
"Speak No Evil": prop still from THE GATHERERS (1998) © Screenworks & ID Fleming
The follow up session to our reading as noted in part #1
After hearing peer praise for both my in-class presentation on session 1 here; "Ian's presentation left a huge imprint on me." (Ibrahim) and my teaching class the other day from my observer, lovely as that always is, I immediately felt that age-old twinge of imposter-complex creeping up my spine.
We opened the session well discussing 'criticality -v- a human approach' to teaching - in breakout groups. Again ... I'm provoked to reflect: My approach is almost fully human ... as is my colleague and ex-CL's Roddy's. Is it vocational teaching that perhaps brings this on? I am constantly aware in my work that I am truly 'connecting' to students. That will read a arrogance, but it's just the truth of my experience. In our breakout discussions I told the guys about how I've reconnected with my old English teacher Mike Bell and how I have never forgotten how out of his way that guy went to try to keep me on the straight and narrow (educationally and morally) at at time when I was truly off the rails, in an era when a casual punch up in the school corridors, abjectly rejecting all authority or being a general over-mouthy (I can't swear here!) bothersome teen was the norm and being a nurturing mentor was NOT the norm for a male teacher. Reflecting, I realise that I don't make my 'connecting' approach a conscious act - indeed, if I ever feel I am having to make a conscious effort, be that with a group or a particular student, I tend to back off to give them the space to find their way to that connection if they want to. I feel that the relationship between tutor and student is very much one of mentor-mentee. I have spent a great deal of my varied career acting on this ... be that as the chief songwriting frontman leading a band with a fanbase, or a TV / Film industry 'face' mentoring emerging or unseen talent, to now as a tutor.
Then, we move back into the main room ... and once more I end being faced with an aspect of my Self that in one sense puzzles and aggravates me and in another thrills (too strong a word I think) me. The old Flemmo's hand grenade technique! I have this thing ... I've always had it, right back to being that disruptive classmate who - totally disinterested in Shakespeare (still am) at O Level would drop a little hand grenade into the pack; eg: In Mike Bell's class circa 1981 "What we studying Shakespeare for ... sir. It's sh*t. What relevance has it got to today and the way we speak?" BOOM! Lesson over as the debate unfolds and the clock ticks away and girls in the classroom start to literally weep and plead with me and my partner in devilment Chiz to not come to English classes if we don't want to study ... "It's alright for you Fleming ... you'll walk the exam" (I didn't). Now, this technique has followed me, so it's obviously a big part of my personality. It made me unpopular with financiers in the film industry ... with producers when I was directing in TV and it is a feature of my life here as a tutor. It's born of a pathological need to be truthful at all times. I do try to resist. I really do! I work so hard at it. I do this thing in meetings where I'll literally sit back, take a relaxed posture, knowing I'm going to be subjected to a meeting about a meeting that will lead to a meeting about another meeting and there'll be all this waffle going on around me. It comes to my turn to speak - if I take it (I of course invariably do) - and I drop a truth grenade; ie: my (usually) contradictory or contrary opinion / thought / word on something and it all kicks off! The debate gets lively. People suddenly start to speak initially defensively (or attackingly) but the point is ... the truth of how they feel or the truth of what they want to say, but convention disavows them, tends to come out and a better result ends up coming of it ... ie: a DECISION. Now ... that sounds all cold and calculated. Trust me, it's not at all. I abjectly resist it, because it makes me feel bad about what I've done and for sure it's most often an instinctive (that word again!) reaction to my imposter-complex creeping up my spine. It's like when it gets to the base of my neck, I know it's about to happen. But it's usually too late. Or ... more often as the case is ... it just comes out of me ... out of an honest place... out of the plain speaker in me ... out of the none-politician in me ... out of the man who juts wants to get on with it and understand it in an instant in me. And I somehow end up doing it today! No plan. No foresight (that's actually usually the problem!). It comes because I simply don't overthink things. As I said today (to a shocked mini-set of digi-video faces, particularly Rahul's) "I mantra my students on that ... I say 'Don't overthink it'." And I lob the grenade of my stance on over-intellectualisation. This is probably the wrong choice of word (something I'm prone to doing), because it does provoke quite a response, particularly from one fellow student / tutor. I rethink the word to 'over-academicise'. Not a proper word I know, but hey, I'm trying to explain here! Boy! Does this provoke debate. Lively debate! Honest debate! It opens people up ... immensely, I feel. I do have this deep, ingrained resistance to a) being referred to as an academic - I instruct students to never say it nor think it of me b) having all debates in this environment couched in the 'waffle' of academic language. I was avoiding using the word "elitist" ... as I felt it would hurt people's feelings perhaps, but then I think I already had ... and someone sort of speaking on my side of the debate used it instead. And that's the c) of my list ... my forthright, almost obsessive anti-elitism. That's very much part of my class chip on my shoulder, yes, but I carried it through industry. [sidenote: I am more than aware how in my life I have shifted class From FSM WWC to definitive middle England, Middle class) Why else would I establish my writing and directing career on the back of community arts film projects working with disadvantaged communities? I believe in that stuff. In opportunities for all. In the RIGHT to higher education ... not this privilege basis we have now with a few token disadvantaged background students pulled in amongst the mostly highly advantaged (economically speaking - life skills etc is a whole other debate we haven't the space to go into here!). So as he debate is raging on, there I am, quieter now ... reflecting on 'how have I done this ... again?' I'm not saying I'm admitting to doing it deliberately in this instance, not at all. In fact my intention had been to show up to the session, stay quiet in the background and perhaps keep up with the work I was already behind on in the day job! But, it just happened ... and happens, so ... what did my reflecting, both during the session and later bring about?
This whole PGCert is very much becoming almost like therapy for me ... reflecting on my 'ways' and what I need to look at, change, improve upon. Well, I have long been in the know of my natural propensity for provocation. I am an antagonist. Not just of others. Of my Self (Note how I use Self). Not in a nasty or intending bad things way ... just that I have this personality that is driven by the need to always be open and honest ... and to provoke open honesty in others at all times, whatever the consequence. As cliched as this will read, it is a very 'Northern' (England) thing. This is me reflecting in the moment remember, not me thinking this through ahead of the events. The debate today did become open and transparent and very intellectual and adult, but did definitely veer away from academic language. Did I somehow get people to think about that side of their own approach? Some people certainly examined their need, or at least academia's need and UAL's need in particular to couch everything this way ... but, we are at a university after all. But not everyone needs to hear things put that way. Even now, as a 56 year old "academic" (I didn't say it!) tutor, I find myself regularly looking up the big, abstract words that get bandied about, I did it in this session ... though I can't think of examples. At the end of the session - after we're shown a great article on White Working Class and Free School Meal receivers and their place in HE (what a breath of fresh air! Totally enlightening! Why so 'buried' in UAL's more outward thinking? Another debate for another day), I get congratulated for taking the class down this different path ... as a 'greta contribution'. Now I feel silly again. Back to that 'Why do I DIO this???' question that hounds me wherever I go. I'm just not a wallflower I suppose. So, my reflections take into instances whereby my previous CL, recently stepped, down admitted to me he was very enamoured of my hand grenade approach (twas he who coined the phrase) and that it helped him a lot to level the playing field in staff meetings and debates. He also commended me on my people reading skills, but that's another issue. If I can read others so well, why can't I read myself as well and get a grip on things and go through life (and my job) more quietly? My reflecting today as I write, makes me realise that this thing in me, as disruptive as it can be, is perhaps a "skill" (right word in this context?) in itself. That I do instinctively (always on instinct) use it a lot, both amongst colleagues and with students. Why? Why do I use for example my regular opening gambit to first years anywhere I've taught: The auteur theory is bullsh*t. I've even used a politer version in Open Day presentations. And go on to explain why. I stress it's MY take on why. But just because I haven't written a thesis or a publication on that doesn't mean it's any less valid than someone who has (and there I am being defensive!). No. What I am doing is provoking them ... antagonising them. Provoking them into THOUGHT. Antagonising them into challenging everything they've previously heard / been taught and more so, what they will be taught here, not least by me. I'm challenging their pre-conceived notions and demonstrating that it's ok to challenge perceived conventional wisdom. To find their own voice. In screenwriting teaching I obsess with them over the concept of Show Don't Tell ... so perhaps that is behind my instinctive modus operandi here? Again I stress these are things that I'm only finding a voice and a sense of reason to be able to articulate through doing this PGCert. The reflective approach we have to take is exactly what I / we are putting students through ... so in that sense I'm gaining such insight and understanding, such empathy, for the student journey.
In our breakout room discussions (we went back in) one of my peers brought up the notion of 'the natural teacher ... born to teach.' People have said this to me, of me. I always think ..."No. I fell into this life. Born to perform ... yes...to teach? No" Though I do see my live lecturing as a performance (performance art darling?) But the wisest person I know in life ... my wife has told me many times over the years "You're a natural at this. The way you are with students ... I've seen you. You are a mentor. You do make a difference to them."
I do know I do ... but I resist acknowledging it too much. Pride is not something to be expressed of one's Self (I am Buddhist after all). That's a whole other can of worms to be opened. But I do know that I get really annoyed if I see colleagues taking an opposite approach, I really do. I believe, and am so heartfelt in my belief all teachers should take up that staff of guidance, of mentorship, of care, of parity, of equality in thought and approach ... of 'love'. THAT is the teaching that makes the difference - that made a massive difference to me as a lad. That and working with, for and supporting your team! Yes, there is a perverse struggle between being proud of achieving (provoking) thought and debate in others and being embarrassed by it because of visits from the Imposter Police.
What a day! My "mirror" is fogged with my hot breath (air). Ha!

"Language of the Knave": THE GATHERERS (1998) © Screenworks & ID Fleming
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