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My first lesson was a total disaster. I’ve had bad lessons, every

teacher has, but this was one of the worst. It was definitely

among the top three worst lessons of all time. Just writing these

sentences has given me sweaty palms and an unpleasant feeling

in my gut.

I had been informed first thing by the head of drama that I was

needed to teach her ‘rather tricky’ year 9 group as she was away

on a course. She looked at me and uttered the ominous words

‘You’re going to need your wits about you’. This is teacher code

for ‘you are about to descend into the depths of hell and an hour

in this group’s company will make a tour of Afghanistan seem

delightful in comparison’.

Year 9 is frequently the worst year group to teach drama to,

for a couple of reasons. They’re thirteen- and fourteen-yearolds,

so they’re in the full unpleasant flush of adolescence.

They’re awkward, moody and crippled by insecurity. The last

thing they want to do is get up in front of their peers and perform.

Secondly, many of them won’t be doing drama for GCSE

so they have no emotional investment in the lessons. It’s the

most toxic of all combinations. You can mitigate this if you

have a connection with the group and you’ve been teaching

them for the last three years. In that case, if you’re very lucky,

you might just be able to make the lesson bearable for everyone

concerned. I, of course, had never even met this class before.

The odds were not in my favour.

Ahead of the lesson, I also received an email saying the venue

had been changed so that it was no longer in a drama studio. The

first time I would encounter these kids wasn’t even going to be

on home territory. I read down the email and my heart sank even

further. It was going to be held in the gym. That’s when I knew

I was completely screwed.

When I entered the gym, any last vestiges of hope quickly

evaporated. The door was unlocked and the kids had managed to

enter before me. This is a disaster for any teacher trying to establish

their authority. One way of doing this is demanding the kids

line up outside the classroom in a quiet and orderly fashion. They

will then enter the room, calm, ready to work, and you are far

more likely to have a productive lesson with them. That option

had been removed from me.

As I entered the gym and looked around, I realised that this

entire experience was going to be horrific for everyone concerned.

But mainly for me. The group was scattered across the

room and it looked like they were enjoying an extension to their

break time. They were drinking fizzy drinks, eating crisps and

chasing each other round the gym. This was already shaping up

to be a disaster. I inhaled a huge gulp of air deep into my lungs in

an effort to create a voice that sounded calm and authoritative. It

ended up coming out sounding more like an emasculated squeak.

The kids were taking out the gym equipment, including the

pommel horse and the monkey bars. From appearing to be an

uncooperative rabble, they seemed to be working well as a group.

The apparatus was gradually and effectively being built in front

of my eyes. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. I realised that

I would not be teaching a drama lesson. I would be attempting

to stop a PE lesson and it was thirty kids against one teacher.

The worst thing was, I didn’t know who the well-behaved kids

were, I didn’t understand the group dynamics, I didn’t even

know their names.

One thing I didn’t notice, which makes sense in hindsight, was

that every young boy seemed to be swigging a giant can of Monster.

Monster is an ‘energy drink’ that you can easily buy in any

newsagent or corner shop. The term ‘energy drink’ is a euphemism.

What it really means is that every can has a caffeine level

equivalent to about three shots of espresso. That doesn’t sound like

a lot. But imagine you gave a three-shot espresso to a fourteenyear-

old boy and then asked him to behave normally. What would

happen? You’re right. He would behave like a grade-A lunatic.

Now imagine ten of them on this jet fuel and the other five drinking

regular fizzy drinks. You might as well go out in Hackney and

try to teach drama to a group of meth heads in the park.

The apparatus was now fully built. It was tall. Very tall. The

height of the gym was around 30 feet and the apparatus almost

reached the ceiling. I looked up to see some of the more intrepid

members of the class climbing ladders so that they could begin

swinging across the monkey bars.

‘Year 9,’ I squeaked, ‘under no circumstances are you to climb

the apparatus.’

I shouldn’t have bothered. It was like trying to explain to

Genghis Khan and his Mongol hordes that his planned invasion

of your village needs to be postponed as now is not a good

time. And, in my case, the Mongol hordes were all off their tits

on Monster.

‘Year 9,’ I shrieked as my voice went completely prepubescent,

‘stop that immediately.’

Before long, the kids, showing remarkable athleticism, were

swinging across the monkey bars confidently and expertly. I

stood below watching them, utterly aghast. My teaching career

was already in the gutter and now it was rapidly descending

into the sewer. The kids, on the other hand, were all having a

wonderful time and probably getting a very good workout too.

However, I was meant to be teaching a lesson on theatrical mime

and there was no one in the room who was doing anything connected

to that particular activity.

I then noticed that while the kids had put out the apparatus

fairly confidently, they hadn’t included any safety equipment.

Of course they hadn’t. They were fourteen years old and high on

liquid crack. They all felt immortal. I’m sure if you’d mainlined

that stuff into me at fourteen years old, my response would have

been exactly the same. I found myself pacing up and down as

I struggled to decide what to do. Do I exert my authority and

demand they come down from the apparatus or do I cave in and

start putting out mats so they wouldn’t hurt themselves?

I put out the mats.

I was completely out of my depth and had resigned myself

to the fact that my teaching career was finished and I was going

to end up being a recruitment consultant like everybody I went to

school with. At least I would have access to all the cheap cocaine

a boy could dream of.

I looked around and saw a small group of well-behaved kids

sitting on the floor reading books. Naturally, they had all grabbed

a mat. I couldn’t blame them. If everyone else was taking out

gymnastic equipment, why not them? I went up to the geekiest

kid with glasses, who looked like he still hadn’t entered puberty

and was reading Harry Potter, and asked him to get the deputy

head teacher immediately. Without a word, he nodded his head

and ran out the door. Even he understood that things had plummeted

to a point where if someone didn’t get hurt it would be a

miracle. I watched him go, along with my professional life.

When the deputy head, Mr Turner, finally appeared, he went

apoplectic with fury. He was a short, bespectacled man with silver

hair and a rather sizeable gut straining to be released from the

confines of his shirt. The moment he saw the carnage, his eyes

bulged in furious incomprehension and his head went the colour

of a very angry pimple. This was a man who looked to be losing

his battle with blood pressure and, if anything, I was hastening

his demise.

Available 28th May, Pre-Order Now.