Day after day I watch children and young people looking at their phones, oblivious to traffic or birdsong, not talking to friends and family, isolated from the real world to be part of an internet world. I therefore make no apology for coming back to what I consider one of…
Dear Friends, Whilst you are all enjoying the summer (even if we are all in desperate need of some rain!), we wanted to take a moment to say thank you. Thank you to every headteacher who welcomed us through your doors last academic year. Thank you to every teacher and teaching…
Clap, clap (on left) clap, clap (right) Stamp stamp Bang my tum like a drum Wiggle my bum. It isn’t exactly high opera and I’m not sure if Wagner or Verdi would have approved, though I think Mozart would have been delighted! This song, and dance, was the introduction to…
Since we started Cotswolds Arts Through Schools, arguing for the arts in primary schools has meant making the case from scratch, school by school, funder by funder. That has been true in schools, to trusts and philanthropists, and, when we get the chance, to politicians. Is that about to change? In…
I was listening to the Gospel in church this week. Two of the stories Jesus told — about the impact of a little yeast on a bowl of flour, and the ability of a mustard seed to grow into a tree (I have always struggled with that one, since mustard…
The other day I watched a group of children at one of our schools doing African dancing and drumming. They were completely absorbed — moving in ways they had never moved before, laughing, concentrating, pushing themselves physically. What struck me most was not the energy or the joy, though there…
The announcement that the government intends to ban children under sixteen from using social media was genuinely welcome. When Keir Starmer says that children are being “robbed of their childhoods” by social media platforms, he is right. When he adds that he will also prevent under-eighteens from accessing AI chatbots used for…
Last weekend, Kingham Lodge hosted three concerts as part of the Dean and Chadlington Music Festival. Two others took place at Chipping Norton Theatre, a third at Bruern Farm, and a gala in the theatre at Heythrop (a Warner Resort Hotel but a splendid historic site). A Desert Island Discs took place in Chadlington…
There is a particular kind of government announcement that manages to be simultaneously well-intentioned, inadequate, and infuriating. Last week’s ‘Every Child Can’ programme is a masterclass in the genre. The headline sounds impressive: £132.5 million from the Dormant Assets Scheme to enrich the lives of children through arts, sport, nature,…
We all know the saying. It took a village to raise a child — and most of us, if we are honest, have a feeling for what it meant even if we have never lived it. It meant that children were not the exclusive property of their parents, watched over…