Jonny McCambridge: Whitesnake, bongo drums, sangria and a dancing pirate – adventures at school open nights

However, I found myself in the modern languages classroom with three other students. As scores of prospective pupils filed through, we spoke French in mock-spontaneous conversations. The problem was that I was barely competent as a French speaker.

‘Comment vous-appelez vous?’

‘Je m’appelle Jooonniee’ (You have to imagine this being said in an accent midway between French and my country bumpkin north Antrim brogue).

‘As-tu des freres et soeurs?’

‘Mais oui. J’ai deux freres. Ils sont appeles Stephen et Paul.’

‘Quel age as-tu?’

‘Huh?’ Zut alors!’

‘Quelle est ta couleur preferee?’

‘Eh? Sacre bleu!’

I am thinking about this as I am sitting in a packed assembly hall. I have spent much of the early part of 2024 going around school open nights with my family as my son nears the end of his P7 adventure.

Suddenly the stage in front of me is filled with a number of teenagers wearing radio mics and loud outfits. Unexpectedly, the children break into an enthusiastic rendition of Here I Go Again by Whitesnake. The performers are dancing. I notice that some of the teachers are also moving in time with the music and parents in the audience are clapping along.

It is as far away from my stuffy old experience from decades ago as it is possible to imagine. It is hardly novel for me to make the point in this column about how much the world has changed since I was a kid (in truth, if I had to come up with a new philosophical concept every week, I’d pretty quickly run out of things to write about). Nonetheless, it is impossible to ignore the conclusion that education today is a much broader concept – things ain’t what they used to be.

As the transfer test results are yet to arrive and we don’t have the complete picture of which schools my son will be able to attend, we have spread the net wide.

We have visited schools with old, crumbling facilities and establishments which are modern and occasionally breathtaking.

I have been in libraries large and impressive enough to support the population of a medium-sized town and others which have fewer books than I store in my spare room. There have been more classrooms than I can count, inspirational slogans painted on walls, indoor and outdoor gyms, capacious sports halls, science labs, rooms with 3-D printers, laser drills and any amount of computer equipment.

There have been plenty of surprises. I have seen drama performances (including one where an enthusiastic young man was dressed as a magpie), I have tasted a large selection of school-made food (including sampling tapas and sangria in a classroom where Spanish is taught). I also took part in a test in which I was required to name a list of herbs by sight. The teacher and I disagreed over which was rosemary and which thyme (she was right).

I have watched several science experiments where liquids have changed colour or substances have been altered and expanded alarmingly in size. I have gazed through microscopes. I have watched children taking part in several sporting activities as well as working on car engines or showing off the skills they have learnt as military cadets.

There has been a lot of music. Aside from Whitesnake, I’ve also enjoyed hearty renditions of Jimi Hendrix’s version of All Along the Watchtower, Fleetwood Mac’s The Chain and various other more contemporary songs which I could not name. I had my first ever attempt at playing the bongo drums.

Dressing up and dancing has been a constant theme. I must give a special mention to the man (presumably a teacher) who costumed himself as a pirate and played a guitar. No matter which part of the school I visited, the pirate appeared, like a ghost determined to haunt me. Wherever I went, he was there, dancing, pulling exaggerated faces and laughing. I was determined to maintain the good humour and bonhomie of the evening, although by the end I must admit that as a committed land-lubber, I was sorely tempted to tell this scurvy dog to walk the plank.

The constant throughout all of the experiences has been the people. All of the teachers I have spoken to have shown determination to put the best face of their school forward and enthusiastically answered all of my inane questions.

But the main memory I will retain has to be of the children; those pupils who gave up their time to take my family on tours of their school or who performed music or drama or who stood in classrooms, labs or workshops and told me about their experiences.

There were some shy children who fought to overcome their nerves and some who startled me with their composure and confidence – all of them were a credit to the schools which they attend.

It is easy, when you have worked and travelled for decades, to forget how all-encompassing the school experience is during those formative years; how what goes on in those halls and classrooms, in the corridors and fields, makes up the majority of your experience. Most of us will go on to do things that take us on a journey well beyond what we could have imagined when we first nervously pulled on the over-sized blazer with the crest on the pocket, but not much will ever burn as deep into our psyche as the school experience.

The point of the school open nights is to assist in the process of choice. The problem is, the more you see, the more you realise about what is available and the more difficult the choice becomes.

Zut alors!