Wednesday, 6 November 2019

The Numbers of a School Trip

School trips can be stressful for teachers because it’s all about counting. You spend the day counting your children. Yesterday, we sang at the Royal Albert Hall for a concert in aid of the Barnardo’s charity. It’s a great thing to do and I’m sure I’ve written about it every year.



After the concert it can take a while for my brain to return to normal. The counting gets stuck and this year I have a whole load of numbers buzzing around in my head.

6 - Time to leave the house
30 - children  (count repeatedly, panic when you have less. Feel confused if you count more: they will keep moving)
3 - wonderful colleagues to come with me (and make the day run smoothly and easily)
29 - other schools
98 - children in the school behind us (fools)
1311 - people on stage
2 - conductors (Douglas Coombes = genius and his wife Carole Lindsay Douglas = also genius with sparkly tops)
76 - Trombones
1 - Trevor (on the organ)
11 - times I told my choir that Trevor was going to be my next husband.
110 - cornets
2 - wobbly teeth
3 - rocking mice
 5 - times I said, “Go to the toilet now, even if you don’t need to.”
180 - minutes until the next toilet break
15 - photos for Twitter
101  - photos to make a great display board
 33 - photos that came out blurred (they will keep moving)
5 - hours of rehearsal
2 - one hour food breaks
3 - hours on stage for the concert
87 - times I felt proud of our choir
17 - minutes of life I lost due to the ill advised screaming session by the Barnardo’s ambassador
32 - flights of stairs in the day to get between waiting area and stage
14- songs sung
16 - times one of my choir rolled her eyes at her brother
3233 - words sung
 3200 - words learnt by my choir (we never got Big Bang bonger  at the rear right)
3 - times one of my choir felt sick.
0 - words learnt by some schools.
5544 - people in the audience (I didn’t count but it was full to capacity)
4 - children left behind by a school (that will remain nameless) at the end of a concert (this would be my worst nightmare)
9 - children going home with their parents
21 - hyper children on the coach
7 - times they sang ‘The Wheels on the Bus’
12 - The time I arrived home
9 - days before we start rehearsing for our next concert (There’s no rest for the talented)

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