Second draft - started as a Tom Waits influenced blues type number at the piano - suffering from a recent Gilbert and Sullivan tendency but I wanted to capture the essential truth that 450,000 teachers make their classrooms "learning homes" every day and are trusted by students, parents and carers to hold the power, the real power, within a system that seems to have been atomised over the last years.... Yes, the pundits hector from the margin, behind the doors... "we professionals do the work".
Monday Night Blues
As I review my
Lesson Plans on Monday night
And scan new curriculum content - I delight
In blue
penning the political oughts
From the matters
to be taught
And selecting
what I professionally know is right
The classroom, our classroom, the classroom is our home
The classroom, our classroom, the classroom is our home
For when I
open up my classroom door each day
It echoes
with the sounds of yesterday
And in that
precious time alone
I re-plan
the shape and tone
And mouth
the words to lead them all away (astray?)
The classroom, our classroom, the classroom is our home
The classroom, our classroom, the classroom is our home
Yes, I’m the
trusted teacher in their midst and I care
For the students
know it’s me who’s always there
Distant critics
may spew derision
Or reverse
an earlier decision
Whilst I
smile and point to what and how and where
In the classroom, our classroom, the classroom is our home
In the classroom, our classroom, the classroom is our home
Our
learning journey starts and off we go
To stunning
places where only we will know
There is
much work to be done
And there’s
always time for fun
As I guide
them, chide them, challenge them to and fro
In the classroom, our classroom, the classroom is our home
In the classroom, our classroom, the classroom is our home
Contemporaneously in dusty ivory towers
The politician
and pundit spend their hours
Tapping out negative
witticisms
Or balanced relative
criticisms
Whilst this
teacher studiously empowers
In the classroom, our classroom, the classroom is our home
In the classroom, our classroom, the classroom is our home
Then when I lock my classroom door each day
The hurtful headlines
quickly fade away
As I recap our time alone
And how we made this
space our home
As we travelled, on our journey, in our way
Oh the classroom, our classroom, the classroom is our home
(so tempted to have astray as last word in Verse 2)
John
Oh the classroom, our classroom, the classroom is our home
(so tempted to have astray as last word in Verse 2)
John