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Dartington in Conisbrough 1972 - 1975 by Pat Kitto

ISBN 978 0 9551647 1 2    £8.95

Book Review by Stephen Jones

This is the story of a fascinating educational experiment in what might be considered the golden years of progressive education in England. The story covers the years from 1972 to 1975 and yet it is absolutely relevant today.

Michael Gove, the present education minister, talks about his radical plans for schools and in particular the free schools which will allow parents and teachers to establish their own schools. Radical plans existed before this time and this is one of the stories.

In the early seventies progressive education was part of the landscape which include free schools, liberal progressive private schools of which Dartington was one and new community comprehensive schools built to deliver student- centred learning.

Pat Kitto’s book should be compulsory reading for Michael Gove’s new radicals. There is a particular irony in the fact that Toby Young,the son of Michael Young, Lord Young of Dartington, should now be one of the pioneers of the new “free schools”. I am not sure that Pat Kitto’s experiences on the Yorkshire coalfield will resonate strongly with him.

Pat Kitto and her husband Dick were long-serving members of Dartington Hall School but not teachers, and yet they were inspired by the new head, Royston Lambert to move over 300 miles away from friends and family to become wardens of an educational experiment in the middle of the mining community of Conisbrough in the south Yorkshire coalfield.

Lambert had set up a link with Northcliffe Secondary School to see how the progressive methods at Dartington, a private school for children who came from rich and varied backgrounds, would stand up to scrutiny and be relevant to the demands of the state system and in particular to the raising of the school leaving age to sixteen. Equally Arthur Young, the head at Northcliffe, was keen to see if there were any benefits for his school students from mixing with the youngsters from Dartington who followed a different curriculum and had a different relationship with their staff.

Kitto tells a compelling story of working with the children of miners in a community that was about as far removed from the pastoral scene of Dartington as can be imagined, a community at that time shaped by the omnipresence of the coalmine and its history and indeed its future. Her stories are of youngsters who challenge, who come from backgrounds that she has never experienced, where the man is the boss and yet the women are the ones who keep their families and the community together while living in the shadows of their menfolk, where consequently the girls struggle to find their own voice – all such a contrast to her experience at Dartington. She shares freely with the reader her astonishments and her surprises.

The Kittos succeeded in Conisbrough because they believed that the values of the Dartington School were applicable in this very different community. They were listeners, they had immense patience and they believed that children should be given responsibility, they cared and they did not stand on ceremony.

In the early days such values were an invitation to the youngsters to run riot round “The Terrace”, the building which housed the experiment. They could not make sense of the fact that there were not long lists of rules or locked doors. The food was different – brown flour, lots of vegetables and salads. The stories the children tell in the book not only reflect the richness of the oral tradition of the coalfield but also describe an awakening to drama and art, visits to the theatre, learning, living and working with the Dartington children and above all a developing confidence in themselves.

The Kittos aspired to and delivered the principles set out by the heads of the two schools. Like all those involved in progressive education these were challenging tasks, much more so than those in authoritarian institutions where the relationship between adults and young people is very clearly defined and there is no doubting who is in charge.

In this wonderful, relevant book the voice of the young person is strong and clear and it will remind all those working with schoolchildren to listen and to demand the very best from all those they work with.

Stephen Jones

Buy the book Dartington in Conisbrough on this web site.

 

 

 

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