During my time as an educator I've met a number of children that were particularly fascinating and have lodged in my memory, some struck me as vulnerable, some as creative thinkers, others as bright bright sparks. Once during a screen printing workshop a boy was so full of delight about the printing process that he could hardly contain himself. I recall his energy at finally getting hold of the squeegee and afterwards saying, ‘That was the best lesson of my life’, he will be a young adult now and I dearly hope he got to follow his creative interest... In Nottingham I met a hard girl who was pretty unlikeable to be honest, on one particular occasion I told her, ‘You did that really well’, for a second her face softened and became childlike, and it dawned on me praise was a rare commodity for some. The ways we keep ourselves safe are complex and variable.
This is a photograph of a young girl I met during a project in Islington, London. She was in the park with her parents and younger sibling and was an incredibly bright kid. She had an intuitive understanding of special awareness and was very curious. We all struggled with some basic origami, but she didn’t get bored with our folding and re-folding and took to our discussion and problem solving process with a learners delight. She made a lovely word piece using white cups pushed into a grid fence which spelled out the word n i c e.
