Thursday 17th May - Today I am not going to tell you the anwer

That's it. I have reached the end of "spoon-feeding" people who are perfectly capable of wielding a knife and fork, metaphorically speaking.

Let's face it, put a plate of chips, or cake, or sweets in front of most children, and they will have no difficulty in transferring said victuals into their gob, masticating them to a pulp and swallowing.

Replace chips, cake, sweets, with nutritious fare such as broccoli, spinach, meat, and (still inside the metaphor) they need the food cut up into titchy bits and carefully presented to them in tiny spoonfuls. You may even have to pin them down and hold their noses to get the food into their mouths, possibly work their jaws up and down to get it chewed and stroke their throats to get it swallowed. Like getting pills down the dog (metaphorically, remember).

I am told that, when I was a toddler, I would only eat eggs if there was a spoonful of sugar on the yolk. (Ugh. The thought makes me shudder. That was a long, long time ago.) But I fully understand the need to make new experiences palatable (staying inside the metaphor).

However, the bottom line is, YOU have to learn TO DO IT FOR YOURSELF, what ever IT is.

Whether it is learning E flat minor scale, or learning your spellings, or filling in your tax return, or training your dog, or parenting your child, YOU have to DO it, and keep on "doing it". "It" won't "do it" by itself.

As a teacher, my job is to make learning fun, adventurous, exciting - true. But I think it is also my job to help children to learn that sometimes the act of doing the learning is none of the above, but still worth persevering with for the long term rewards way, way in the future.

If only life could all be as easy as eating chocolate. However, we need to chew on something more solid in order to grow.

PS None of the above applies to housework or gardening. Both are an utter and complete waste of time - if you do them, a week later it will all look as though you never bothered. Unless of course, you actually LIKE doing them, in which case you can experience the pleasure over and over again as you will never, ever reach the stage of having finished the house or garden.

PPSS The exception for housework is the bathroom, kitchen and loo. If you don't keep those clean you will regret it.

PPPSSS Invest in non-iron clothes. Most of the time I only iron shirts for work (Mon-Thurs as Friday is "dress-down day" and he is wears casual clothes to work)