unable to speak in public, and typically at school. I started preparing from the minute I knew I was going to be on the programme. I listened to other people in radio interviews: the ones who did it well, and those who were less successful. I realised that the programme producer plays a crucial role in preparing the interviewer. I had spoken on the phone to the producer and assumed that she would use this information to prepare the questions that Michael Rosen would ask me.

I was really excited at the thought of going into Broadcasting House. Maybe I would have a brief chat with Kirsty Young in the canteen, or even rub shoulders with Matthew Parris in the men’s room. No such luck. Our recording took place in a small studio several streets away from the BBC’s headquarters. As I walked into the foyer, there was Michael and the producer hurriedly looking at a DVD about selective mutism. Although he was clearly not as well-prepared as Kirsty Young, Michael Rosen was brilliant. His first question was the only one I hadn’t prepared for: “How many children in the UK have selective mutism?” To which I blew a raspberry and practiced my ‘Gallic Shrug’. To which Michael replied, “Obviously not a good question to start with. Shall we edit that bit out?”

Michael Rosen: going on a bear hunt or listening to Michael Jones?

We had a good chat afterwards and he told me the story of how Going on a Bear Hunt was created. (He envisaged lots of children in fancy dress marching to the sound of a brass band in a parade through the streets of a small town. Helen Oxenbury created images from the Suffolk coast, and one of the most popular works of children’s fiction came into being). I can’t say that I answered the questions really well, and listening to the recording, I think I messed up my chance to explain the difference between shyness and selective mutism. However I did feel that Michael Rosen was deeply interested in the subject. He didn’t have a script in front of him, and let me talk for as long as I wanted. It felt more like a conversation, where two minds were meeting about a subject of mutual interest, so I quickly relaxed and forgot about the microphones.

I think we can apply these principles to how we talk with children. We need to know about their lives and interests and be genuinely interested in what they have to say. I’m not saying we should talk to little children as if we were Kirsty Young, as the results might turn out like this:

Kirsty Young: My castaway this week is three and a half year old Charlotte. Charlotte, since the age of three you have been in preschool. Your mummy and daddy adore you and you adore your little brother (most of the time). Your first work of art, Mr Potato Head and Lots of Purple and Blue Spots has been on public display on your Nan’s fridge for the last six months. You once famously said, “My best colour is blue, or is it orange?” What did you mean by that?

Charlotte: I didn’t know my colours.

KY: This kind of approach to your art leaves the critics baffled. What’s your first piece of music?

Charlotte: Chris Rea singing The Road to Hell. My dad sings this in the car on the way to my Nan’s house.

More tip top interviewing ensues, with gently probing questions….

KY: Record number six

Charlotte: I can only count to five.

More charm from Kirsty until finally…

KY: You’ve got the Bible and Shakespeare, what book would you take with you?

Charlotte: The Story of Peppa Pig

KY: And your luxury?

Charlotte: My teddy

KY: Thank you for sharing your Desert Island Discs with us.

Charlotte: Is it home time yet?

To listen to the interview about selective mutism with Michael Rosen, click here.

To read more about the subject, including a comparison between shyness and selective mutism, click here.

And what favourite piece of music, your favourite book and luxury would you take on your desert island? Mine would be I’m a Believer by The Monkees, Jayne Eyre by Charlotte Bronte and a suitcase full of family photos.

The word wonder has several meanings. School assemblies are supposed to fill children with a sense of ‘awe and wonder’. Children should leave an outstanding assembly feeling thrilled and with a sense of the greatness of the world and the power of the spiritual life. As a teacher I would strive to achieve this state in the massed ranks of children, but they often left my assemblies on a Monday morning wondering what it had all been about. So in that sense, the word wonder involves thinking about confusion.

I have been listening to a lot of Led Zeppelin recently, and watching the film Celebration Day, about their amazing comeback concert at the O2 Arena in 2007.

If there’s a bustle in your hedgerow, don’t be alarmed now

It’s just a spring clean for the May Queen.

Listening to Stairway to Heaven really makes me wonder: how could one of the coolest, loudest and heaviest of bands of all time sing such twaddle? And have you ever wondered why certain tunes and lyrics pop into your mind for no apparent reason? This may be because they reflect what we are subconsciously thinking or how we are feeling. I think this was one of the reasons why my first ever date went so badly wrong. I was a great Led Zeppelin fan from the age of 14, and could sing all of the great songs from their early albums. I thought the date was going quite well until, for mysterious reason, I started to hum a line from ‘Dazed and Confused’.

Felicity, unfortunately, was also a massive Led Zep fan, though she was wondering why their lyrics were so horrible about women. She recognised that I was humming

‘Lots of people talking, few of them know,

The soul of a woman is created below.’

The date ended before it started, so we never got to discuss why Robert Plant used to shriek and wail just like Janis Joplin, and how an apparently macho man could get away with wearing women’s tops on stage and waving his arms around like an overexcited girl. It still makes me wonder.

Robert Plant: A bustle in his hedgerow, the Hammer of the Gods, or a big girl’s blouse?

I also used to wonder about my friend Doug. Doug was ‘a big noise in HR’, for a large firm in the City of London. He was a very sensible guy, most of the time. He used to try to spend ‘quality time’ with his two little boys. One Saturday morning he decided to teach his children about science. So, like most parents who think about science teaching, he took the boys into the garden and tried to recreate his first secondary school science lesson. He set alight to a piece of paper and said, “Look boys, that’s a chemical reaction. That paper can never be paper again. But if we had soaked it in water and then dried it, the paper would have returned to its original state. That’s called a physical reaction.” The children were filled with wonder: “Daddy, I wonder if I can go inside now? I’m scared.”

Doug’s wife was a science teacher, and while she didn’t want to stop her husband from bonding with the kids, she took him to one side. She explained that when you first involve children in thinking about science, you start by asking real questions like: ‘I wonder what would happen if..?’ You do something interesting together, and then talk with the children about it. So she asked Doug, “I wonder what would happen if you went back down the garden with the boys and looked for slugs and snails and worms, and wondered out loud with them about all the minibeasts you find?”

So Doug took the boys back down the bottom of the garden, and they collected a pile of slugs, snails, centipedes and worms. He was now ready to engage his little children in some constructive talk that would help them love science. “Right boys, let’s set alight to these bugs, and I wonder if that will be chemical change or a physical change?” Ooh, it makes you wonder….

Joking apart, there are lots of advantages to wondering aloud with children. Early Years Consultant Judith Twani often wonders aloud with children about what they are doing, as a way of supporting their development of Knowledge and Understanding of the World: “I wonder what would happen if we put another brick on top of that tower. I wonder if it is firm enough, or might it fall? / Look at those dark clouds. I wonder if it is going to rain. What do you think?” These are real questions, as the answer is not clear. Judith calls this ‘pondering out loud’ and it helps give children the language they need to frame their thoughts.

This technique can also be used with children who are very quiet. They often know what they want to say, but are anxious about talking with unfamiliar adults and in groups. Quiet children can also find it quite a challenge to respond to questions, even though they know the answer. If I am playing with a quiet child; e.g. completing a puzzle, I might say, “I wonder which piece you are going to fit in next. Might it be the train or the bus?” or “I wonder what piece goes in there?” This shows the child that I am thinking about what they are doing, and because I am not asking a direct question, the child will more likely to feel relaxed with me and respond.

I wonder if this post has been helpful. I wonder if readers can help to explain what this means?

And as we wind on down the road

Our shadows taller than our soul

There walks a lady we all know

Who shines white light and wants to show

How everything still turns to gold

And if you listen very hard

The tune will come to you at last

When all is one and one is all

To be a rock and not to roll

And she’s buying a stairway to heaven.

The film gets part of its title from a scene where the film director shouts directions for about 2 minutes at Bill Murray, in Japanese. Bill asks his interpreter, “What did he say?” and she replies, “Say it like James Bond”. Possibly not the funniest line in film comedy history, but it sums up just how difficult it can be to understand another language when you have no clues about what is being said, and the speaker makes no effort to help you.

I had a ‘Lost In Translation moment’ in the Czech Republic 15 years ago. I had taken a group of 12- year- old English boys and girls to a youth summer camp in the middle of the forests of Moravia. Only one of our hosts spoke English, and she wasn’t always available for translation. I had learned a few Czech phrases, including, ‘What’s your name? My name is Michael. /Where are the luggage carts? /A double room with a shower please’ (That’s right; I had been learning Czech by listening to a Berlitz Teach Yourself Czech CD). On our first day I was introducing myself to all the adults, and trying to remember their names, when the young female cook beckoned me over to the cook house. I said the only thing I could in the circumstances: “What’s your name? My name is Michael”. She smiled and said, “Umývej Nádobí”.

Well it was nice to meet Umývej, but I was a little puzzled. Why did she tell me her first name and surname? Maybe that was typical of cooks in this lovely country? Maybe I had been marked out as someone special in her affections? (When you have no idea of how to speak a language all sorts of wild ideas enter your head, as you try to make sense of what is going on.) She kept repeating her names. And I kept repeating mine. Then she dramatically slipped on a pair of rubber gloves. I took a step back in alarm.

Then the krona dropped, as she handed me the rubber gloves and pointed to the sink and a pile of dirty dishes. That’s when I realised that Romana, for that was her name, was teaching me a phrase I have remembered ever since. Umývej Nádobí is Czech for ‘washing up’. To this day, I think of Romana every time I don a pair of pink marigold gloves.

I was intrigued to find out how long it would take our children to learn Czech. What would their first Czech words be, and how would they learn them? As you can imagine, there was lots of vocabulary to do with toilets, football, food, tents, chocolate, colours, clothes, parts of the body, animals, numbers and phrases such as, ‘Hello/Goodbye‘, I like/I don’t like’, ‘What’s your name?’ and ‘How old are you?’ There were some phrases that you needed to know on a Czech camp: ‘Can I play with your knife?’ (Knives are very popular both as tools and playthings), camp fire, axe, and ‘Can I have another dumpling please?’ There were also some very surprising first words; e.g. brambory (potato) and prase (pig).

Why potato? Why pig? Every day children took turns to sit in groups and peel potatoes (with their own knives, of course). And as they peeled they sang songs. The children and adults seemed to sing together at every possible opportunity, and there was even a poll to find ‘the top ten favourite camp songs’. Number one was a song that told the story of The Three Little Pigs, with the chorus ‘Wee wee wee wee wee wee/Wee wee wee wee wee’. We knew this because the Czech children and Pipec, the principal leader of the singing, took time to explain to us, as best they could, what each song was about, and taught us the chorus of every song. We all learned that particular chorus quickly and could join in with it, because it sounds just like a certain word in English.

But the most important Czech phrase that helped us to learn the language was ‘What’s that?’

These youngsters were learning a brand new language in exactly the same way as the very young children who are becoming bilingual in settings across the UK. They learn words from each other, as they join in with activities that they are familiar with in their home country: cooking, sand and water play, outdoor play on the bikes and play equipment. They are especially attracted to singing, and stories with repetitive chants; e.g. Brown Bear Brown Bear by Eric Carle. Instead of our dictionaries, little children benefit from sharing non-fiction books with photos of objects and actions, where they can practice saying ‘What’s that?’ If they share books featuring stories that they already know, including fairy stories, traditional tales, and those based on popular TV programmes and films, they soon begin to feel ‘at home’.

There is one last observation about our Czech hosts that is important for anyone who is learning a second language: some adults and children were easier to talk with than others. Some boys and girls had infinite patience, and these were usually, though not always, the children who were keen to learn English. The same applied to the adults. Some seemed to know instinctively how to help us as we struggled to make sense of what was being said to us. They anticipated what we wanted to say, politely correcting us or giving us the word we were searching for, and speaking slightly slower in Czech than they usually did. In other words they were good listeners and communicators. They also used lots of facial expression and gesture, praised us for trying and complimented us when we learned new words. Others, unfortunately, either assumed we were ignorant, or just talked to us as if we should understand what they were saying the first and only time they said something. Or they just repeated things louder and louder. The very best communicators were those who took the time to learn English as we learned Czech.

Today I was in Basingstoke, leading a training morning to celebrate the success of another year of Hampshire’s Let’s Keep Talking project, which extends the Every Child a Talker project (ECaT) to more settings throughout the county. I met Sonata Manning, a practitioner who is originally from Lithuania. I asked her to write down for me 10 key words in Lithuanian, that I can use when next I am chatting with Lithuanian children. These included, dog, cat, pig, cow, good boy/good girl… and washing up.

The scene: The cloakroom in a Foundation Unit

Mr Jones (MJ) is in the cloakroom at 8.45am, helping children put their coats on their pegs and ‘meeting and greeting’ children and parents as they arrive. Enter Jessica (a quiet, shy child) and her dad. Dad’s in a bit of a rush. He kisses Jessica, and says ‘Mummy will collect you later.’ He looks at MJ and says, ‘Mr Jones will help you with your bag and coat.’ (Winks at Mr Jones). Exit Dad.

Jessica is a bit unhappy to see dad go, but doesn’t cry. She stands with her coat and bag on.

MJ I like your bag Jessica. That’s Peppa Pig, isn’t it. Let’s hang it on your peg.

(Jessica moves to take her bag off.) I like Peppa.

Jessica I like…

(Enter Josh)

Josh (says loudly to MJ) I’ve got a Spiderman bag! It’s over there on my peg. Come and have a look. And I’ve got Spiderman shoes. Look at them!!

(Enter Zak)

Zak (to MJ, in a voice louder than Josh’s) I’ve got a Thomas bag and Thomas wellies. And I’ve got a train set in my home.

(Jessica moves off. She has hung her bag up but still has her coat on.)

MJ Wait Jessica. (Holds her hand) Let’s help you hang your coat up and then we can tell Josh and Zak about your bag and shoes.

(Jessica looks anxious. MJ helps Jessica with her coat.)

Right boys; let’s hear about Jessica’s bag and shoes. Jessica has a Peppa Pig bag, and she’s wearing Peppa wellies…

Zak I got…

MJ Wait Zak. It’s Jessica’s turn, then Josh’s turn and then Zak’s turn. Let’s start again.

Jessica has a Peppa bag and Peppa wellies. Josh, you’ve got a Spiderman bag and Spiderman shoes. Zak, you’ve got a Thomas bag, Thomas wellies and a train…

(Enter Reece. He pushes Jessica and Josh. Josh is about to push him back. Jessica starts to walk off. Michael holds Jessica’s hand.)

Reece(To MJ in a voice louder than Josh or Zak’s) I got a…

MJ Wait Jessica. Reece, do you want to hear about everyone’s bag and shoes? Let’s start again. Jessica, what have you got? Ah, yes… you’ve got a Peppa bag and Peppa wellies. Josh, you’ve got a Spiderman bag and Spiderman shoes. Zak has got a Thomas bag, Thomas wellies and a train set at home. Reece has got…

Reece I got a Buzz Lightyear bag and a Woody outfit in my home and a fish in a bowl.

Zak and Josh I got a Buzz at home! I got a Buzz at home!

MJ Great! Now it’s Jessica’s turn, then Josh’s turn and then Zak’s turn and then Reece’s turn. Let’s start again. Let’s see if we can all remember who’s got what, and then it’s time for family groups. (Take’s a deep breath.) Jessica, you’ve got a…

All (including Jessica) … Peppa Pig bag and Peppa wellies. Josh has a Spiderman bag and Spiderman shoes. Zak has got a Thomas bag, Thomas wellies and a train…

MJ And Reece has got…

All (including Jessica) A Buzz Lightyear bag, a Woody outfit and a fish in a bowl.

MJ Well done Jessica! Well done everyone. You are all so good at listening to each other and letting each other have a chance to speak. Now let’s go to our family groups.

(Exit all. Children go to family groups. MJ heads for the staffroom.)

End

A review of ‘Not the Survival of the Loudest’, by Ben Kingsley of the Guardian.

“It’s very common for quiet children to find it challenging to compete for an adult’s attention, when confident children quite naturally join in, but unfortunately take over. Some children also join in to compete for the adult’s attention, just for the sake of competing!

Faced with this situation (which let’s face it is commonplace in settings and classrooms where there are young children) quiet children will walk away.

Michael Jones, (Played brilliantly by Johnny Depp, here in his West End debut), could easily have taken the easy option and allowed Josh to butt in and take over. Another option would have been to tell Josh to, “wait until we have finished talking”. However Michael’s approach allows the other children to join in, and encourages Jessica to stay. He turned the whole conversation into a listening game, and showed the children how to take turns in a conversation.

So children don’t feel the need to out-shout each other to get heard, and it no longer becomes ‘survival of the loudest’.

One would imagine that Jessica (played by Keira Knightley) would have felt an increase in her self-esteem, even though she didn’t say very much.”

‘Not the Survival of the Loudest’ starring a quiet child, one adult and host of confident children, could be performed at an early years setting or KS1 class near you. Every day!

Feel free to write your own review of this play! What strategies to you use to support quiet children in this type of situation?

Supporting Quiet Children: Exciting Ideas and Activities to Help ‘Reluctant Talkers Become ‘Confident Talkers’ by Maggie Johnson & Michael Jones is published by Lawrence Educational. Visit www.lawrenceeducational.co.uk for details.

A very enthusiastic young guy got me into earnest conversation: What does ‘A whop bop-a-lu a whop bam boo’ mean?” I had to tell him that it was just a load of rhythmic rubbish.

“What about ‘Scaramouch, Scaramouch will you do the fandango’?

More rubbish.

“Then how about ‘Here come old flat top/He come groovin’ up slowly/He got Juju eyeballs/He one holy roller/’ ? Isn’t this by John Lennon? This can’t be rubbish too?”

‘Fraid so.

Although my new friend’s pronunciation of English was not great, (think Manuel from Fawlty Towers), his pronunciation of the ‘rhythmic rubbish’ was spot on. Had I had too much sangria, or was there something quite remarkable going on here?

One of the jobs that children need to do is to learn to talk- and to learn that lesson as quickly as possible. This includes developing an awareness of the sound system of the languages they are going to learn: not only so they can have clear speech, but as the foundation for reading and spelling. At the same time they need to learn to coordinate the hundreds of muscle movements needed for clear pronunciation. Children’s pronunciation needs to be right by four years of age, so they can make themselves clearly understood, and learn phonics in school.

Children also need to pick up the rhythms of their language, and all the little nuances of their family’s accent, like the Londoners’ glottal stop’ and the Irish ‘brogue’. All of this information about pronunciation needs to be embedded in the child’s mind, so when he speaks he can concentrate on the message of what he wants to say.

It is an incredible achievement for any adult to master the sound system of a new language, and to use speech sounds rapidly and clearly in words and sentences. For a three-year-old-to do this is a miracle! How do they do it? There is only one way: by intense listening and practicing speaking. (That’s two things, but they are part of a whole.) This practice needs to involve thousands and thousands of listening opportunities and chances to use the sounds of your language.

Singing is the answer

I spend a lot of time singing with two-year-olds (it’s my job). I am absolutely convinced that singing is crucial for speech development. Once a child latches onto a song, she will want to sing it over and over and over again. This helps her get to the point where she literally can’t get it out of her head. It is embedded. And we’ve all had the experience when we hear a song first thing in the morning and are humming it for the rest of the day. I’m not proud of it, but The Macarena got me after just one listen. After hearing Gangnam Style for the umpteenth time I’m sure my Korean pronunciation is almost perfect (Though I’m not sure ‘Jom ja na bo wi ji man nol ten no nun sa na ye’makes sense or is appropriate!)

And the more speech sounds children can hear in a song, and the more rhyming there is, the more children are laying down the foundations in their minds for the patterns of speech. And the good news is that it doesn’t have to make sense! I’m glad about that, because otherwise we would have to have a government-led campaign to outlaw Wind the Bobbin Up and Hickory Dickory Dock. Now there’s a thought….

For really fantastic songs that you and the children won’t want to get out of your heads, visit Steve Grocott’s website www.dronesmusic.net (Steve’s pages)

And for an interesting article on this subject visit

http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2011/may/08/singing-children-development-language-skills

*Tutti Frutti by Little Richard!