Today in my post, I would like your understanding and for you to spend a couple of minutes humouring me …

Read the original document below – it is from Great Dunmow’s churchwardens’ accounts of 1530 so is the financial records of a church. Read it aloud, without stopping (don’t bother with the Roman numerals for the shillings and pence at the end of each line). Don’t make notes but just read it in straight through in one attempt. If you stumble, just carry onto the next line. Everything you are reading is an English word or person’s name still in use today and all lines should make absolute perfect sense as you read it.

How did you get on? Could you read it? If you could, did you understand exactly what you are reading? Now you’ve finished, can you remember what you read and précis it to someone else? What if you were under pressure reading this in a roomful of your peers who found it easy-peasy? Would it make you break-out in a cold sweat of inadequacy and failure?

Unless you are very experienced in reading Tudor hand writing or you are a palaeography expert, then I suggest you found it very difficult – if not impossible. Not just reading it, but also understanding and remembering it. Did some of the words come in and out of focus – not just literal focus – blurry one minute but clear the next – but also mental focus? One minute you understood something but the next minute you couldn’t and its meaning simply vanished into the deepest depths of your mind?

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Thank you for humouring me and walking in my severely dyslexic child’s shoes. The difficulty you had in reading this 500 year old document is exactly the same experience my child has every day of his life reading modern English whether in a book, on a favourite iPad game, or written by hand.

Dyslexia is horrible. Not only do dyslexics have to cope with the difficulties you have just experienced but suffers are called “lazy”, “stupid”, “academically challenged” and “thick”. And to top it all, many dyslexic children, such as my child(ren), are denied a proper education suitable for their needs.

I should know. I am dyslexic too. And as a dyslexic, I had absolutely no trouble in reading the extract above because I have no pre-conceived ideas about the English language and ‘spelling rules’.  Much like our Tudor accountant who most certainly didn’t know about modern-English spelling – just how many ways can anyone spell ‘church’! I spotted three different spellings just within that one little sample.  Also, just look at the last word on second line (before the shillings & pence) and look at our Tudor scribe’s spelling of ‘house’ – ‘hawys’!  And our Tudor accountant didn’t know that correct modern grammar meant he should have written ‘from’ or ‘for’ instead of ‘of’!

My child would certainly not make a good Tudor accountant. He’d be able to add up everything in his head without the need of a paper abacus because he’s a whiz at maths, but won’t be able to write it down in any comprehensible way.  Oh, and if you think I was mean in displaying the extract in a strange black & white visual, then you may be surprised to know that many dyslexics also suffer from visual perception problems too. My son does. His is called Irlens Syndrome – black ink on bright white paper causes his eyes considerable stress. Not a good syndrome to have when you are also severely dyslexic.

These are  just the problems a dyslexic faces when reading.  There are equally severe problems with writing, which, for my child, is not helped by his dysprexia which makes pen control very difficult.

But for now, until his needs are properly met, there’s the misery of the school years for him to stagger and lurch through.

Thank you for walking in my son’s shoes

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Speak roughly to your little boy,
And beat him when he can’t read:
He only does it to annoy,
Because he knows he can really

Chorus: Wah! Wah! Wah

I speak severely to my boy,
I beat him when he can’t read:
For he can thoroughly enjoy
Reading when he pleases!

Chorus: Wah! Wah! Wah

(Written with tongue firmly in cheek and apologies to
Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll
but dedicated to everyone everywhere who doesn’t ‘believe in dyslexia’
or thinks that dyslexic children are lazy or ‘aren’t trying’.)

You may also be interested in
– School Trip Friday – St Michael’s Mount and the Tudor Pretender, Perkin Warbeck
– School Trip Friday – Weald and Downland Open Air Museum
– School Trip Friday – Chapel of St Peter’s on the Wall, Bradwell
– School Trip Friday – Imperial War Museum Duxford
– School Trip Friday – Of Cabbages and Kings
– School Trip Friday – Hadrian’s Wall
– School Trip Friday – Messages from England’s Roman Past
– School Trip Friday – What did the Roman’s ever do for us?

© Essex Voices Past 2013.

Many people use the word ‘journey’ to describe something very personal to them which has been life changing (and possibly life-enhancing). Maybe a ‘spiritual journey’ or an ‘emotional journey’ on their way to the top as a world-class Olympic champion? My own journey has far less lofty aspirations: mine is to provide my vulnerable child, who has severe learning difficulties, the correct education he so desperately needs. A year ago this month, I decided that we had to do ‘something’ to stop the downward emotional and mental spiral of our small child who was struggling, and failing spectacularly, in mainstream education. So we withdrew him from school and, after failing to convince our local education authority as to the extent of his needs, took to the Courts to get them to provide protection for his educational needs. Sadly, having won the legal battle to convince my local education authority that he requires a Statement of Special Educational Needs, the war continues with the grown-ups still fighting through the courts for the precise education he so desperately needs. In the meantime, my son continues to be ‘home educated’ and so continues the massive spiritual, emotional and physical ‘journey’ for him and me. (It is totally beyond my understanding why I have to go to the law of this land to get the education that my child so desperately needs – isn’t that a basic human right in our so-called progressive country?)

My own ‘journey’ is to be my child’s legal advocate, educational tutor and mentor. Me? Someone with nearly 30 years of experience of the hustle and bustle of the corporate IT world but zero experience of teaching children. Me: now tasked with organising the legal battle, along with personally tutoring one small vulnerable child, and, more importantly, arranging much more competent specialist tutoring than myself.  But there are some considerable pluses to this ‘journey’. Now, my eyes and ears are more alert and more receptive to the sights and sounds of life. Mine are the ears and eyes which are the conduit to teach my child about life and the universe: anything and everything.

In the first week of March, during a beautiful balmy English Spring-time, my ‘journey’ became one that is physical as we once more headed for the hills and arrived in Cornwall for a week of rest, relaxation and tuition. Last term, our quest was to search out Romans at Hadrian’s Wall in Northumberland. This term, our quest is to search out the dark ages and then onto medieval kings and queens. Our appetite was already wetted with watching every single programme on the recent discovery of the mortal remains of Richard III.  We came to Cornwall expecting to find the far distant voices of King Arthur at Tintagel but didn’t expect the echoes of Richard III and Henry VII in the furthest tips of Cornwall.

Our journey across this, one of the most beautiful counties of England, included early-modern stories of smugglers, Revenue Men, and Wreckers, along with modern-day stories of the sacrifice of the heroic lifeboat men of Penlee and Mousehole. It therefore seemed appropriate that we spent Tuesday 5th March 2013, St Piran’s Day, the patron Saint of Cornwall, walking through that most iconic of Cornish lands, St Michael’s Mount.

5 March 2013, the Cornish flag on St Piran’s Day, St Michael’s Mount

What can be more enticing to a small child who can barely read and write then the legends and stories of this magical isle? Tales of seven foot giant skeletons found buried under the church’s staircase… The legend of Jack the giant killer: the giant whose heart still vigorously beats in the chests of today’s young children who pause for a moment to tread on his  heart which is buried within the very pathway to the top of the Mount…

And there on the foreshore of St Michael’s Mount and the causeway to the island was lurking the Tudor story of Perkin Warbeck.  The second of the Tudor Pretenders.

Perkin Warbeck, the second Tudor Pretender, born circa 1474, executed 1499

Perkin Warkbeck who pretended to be one of the Princes in the Tower.  The long-dead brother of the long-since murdered Edward V, in 1490 Perkin Warbeck proclaimed himself to be Richard of Shrewsbury, Duke of York: the Yorkist king of England, Richard IV.  A claim that was championed by no less than Margaret of Burgundy, the sister of Edward IV and Richard III, and, therefore, aunt to the real Princes in the Tower: Edward V and Richard.  After much adventuring and political championing throughout the Continent, Perkin Warbeck finally landed by sea in Cornwall in September 1497 and took occupation of St Michael’s Mount. After refortifying the Mount’s castle, he left his beautiful wife, Lady Catherine Gordon, on the Mount for safety. From St Michael’s Mount, he and his army of west-country rebels marched through Cornwall and the south-west of England in his attempt to seize the English throne: an attempt which ended in failure and his capture at Beaulieu Abbey in Hampshire. Henry VII reached Taunton on 4 October 1497 when the Cornish rebels and Perkins’army surrendered. Perkin Warbeck finally met his maker and an unceremonious end on 23 November 1499 at the end of a rope on the gallows of Tyburn, London.

And the fate of Warbeck’s wife, Lady Catherine Gordon?  She suffered a very lenient fate at the hands of Henry VII.  She was the daughter of the Scottish George Gordon, 2nd Earl of Huntly.  For political reasons, it had suited the Scottish king, James IV, to believe that Warbeck was indeed Richard, Duke of York.  Therefore Warbeck was encouraged to marry the daughter of a Scottish nobleman.  Warbeck and Lady Catherine had a grand and lavish wedding in Edinburgh.  Calling herself the ‘Duchess of York’, Lady Catherine was finally captured by Henry VII’s forces at St Michael’s Mount, Cornwall in September or October 1497.  She was brought back to London. Surprisingly Henry VII treated her very kindly and she became a much favoured (and favourite) lady-in-waiting to his wife, Elizabeth of York.  Henry VII arranged for Lady Catherine to have a pension, paid for by him, and he also settled her expenses for her clothes.  The favours continued when Lady Catherine attended her Scottish king, James IV’s, 1503 marriage to Henry VII’s daughter, Margaret and the same year, she was the Chief Mourner at Elizabeth of York’s funeral.  Lady Catherine’s fate at the hands of Henry VII was remarkably kind and generous, especially considering that if Warbeck really had been Richard, Duke of York, then Elizabeth of York would have been her sister-in-law.  Perhaps Henry VII decided that it was better to keep your (innocent) enemies close to you rather then have them holed up on a far-distant Cornish island? Lady Catherine went on to marry a further three husbands and died a peaceful death in 1537 – many many years after her adventures with the Tudor Pretender, Perkin Warbeck.

Was Warbeck Richard, Duke of York?…  Who knows!  But who-ever he was, my husband, child and I thoroughly enjoyed our trip to St Michael’s Mount on St Piran’s Day.

The Castle on St Michael’s Mount

The perilous staircase up to the castle on St Michael’s Mount.
Whenever the castle was besieged throughout the centuries,
the poor troops had to run up these stairs to storm the castle!

The view from the top of St Michael’s Mount’s castle

One of the early-modern canons, now (strangely!)
trained on the amphibious boat used to transport modern-day
residents and visitors to the island

Looking down the canon into the bay

The canons on St Michael’s Mount

The ancient causeway totally under the water of high-tide
but visible from the top of St Michael’s Mount

Medieval stained glass windows from Bruges in the
Chevy Chase room, St Michael’s Mount

The medieval church of St Michael’s Mount

Medieval stained glass in the church of St Michael’s Mount

A medieval religious object within the church of St Michael’s Mount

Re-enacting Perkin Warbeck leaving St Michael’s Mount?
Or King Canute trying to drive back the waves?

Postscript
Home educating a year on, it is somewhat strange that I have ended up teaching my special educational needs child about life and the universe in the very area where the controversial councillor, Collin Brewer, proclaimed that special educational needs children need ‘putting down’. Mr Brewer, if you are reading this, come spend a day (or two) with me and my child whilst I home educate him, and tell my child to his face that he needs putting down. Or alternatively, do some good by showing my child (and me) that you lofty councillors do care about some of the most vulnerable people in our society. Mr Brewer, come listen to the story of my child and my fight for him to have a basic human right: a school education. I promise you, our story will make you weep.

You may also be interested in
– School Trip Friday – Weald and Downland Open Air Museum
– School Trip Friday – Chapel of St Peter’s on the Wall, Bradwell
– School Trip Friday – Imperial War Museum Duxford
– School Trip Friday – Of Cabbages and Kings
– School Trip Friday – Hadrian’s Wall
– School Trip Friday – Messages from England’s Roman Past
– School Trip Friday – What did the Roman’s ever do for us?

© Essex Voices Past 2013.

Last week I posted on my blog my first post about our School Trip Friday – trips that my child and I take as part of our home education programme.  This week, my School Trip Friday is along the salt marshes of the Essex coast.  Essex is much maligned on tv and in the national press but its coast-line has some of the most beautiful but wild, remote and isolated areas within East Anglia.  This is a School Trip Friday which took place during late summer – hence the crops still in the fields!  This School Trip Friday combined history and religion (St Peter’s Chapel at Bradwell), along with geography (Geocaching along the coastline) and science (butterfly hunting). 

How else but walking through our beautiful countryside can we achieve the combination of teaching Roman history along with the Dark Ages and World War 2 all on one glorious day out! 

The rough track leading to the isolated chapel

The view of the Chapel from the coast-line

In AD653, Cedd  arrived from Lindisfarne to spread Christainity on the request of the King of the East Saxons, Sigeberht the Good.  The following year, Cedd became the Bishop of Essex and built his Cathedral of St Peters.  It was built on the foundations of the Roman Fort where the gatehouse had been – hence its name ‘St Peter-on-the-Wall’.  It is one of the oldest surviving churches in England.

From the approximately the 18th century until 1920, the Chapel was used as a barn for storage and the shelter for cattle.  

A postcard from when the chapel was still used for storage and cattle

The door leading into the chapel

The late Summer light streaming into the Chapel

Inside the Chapel – the simple altar

Outside the Chapel on the sea wall.  This part of the Essex coast-line is full of Second World War Pill Boxes – a line of sea defences built to protect England from any possible German invasion.  The wild sea and mud of the salt marshes have reclaimed many of the pillboxes 

An ancient fishing structure still visible in the water even at mid-tide

The red sails of a magnificent Thames Barge clearly visible in the distance.

All pictures are © Essex Voices Past
and may not be produced without permission

Further reading
– Second World War – GHQ Line
– Great Dunmow’s Second World War Pill Boxes
– Military Pill boxes
– Pill Box Study Group
– St Peter’s on the Wall, Bradwell

You may also be interested in
– School Trip Friday – Weald and Downland Open Air Museum

 Join us this time next week for our next School Trip Friday…!

I have always been a traditional and conventional kind-of-a person (whatever ‘traditional’ and ‘conventional’ mean!).  So it is with great surprise that, some 17 years after my eldest child took their first hesitant steps into a classroom, I found myself having to withdraw my youngest child – aged only 8 – from mainstream schooling.  The reasons for this are serious and includes a diagnosis of severe dyslexia along with many other special educational needs.   Someone (who should have known better) wrote of my child that they are ‘academically challenged’.  I am also dyslexic, so with my first class honours history degree and masters in local history from Cambridge University, I am proud to have the same badge as my child of being academically challenged.

So, for the past few months, I have had to educate my child at home – while the grown-ups fight out my child’s future in the Courts, and I have had to learn very quickly the educational laws of this land.  There have been some positives, whilst I cope with the most stressful and distressing situation of my entire life (the legal battles, not the home education!).   For the first time in 17 years, I am no longer governed by term time, school holidays and half terms.  Instead, we can roam and explore our beautiful country at our own pace, at our own time and in our own way – and in a way suitable for my child’s learning style.

Every Friday, we push the school books aside, switch off the computer with its bleeping educational apps, and head for the hills.  For Friday is our ‘School Trip Friday’.  We visit places that interest us – history, geography, geology – Tudors, Romans, Vikings – nature walks, bug hunting, Geocaching – anything and everything all rolled into one glorious day out each week.

Come join us on one of our School Trip Fridays for the Academically Challenged at the Weald and Downland Open Air Museum in Chichester, West Sussex.

Storm clouds gathering over the market place.

Medieval Shop from Horsham, Sussex.
This is a pair of shops which were originally built in the 15th century.
Only one of the pair has stairs up to the jettied upper rooms.
This is our favourite house in the entire museum – great for playing ‘shops’ in!

Upper Hall from Crawley (circa 1500).  The ground floor was divided into separate rooms and the first floor was one long open room (perhaps used as a meeting room).  Both ends of the building are not the original (only one end is visible in my picture – in the centre) – they are modern ends added because the original ends no longer exist.

Market Hall from Titchfield, Hampshire.
A typical 17th century market hall – this one was built in 1620.
The lower level was used as an open arcade used by traders whilst
the rooms on the upper floor would have been used as the town’s council chambers.  Under the stairs leading to the upper level there is a ‘cage’ (or village lock-up).

House from Walderton, Sussex.  This is a 17th century building constructed of flint and brick.  This was our 2nd favourite building of the day – mainly because one of the museum’s wonderful volunteer helpers spent a long time talking to my child about the house.  We were shown the indentations on the cobbles by the hearth (inside) caused by hob-nailed boots where the man of the house used to stand and shuffle, trying to warm himself in front of the fire.  We were shown how the building was constructed and altered over hundreds of years of occupation to suit each new generation.  The front door was of great fascination because of the over-sized lock!  All the nooks and crannies within this incredible house was scrutinized and studied in depth through the eyes of an 8 year old child.  The volunteers and staff love their museum and I thank them for the patience and trouble they took with my child.

‘Bayleaf Farmstead’ – Wealden House from Chiddingstone, Kent.

‘Bayleaf Farmstead’ – Wealden House from Chiddingstone, Kent.

‘Bayleaf Farmstead’ – Wealden House from Chiddingstone, Kent.  A timber-framed hall-house from the early 15th century.

Inside the Wealden House from Chiddingstone.

Inside the Wealden House from Chiddingstone – the open fire place.

Inside the Wealden House from Chiddingstone – the kitchen area.

Inside the Wealden House from Chiddingstone – the kitchen area.

Inside the Wealden House from Chiddingstone.

Hall from Boarhunt, Hampshire.  This building dates from the late 14th century and is an example of a medieval open hall.

All pictures are © Essex Voices Past
and may not be produced without permission

Further information
I hope you have enjoyed looking at some of our photos of our School Trip Friday into the buildings and architecture of England’s medieval and Tudor heritage.  This is just a very small sample of the houses that can be visited at the Weald and Downland Open Air Museum.  We thoroughly recommend that you pay a visit.

Weald and Downland Open Air Museum
Building History: Weald & Downland Open Air Museum 1970-2010 the First 40 Years

Join us this time next week for our next School Trip Friday…!