“I was so much older then. I’m younger than that now.”

Over 32 years further on, more wrinkles, less hair, but still as positive-minded as ever and still very much in love with languages; that’s me!

Although you might not know this, it’s a privilege for people like me to be able to continue to make a modest contribution to your learning in such a beautiful area of the world and in such an attractive working environment, instead of perhaps sitting in a stuffy office block in a dreary, grey capital city after more than an hour’s commute on unhealthy public transport. Teaching children and young people is quite different from working in business and industry with unreliable, dishonest, burnt-out, back-stabbing, picaresque adults. Of course, they aren’t all like that!

These are key years in your life; if you’re a young starter, we as teachers must strive to make sure you enjoy English and see it as a normal part of your everyday life right from the very beginning. If you’ve slipped into your teens in recent times, you’ve got lots of other challenges in your lives, both personal and academic and you often question the usefulness of many things you do, including learning a foreign language. If you’re nearing the end of your school years and beginning to think about further education, university or a professional career, you’re subject to a continuous degree of stress, some of which is probably unfair and much of which could perhaps be avoided with a more sensitive approach from academic planners, better research, and a better understanding of ever-changing social and technological trends.

Your parents are behind you and, even if they haven’t had the opportunity to learn a language during their education, they want you to seize the opportunity. Parents aren’t always right, however; like everyone, they make mistakes, give questionable advice, make wrong assumptions, have unrealistic expectations, and aren’t always in touch with reality. Right?

That said, they’ll mostly bust a gut for you!

When you’ve been doing something for a long time, like me, you can often read into situations almost intuitively, you can predict behaviour, anticipate reactions and give meaningful advice, but you still make mistakes. The most important thing is to keep a reasonably clear path and only stray a little from it when you deem it to be absolutely necessary. Every day in our lives is new, fresh, different, and full of opportunities, but we need to keep the engine going; we need to keep on track: “Il faut cultiver notre jardin” – Candide (Voltaire).

With our new web page, I’ll be writing some articles regularly on a variety of subjects and I’d like to share these with you. I’d also like to invite you to publish on our web if you’d like a platform for your voice to be heard. So, go on, feel free, express yourself and let’s have your articles; we’d love to hear from you.

Just before I sign off for today, above all else, always try to be happy and thank you all for making me so happy throughout my teaching years.

Iain Cunningham