The wrapping paper fills the recycling bin, already overflowing with bottles and cardboard. It has been a festive Christmas. A very happy 2025 to all our readers.
January is full of promise and good intentions. Those resolutions – how long will they last? Research shows the most common adult resolutions relate to diet, weight, alcohol and money. As to children, might it be: keeping my room tidy, helping more at home, doing my homework properly, in timely fashion – even going so far as being kinder to my younger siblings? In a school assembly, late January, I would ask how many had sustained those good intentions. Their expressions told the story.
So what advice and support can we give our young people as 2025 dawns? The alarm clock will come as something of a shock after those late nights and lie-ins but school, college, university and life must go on.
The January reset is important. Equally so is the need to look back – to reflect. The Roman God Janus – hence January – is pictured looking both back and forward. A former colleague (why is it always the Head of Classics?) had a great expression: the past is for informing, not inhabiting. Learning from past experience can only enhance learning and development; child and adult alike. Learn and move on. I am no neuroscientist but my understanding of the emerging adolescent is that the developing emotional brain lags behind that of the logical brain. This leads to what we will recognise as teenage spontaneity and impulsivity. Ask a teenager about any ethical matter where there is a right and a wrong and you will, most likely, be given the right answer. The same will not necessarily be found in their everyday behaviour and decision-making: they will sometimes, inevitably, get it wrong.

One of our many responsibilities as parents and teachers is to encourage reflection. As adults we might not want to spend too long looking back at 2024 but, in the context of education and learning, we should do so with our young people. Don’t be afraid of tackling those things that didn’t go so well. Revisit them, reflect on them, discuss the learning, check the compass.
Many of our young people will face national or school entry exams in the coming months. Look at last term’s report – if there is one. Return to any targets set back in September. Were those targets achievable and how far have we travelled? What are the actions needed to sustain or even accelerate progress? What support is needed?
Admittedly rather clichéd, leading a horse to water won’t necessarily make it drink. Giving the direction to young people doesn’t necessarily mean they will take or follow it. But that is as it should be – they must learn to take responsibility for their own lives, their decisions, their learning and, so it follows, the consequences.
Thomas Henry Huxley, the Victorian anthropologist and biologist, did not benefit from any formal education. He was, however, determined to educate himself, rising to prominence as an academic and even Privy Councillor. What a fantastic role model for our young people, witnessed by these wise words: “Perhaps the most valuable result of all education is the ability to make yourself do the thing you have to do, when it ought to be done, whether you like it or not.” Excellent advice for the new year – perhaps for children and adults alike? May 2025 bring you all happiness and fulfilment.

Mike’s book, Careering is available now with troubador.co.uk. You can contact Mike at mikepiercy@hotmail.com with your education-related queries.