Teaching pupils to clown around

BEHIND the red spongy noses and the elastic balloon animals, there’s a method to Bryan Black’s silliness – a serious belief in the value of letting kids clown around.  

The 32-year-old physical education teacher at Old Mill South Middle School in Millersville, Maryland in the Unites States, scanned the list of after-school clubs and found the standard options year after year: drama, orchestra, soccer, yearbook. He was concerned about the lack of opportunities for students whose interests don’t fit into predictable activities, recognising that not every kid can be the team captain or first-chair violin in the orchestra.