TheBanyanTree: NEVER turn your back!

[peter macinnis]

This was just at the end of the Vietnam war, so we were able to carpet 
bomb large areas at will, with a mix of napalm, Agent Orange and 
testosterone.

No, sorry, that was just the fantasy we entertained most Fridays at 
drinks in the club next door. Friday arvo drinks was an essential part 
of our very effective kid management and maintenance as cases were 
raised and actions planned to deal with behaviour and welfare. The 
school should have been a Blackboard Jungle disaster zone, but we made a 
lot of good kids.

Our programs all came down to sports: boys from Asia, Lebanon or Cyprus 
had never encountered cricket, and needed to be unafraid of high hard 
balls. (Only the wicket keeper, with a role like a baseball catcher, 
uses gloves, and the ball is very similar to a baseball.)

We started them on softball, taught them the rudiments of throwing, 
catching and running, and in the second year they were playing cricket 
with the best of them, and tennis, and even Rugby football.

They were good years: we had their backs, and when the crunch came, they 
had ours.

p1

On 22/08/2018 00:55, Teague, Julie Anna wrote:
> I agree 100 percent! But coming from a slightly more practical (albeit, based on close scientific observations of my own) bent, my first thought about teaching the 40 year 8 boys on a hot Friday afternoon would be to douse them all with spray deodorant before they came in the classroom door.  Then maybe some teaching could happen because at least they would be thrown off the scent of the other 39's raging testosterone.