ATL

The great outdoors

Former Blue Peter presenter and UK Chief Scout Peter Duncan looks at how young people can be inspired by the stimulus of the real world

In 1999 I attended a conference at Nottingham University about creativity, culture and education. By this time I had been a Blue Peter presenter, toured in my own drama workshops and worked as an actor, often in children's theatre. My own education had been fragmentary; being born into a touring theatrical family, I had never even taken a proper exam until I enrolled in the Open University.

Young people are inspired by the stimulus of the real world, an active imagination and the journey of discovery at a pace that suits them. I understood this instinctively but I wanted to see if the experts at the conference felt this way too.

I concluded that they did, but there was an inability to apply it to the education system, which was always having to digest the latest guidelines and philosophies. So, much to my surprise, 10 years later I discovered a new agency called Creativity, Culture & Education, with £100 million to spend during the next two years.

It has evolved from the successful Creative Partnerships scheme and its aim is to transform the aspirations, attainments, skills and life chances of young people. I hope the teaching profession thinks it is a positive move and not just another organisation with cash to spend.

My own personal version of extracurricular stimulus was to take my children - three daughters and a son - on backpacking filming sabbaticals around the world, turning their reactions to the cultures they encountered into TV documentaries.

This, in turn, has led to a Mandarin-speaking daughter, and three other children who want to enter the adult world on their terms and not through the model someone else has formed. I think a lot of wise young people want to re-calibrate the world and not prop up faltering institutions.

I have taken to making grand statements about young people over the last few years because another outcome of being a TV daredevil and adventurer was being asked to become Chief Scout, the symbolic leader of the UK's half-a-million volunteers and scouts.

It has been good to see the Scout Association's profile and numbers grow during my time in the role because its ethos contains many of the ideas I have been involved with all my life. Our current campaign is called simply KidsOutdoors, which is an all-embracing title but with an emphasis that is needed in a digital age.

Founder Robert Baden-Powell's philosophy was that of a man who wished to conjure equal opportunities for all young people, whatever their background. He was a practical teacher who passed on skills and set challenges. I have always felt that the more we are able to leave the classroom (with the teacher), the better. I understand how difficult it can be in the health-and-safety, CRB-checking quagmire we have entered into, but it is worth the effort.

During the last few weeks I have been sharing a dressing room with a new primary school teacher who was Widow Twankey to my Wishee Washee in Aladdin. In our chats between scenes about his education profession, it was his passion for inspiring his class that most impressed me.

I could never imagine completely giving up the 'roar' of the greasepaint for the 'roar' of the classroom, but for him, one passion - teaching - had become more important. Becoming a teacher or a volunteer and working for young people can be hugely rewarding and I admire anyone who takes the plunge, whatever his or her former profession.

For more information see www.creativitycultureeducation.org and www.scouts.org.uk.

Peter Duncan presented Blue Peter from 1980 to 1986 and is volunteer Chief Scout of the UK, see www.heresoneimadeearlier.com.

Image (c) Phil Wrigglesworth