It may be just another working day for most of us, but May the fourth is, of course, party time for any colleagues who have a thing about Star Wars. “May the fourth be with you” they will greet us when we pass in the corridor on this day, the mysterious gleam in their eyes confirming that - as annual religious festivals go - this one beats all others as far as they are concerned.
Given that a high proportion of these revellers usually come from the physics or maths departments, the nature of those celebrations tends to be rather different from some of the parties found anywhere else in the galaxy. I know, for instance, that the entertainment in one team-room will first involve a Star Wars-themed quiz, after which they will hold a lightsabre elimination contest, followed by a competition to see which one of them can do the best impersonation of Chewbacca. (No-one, to my knowledge, has ever pulled at such a party.)
Brazen eccentricity
None of us on the outside ever dares to question their commitment to this fantasy. We already know their response. They will pin us to the wall with some toy weapon and deliver Darth Vader’s withering “I find your lack of faith disturbing”. Besides, long may such brazen eccentricity survive in our schools.
Similarly, in primary schools I hope that there continues to be plenty of escapist, Star Wars dressing up today, whatever the cost to fronted adverbials. In fact, a Star Wars day now seems particularly apt. Like the film, those proposed key stage tests on grammar were surely set a long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away. Even the students in the much-vaunted Jedi Academies chain of schools would struggle with some of those questions.
Motto for our times
“May the Force be with us” is not a bad motto for our times. Yet I find certain other Star Wars quotes even more apposite at the moment.
Below is my own top-10 compilation of well-known Star Wars lines that could (or should) have been said by, to, or about various people or organisations in education today.
- “Show me again, the power of the darkness, and I’ll let nothing stand in our way. Show me, grandfather, and I will finish what you started.”
- “You were the chosen one! It was said that you would destroy the Sith, not join them. You were to bring balance to the force, not leave it in darkness.”
- “Who’s the more foolish: the fool, or the fool who follows him?”
- “Even you, Master of the Knights of Gibb, have never faced a [key stage] test like this.”
- “He is as clumsy as he is stupid.”
- “Bounty hunters! We don’t need this scum.”
- “You will find that it is you who are mistaken…about a great many things.”
- “If once you start down the dark side, forever will it dominate your destiny, consume you it will, as it did Obi-Wan’s apprentice.”
- “Sometimes we must let go of our pride and do what is requested of us.”
- “Many of the truths that we cling to depend on our point of view.”
Stephen Petty is head of humanities at Lord Williams’s School in Thame, Oxfordshire
Want to keep up with the latest education news and opinion? Follow TES on Twitter and like TES on Facebook
