Grammar Gazette - Issue 1, 2024

MR ANDREW PENNAY DIRECTOR OF CREATIVE ARTS

1

What’s the ST A TE OF ‘PL A Y’? ANDREW PENNAY RETURNS TO THE CREATIVE ARTS, FOLLOWING A YEAR-LONG GAME OF CULTURAL HIDE ‘N’ SEEK

2

There’s an old joke that starts: ‘What lies in the cupboard, covered in cobwebs?’ Read on for the answer. I n 2023, I undertook the Girls Grammar Staff Fellowship to unearth some aspects of our academic culture that are worth propagating into the future. The Fellowship initiative recognises the value of our expert staff, seeking to enhance teaching at the School, and to promote the School as a leader in effective and innovative teaching. It was a glorious search, full of dead ends and surprises. It was also full of cupboards, cobwebs, and sunshine. Although it is impossible to summarise a year’s worth of cultural research in a word, I will try: Play. It’s everywhere, and for good reason. It’s in the dissection of a flower in Year 7, the cha-cha in Year 9, and—for many of our girls—a complex Mathematics problem in Year 10.

Most prominently, play is at the cricket pitch, the concert, and the bake stall. As I said, we see play everywhere, and we see it for good reason.

3

16

GAZETTE • ISSUE 1, 2024 ISSUE 1, 2024

BRISBANE GIRLS GRAMMAR SCHOOL