PETT eNewsletter 3 May 2014
Who is Bill Garner? P.E.T.T. and a special bequest
Just before setting to work on this newsletter we learned of a bequest of £20,000, and the gift of his books related to working with children, from Frederick William Marchant Garner, known to us as "Bill".
Bill Garner was born in 1920. Before the Second World War he was a clerk in the Gas Light and Coke Company. While in the Army, from 1940-1945, he discovered a genius for teaching other soldiers, and after the War found that he had special skills in working with "maladjusted" children, and children others found difficult to teach. He became a Quaker, and he knew of, met and was ultimately inspired by David Wills. But the "crown of my whole teaching life", as he called his work with the 'C' stream of an 'ordinary city school', Ivydale School, in Peckham, was very much his own invention. Here, over many years, he developed and proved the success of an inclusive/engaging/participating/ non-punitive approach to remedial work and to teaching the children regularly sent into the lowest stream of an urban school. What David Wills and others did in large houses in the countryside, as part of supportive teams, Mr. Garner did in a city school, with the approval and support of his headteachers.
Bonus material:
William Frederick Garner: “I want to tell you about my work in the ‘C’ stream”.
An interview with Bill Garner by Craig Fees, June 14, 2006
(here).
The Internet Archive did not save the recordings, which is a shame - his voice, and the sounds of his flat are part of the magic of the recording events - but there is his refined version of the transcript, and a record of his legacy.
"In the Spring of 2006, archivist Craig Fees was contacted by William Frederick - Bill - Garner, a retired teacher, a Quaker, who wanted to write about his experience with "backward" children in the 'C' stream of an inner city school. He had developed a very successful approach, the development of which came to an abrupt end when he reached the age of mandatory retirement. The story had not quite reached fulfillment; and by writing it down it felt as if he wanted to bring a kind of completion. He got in touch with the Archive for information about David Wills and the wider background to the field, and Craig sent him a copy of Maurice Bridgeland's "Pioneer Work With Maladjusted Children".
"They then spoke on the phone, during the course of which Craig suggested recording a conversation about what Mr. Garner wanted to say, as a way of helping Mr. Garner with his writing: the Trust would transcribe the conversation, and in that way give Mr. Garner a written armature to build on. The paper below came out of that process: Mr. Garner made corrections and changes to that first transcript; a revised version was typed and returned; there was more refinement. The text below emerged from that process. With more time, there would undoubtedly have been more refinement still...."
