We all get scared. At worst, fear can near paralyse. Less dramatically, fear can cloud judgement, affect behaviours, usually for the worse. All of us have been there, whether we admit it to ourselves or not.
Students at Bradford Grammar School who have patiently sat through my assemblies know of my love for mountains and wild places, and a passion for climbing that once burned hot. I did not climb to deliberately scare myself, that wasn’t the point. But, when pushing the grade, fear of failing on a route, or of the more obvious consequence of screwing up, falling, was always there. I was never entirely liberated of earthly concerns when moving upwards on rock or ice.
I guess anyone who embraces a higher level of risk in life, by choice or necessity, must find a way through. Climbers tend to focus on the moves, the immediate details of a route, one at a time. I also remember consciously controlling my breathing when climbing got a bit ‘necky’. Little did I know at the time, that this was a recognised technique. On other occasions, looking up at Flying Buttress Direct on Stanage Edge, or down at Grey Panther, Kilt Rock, for example, (any climbers out there?), I had to simply give myself a ‘good talking to’ and urge progress. Not the hardest climbs I’ve struggled up, but I distinctly remember getting the collywobbles on my first ascents, but then cracking on regardless. Looking back, it’s interesting to think about what life’s wider experiences impart.
It’s a funny thing fear. I remember thinking about it critically for the first time as an A Level psychologist reading about Little Albert. I can’t remember if this was on the syllabus or not, but it captured my attention. John Watson conducted the Little Albert experiment. Albert was 11 months old and without fear of the pink nosed, pristine white lab rats with whom he was about to become closely acquainted. Watson then went about his work pounding vigorously, hammer on a steel bar, whilst showing Albert the rat. Albert wailed in reaction to the din and, after a period of time, cried in response to the rat. Classical conditioning – crying baby – an acquired fear: beautiful science! The original plan had been to decondition Albert but, sadly, for the little man at least, Watson never quite got around to it. It would take a few years before eminent psychologist, Mary Cover Jones demonstrated that fear could be removed by the application of classical conditioning techniques, this time from the subject, Little Peter, debilitated in fear by the sight of fluffy white rabbits. I remain no expert, but a little studying and experience of living tells me that some fears are instinctive and shared. Others are more complex, learnt, some lasting, some ephemeral, many individualistic. I won’t overstate the point, but all of us have been living with new and heightened anxieties these past months, living with a palpable sense of fear about what the pandemic might mean for us, those we love and care about, now and in the longer term. To acknowledge that fear, that we get scared from time to time, is healthy to my mind. Then we draw on our reserves of strength, and reach out to help each other, in order not to succumb to it. And we get on with life, perhaps stoically.
In my previous blog, written whilst looking ahead to what COVID-19 might visit upon us, I remarked “that our pupils are capable and kind; they will undoubtedly show initiative, solve problems for themselves and support each other when needed” and so it has come to pass. The fear has not gone away, it’s still there gnawing at us, growing in some ways and for some folk, particularly as aspects of everyday life look to gradually open up.
At Bradford Grammar School, we recognised early on that fear would be part of our shared pandemic experience. In one of our earliest remote assemblies, Mrs Chapman, our pastoral leader, said: “Each one of us can learn from our own fears … We need to be honest with ourselves and identify what exactly it is that frightens us. We then need to face it, to manage it, to harness it. And we must also recognise it in others and help them deal with it – with supportive words, reassurance, encouragement and maybe humour to diffuse their anxiety”. I believe we have done just that. The manner in which pupils and colleagues, supported by families, embraced new ways of working and interaction with little fuss, has been characteristically BGS, reflecting our School motto Hoc Age, which for me simply means ‘Get Stuck In’ (I hope scholars might forgive my limited powers of Latin translation). It is axiomatic perhaps that BGS would have behaved this way, but that doesn’t stop my heart beating with pride.
We began with an acknowledgement of fear and that a way through could be found. We might allow our legitimate and understandable fears to overcome us still. Anxieties remain high with talk of schools and colleges ‘reopening’. I do not know of any leader in education, or Board of Governors or Trustees, that will admit more folk through school doors, additional to the children of key workers and a skeleton staff, if they perceive that public health protocols cannot be observed. That said, reasonable fears will persist. Fear of returning to school, and for others, anxieties about the consequences of remaining distant from teachers and classmates. We must not however, as mentioned above, allow fear to ‘cloud judgement’ and come between us and objective decision making and action.
‘Fear’ was the topic of our second COVID-19 assembly blog; the first, however, was ‘Hope’. With a little courage we continue to find a way forward.
“The manner in which pupils and colleagues, supported by families, embraced new ways of working and interaction with little fuss, has been characteristically BGS …”
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