As explained earlier, my health hadn’t been on top form for some weeks now. I was in hospital twice for two very different and coincidental reasons. Fortunately I did get to go home for a week between admissions. It was the week beginning the 22nd of February, and the timing couldn’t have been more perfect. I had been invited to a school to talk to kids ranging from 11 – 13 years of age. I’d never done it before, was a nervous wreck and wasn’t yet at 100% health. But I still wasn’t going to miss it for anything.
It was worth every second.
These kids got me talking about things I hardly ever think of. They asked questions some of my closest friends wouldn’t have the guts to. I never thought I’d find such mental stimulation from children literally half my age. I was in my element.
The school in question, St Benet Biscops Catholic Academy , is in Newcastle, just over an hours journey from my humble abode. So I got up early, went through my notes, set off with time to spare, got stuck in traffic and arrived 30 minutes late. -_- . Life right? Nevertheless, the staff were more than accommodating. I was introduced to a few of the “who’s who’s”, and got shown to what would be my class for the day. And then the wonders began.
The kids filed in, clearly more nervous than I was. And once seated, I began my unrehearsed opening monologue. Now all four 1 hour sessions began pretty much the same way and that’s honestly how I remember them. The first session was a group of Year 7’s and then three sessions with Year 9’s.
So my “opening monologue” was a brief summary of who I was Pre-injury, how the accident happened and my life Post-injury: time in hospital till now. I kept it brief so they’d have more time to ask questions. They did not disappoint. I got asked everything from my favourite basketball team to what was most difficult in my life Post-injury. I got asked how I felt straight after the accident, what physically hurt the most, how people’s perception of me changed and how I handled it. I even got asked how my life goals have changed compared to Pre-injury. I mean, these kids were making me reflect on aspects of my life I didn’t know existed. After each session I found myself assessing major life decisions and perspectives, and these guys were just casually bombarding me with Piers Morgan/Oprah Winfrey/Larry King style questions before they moved on to P.E or lunch break or something of the sort. I still can’t get over how intuitive the kids were, especially with the questions that were informed by things I’d said earlier. One girl asked if I missed home (Nigeria) and planned to go back. One of the simplest and most complicated answers I had to squeeze into coherent sentences.Obviously I played it cool like this was all an everyday thing for me, but I definitely left the school that day more enlightened and yet curious about the experiences I had perviously thought I was so familiar with.
I’ll definitely be returning as soon as they’ll have me, and I’ll surely be talking to school kids more often in the future.
Nice! Very interesting read… children of nowadays! lol. I wonder if nigerian kids would have asked these types of questions. Not even kids, but even senior secondary school folks. I just feel like there’s a level of curiosity and enlightenment lacking in the nigerian education sector…whether you go to a public or private school!
Brilliant. I remember my first talk to school children. I too was terribly nervous and like you I found the experience very rewarding – they asked some real curved ball questions!
Yeah, many of the questions took me by suprise. Would defiantly do it again though