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Product reviews for Where Will I Do My Pineapples?
Jim Knight, Lord Knight of Weymout, Schools Minister 2006-2009
A whole new school building is a once in a career happening for most school leaders and a once in a generation opportunity for most communities. Gill Kelly has therefore done us all a great service in capturing her once in a lifetime experience in Nailsea as she led the new building project in her school. In doing so, she finds an engaging voice that makes this short book an enjoyable first read in just a couple of hours, whilst creating a reference book for anyone going through the same sort of journey.
Nailsea School was one of the early winners from Building Schools for the Future. The current political debate writes BSF off as an expensive school building programme that was guilty of waste, complexity and delay. If it was just a school building programme that would be a fair criticism and “Where Will I Do My Pineapples” would be a pretty dull read. If it were just about architects, builders, loos, classroom design and technical specification it would have a very limited reach.
What Gill Kelly grasped, and reflects in her book, is that BSF was an education improvement programme. It was an opportunity to use design, buildings and technology to improve teaching and learning. This book is as much about pedagogy, leadership and change management as it is about buildings.
From that basis, this book is stimulating, exciting and enlightening. New schools in run-down communities can be cathedrals for aspiration, but only if what people do inside them is effective. Whether it is a new block, a refurbishment or a complete rebuild, “Where Will I Do My Pineapples” shows how to think of investment as an opportunity to turbocharge new ways of engaging the community, new ways of empowering learners and new ways of developing professional practice. It involves effective use of technology and space but always and only if it works for learning. The checklists and appendices add practical assistance without pretending that works in Nailsea will work everywhere.
I loved this little book and I hope it will be picked up and used by school leaders up and down the country.
Nailsea School was one of the early winners from Building Schools for the Future. The current political debate writes BSF off as an expensive school building programme that was guilty of waste, complexity and delay. If it was just a school building programme that would be a fair criticism and “Where Will I Do My Pineapples” would be a pretty dull read. If it were just about architects, builders, loos, classroom design and technical specification it would have a very limited reach.
What Gill Kelly grasped, and reflects in her book, is that BSF was an education improvement programme. It was an opportunity to use design, buildings and technology to improve teaching and learning. This book is as much about pedagogy, leadership and change management as it is about buildings.
From that basis, this book is stimulating, exciting and enlightening. New schools in run-down communities can be cathedrals for aspiration, but only if what people do inside them is effective. Whether it is a new block, a refurbishment or a complete rebuild, “Where Will I Do My Pineapples” shows how to think of investment as an opportunity to turbocharge new ways of engaging the community, new ways of empowering learners and new ways of developing professional practice. It involves effective use of technology and space but always and only if it works for learning. The checklists and appendices add practical assistance without pretending that works in Nailsea will work everywhere.
I loved this little book and I hope it will be picked up and used by school leaders up and down the country.
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23/01/2012 00:00
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