When was the last time you were in the classroom? No, not your own: when did you last take a seat in a classroom where someone else was doing the teaching, and you were the student? We’re often told to think about things from the pupil’s point of view, but I wonder if we think more about the sort of pupils we’d like rather than the sort of pupils we would be.

Preparations for the impending birth of our first child have meant attending antenatal classes of late, and it’s something of an eye-opener to realise what sort of pupil I am. In my head, as a schoolboy I was always conscientious, hard-working and the sort of child I’d imagine would be easy to teach. Reflecting on my past few weeks suggests maybe that’s not the case.

In the classroom

I’m a good listener. I’m the sort who tells others to pipe down when the speaker is trying to speak. Why is it that a staffroom full of teachers always contains at least one group that will continue to chat in a not-quite-quiet-enough whisper in a way that we’d never allow when teaching? But that’s not me. I listen attentively, and for the most part I do what I’m told. So far, a pretty good student, if I do say so myself.

Except then the antenatal class teacher asks us to “think of a time when”… and I start to think of a time, except then I remember a related incident that prompts another thought in my head, and before you know it I’m pondering what I need to get done before the end of the weekend. And I suspect that the answer is not appropriate to any question in an antenatal class, with my thoughts on the missing section of my school development plan.

Group work

I used to love a bit of group work, as a younger teacher. In fact, I designed whole units of work around the idea of collaborative teams on an extended project. Wasn’t this what they would be doing when they all got jobs anyway?

Over time I rather went off the idea when I realised that I would end up trying to craft groups so that the “do-ers” were there to carry the “lookers-on”. At first, I thought it was good leadership training for the do-ers, but, looking back, it was just more work for them. The very essence of my job now is leading teams, but, believe me, in the group tasks in these classes, I was more than happy to stand on the fringes and let others do the work. Need a scribe? I’d step back from the pen. Something needs drawing? I know just the person - and it isn’t me. A volunteer to read out the group’s responses? No good looking at me.

Homework

After making it through the session unscathed, it is only at the last minute that the dreaded words emerge: your homework for this week. Suddenly, I get flashbacks: not of my schooldays, but of evening class Spanish in my twenties. Hastily scribbling out the answers to the questions in the textbook as I wolfed down my dinner and dashed out of the door. I’m still the same: it turns out that for all my years of telling children to get into a routine, and to do it early, I’m still a bit of a slacker when it comes to getting my own tasks in order. I just live in hope that they don’t look too closely at the results.

Just wondering how far I’ll get with my coasting attitude when it comes to fatherhood. I don’t fancy my chances.

Michael Tidd is headteacher at Medmerry Primary School in West Sussex. He tweets as @MichaelT1979