Mattie appeared on a BBC documentary called “SHOW ME WHAT YOUR MADE OF” which was filmed in Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia. For 3 weeks he had to leave us and go with 4 other children and the TV crew to film the series. He was just 13 years old at the time and we thought maybe he might actually take and learn something from this experience.
He had to work in the factories making their products, so he was well aware of how hard they worked for very little money, and he also had to live with the families too to see what their home life was like! Looking back at the series now I think Mattie wishes he probably had tried a little harder and maybe not took things for granted. But at 13 years old he was never going to fully appreciated this. Clever editing by the Producers portrayed Mattie to be a spoilt unruley kid when actually he was far from this. Just liked to be heard. would voice his opinion at any given opportunity, would take every moment and run with it if he thought he was getting one over on any adult, so you can image what he was like at School!
But everyone that knows Mattie knows there are 2 sides to him, no not a JEKYLL AND HYDE type character, but more like a cheeky chimp and hungry lion… he could be very funny and oozed vivaciously with his confidence and character but then the hungry lion in him took any opportunity to have an answer for absolutely everything and would go in for the kill if he saw the moment arise. Once at school we had to go into to speak with the Headteacher due to a racist incident. NOOOOOOOOO WAAAAAYYYY was Mattie a racist child, what on earth was school talking about.
“So Mr & Mrs Barnett, we are here today to speak about your Son, Mattie, in relation to an incident that occurred whilst on School premises” Oh my god just cut to the chase you robotic numbskull, and whilst I will support School with any kind of unwarranted incident I needed to know the full facts here! Get this…….
TEACHER – Today´s lesson is on different parts of the world (nope not a cooking lesson but a Geography lesson) – Mattie´s favourite (NOT). We will be looking at people from different parts of the world namely Japan, England, Scotland, USA, India…… the list goes on!
MATTIE – Miss, if we can call people from Japan (Japanese) and people from Scotland (Scots) and people from England (Brits) why can´t we call people from Pakistan (Paki´s)??
Reasonable question, yes? NOPE all the class laughed which obviously spurred Mattie on to keep challenging, and rather than the Teacher saying “I don´t know the answer to this question” she got herself all worked up and into panic mode! There is a time and a place apparently for asking these type of questions and a classroom was not the right place.
NICE ONE SCHOOL! Beyond belief, so you have called us into school to speak about Mattie asking a question in relation to ethnic minority groups and why they are called what they are called, or not as the case maybe?????
SoPro 