Reflections from Mr Mossman

Choose ChallengeIf you had been near the centre of Tonbridge this Sunday you would have been subjected to the sight of a very red faced and sweating Deputy Head, flailing desperately towards the finish line of the local 10K race. Not a pretty sight – one to which I had already subjected the inhabitants of Tunbridge Wells (including some laughing Year 9s) at the Hospice in the Weald run just two weeks before. My 20 year old daughter, instead of being filled with pride over the aging, wannabe athlete that is her father, merely asked why on earth I was doing this. As I made my way up what seemed to be 100th hill of the run, I also began to question my choices. It seems that our region is surprisingly hilly – something I should have considered. Yet in truth, I knew why I made this choice. Was it because I wanted to raise a bit of money for charity? Yes but no. Was it to give me a starter for a News Roundup article on the theme of “choice”? Handy but also no. In reality, the reason was more selfish: I made a choice to challenge myself. I chose to find joy in the path of maximum resistance.So often we choose to do the opposite. The ancient Greeks (Plato etc) had a term for our natural desire to make poor choices in the moment – Akrasia – literally “without control”. Many of the choices we make seem to be driven by this – me eating 4 brownies at the Meet the Tutor evening makes for a good example. I know it is bad but it just seemed to happen. There is the equivalent for our learners as well: when it is time to revise, do they choose the topic they feel safe with or do they focus on the area that seems most complicated and maybe a bit scary? In these situations, I would encourage the students to choose the challenging option; this is the path to genuine learning.If you look closely, you will see choices everywhere in education. Kent College was a choice – a wise one! Our Year 9s and Year 11s will soon be choosing options for their GCSEs and Sixth Form. I will contradict myself a bit here and say that, whilst challenge is important, enjoyment should also play a big part. Examination syllabi come pre-loaded with challenge, so choosing a bit of educational brownie does not do any harm. In fact, our students are making choices every day, and I am proud that they mostly make the right ones: they choose hard work and perseverance, and they choose kindness and to help each other. But we are all human, and sometimes make mistakes. The key thing is to recognise the challenge and to choose to keep trying anyway; that is a race worth running.