If you were a shape, what shape would you be?

Circle.

I could leave it at that but Terrie would fail me for not writing enough words. I could analyse why I’d want to be a circle but to be honest that would probably be a bit boring seen as I don’t really know why I’d want to be a circle. Or, I could talk about the song that starts with this quote but seen as I’d literally heard it once when Terrie played it to me, that too would be a bit boring. Instead, I’m going to talk about our mechanics lessons.

“Mechanics?” you ask, “In a girls’ school?” Well, yes. Not car mechanics exactly but a type of maths which is a like an awesome form of physics. But don’t be fooled! Our mechanics lessons are awesome and although we do eventually do the work, we also have a lot of fun. Last lesson we spent a lot of it just asking each other weird and wonderful question and, yes, you’ve guessed it, “If you were a shape, what shape would you be?” was one of them. There was only one of the boys in this lesson and the poor guy had to put up with us girls talking about who are our favourite celebrity and other such girly shenanigans.

One of the craziest lessons we had actually didn’t deviate from what we were learning. There was one question involving pulleys that we didn’t think quite make sense so the boys decided to test it out with a table, some books, a pulley, some string and some weights...

"As the rest of the class chatted amongst themselves the boys fiddled about with the pulley system they had created. Books were piled up underneath one end of the table while the other two legs rested on another table. Threading some string over the pulley the boys watched the weights slide down the table.

‘I’m going to build a time machine!’ one of them joked, sliding the weights once more. Again the pulley span round making a quiet buzzing noise that was easily drowned out by the class’s loud chatter. The boys continued to play with their large makeshift pulley system, unaware of the Huon energy gradually building up.

A strange, inhuman noise broke into the chatter and the girls all glanced at each other in disbelief. It couldn’t be. The boys had only been joking when they mentioned time travel. It couldn’t be. Nevertheless, a blue box started to materialise in the corner of the classroom and everyone stared in awe. The boys hadn’t created a time machine but they’d done something (in the girls’ view) much better. A cold breeze swept around the room rustling the pages of the forgotten maths books and everyone’s eyes locked onto the police box that had appeared in their room.

The squeak of a door broke the silence and two Converse clad feet stepped out onto the carpet. The tall figure that stepped out scratched the back of his head before pulling out a pair of dark brown rimmed glasses. After studying the outside of his blue box he turned to face the room, almost knocking over the boys’ bizarre contraption.

‘Whoa!’ he said, grabbing onto the table before it fell. ‘Health and safety problem that. Better not let your head teacher see that. On the other hand, this thing looks pretty ingenious; fancy contraption that seems to be creating Huon energy.’ Fishing out a strange metal tube-like contraption he pointed it at the boys’ pulley system and a gentle blue light emanated from the end.

Coming to her senses, Hannah elbowed Ellie muttering two words: ‘He came.’ Suddenly Ellie jumped to her feet startling both the elusive man and the rest of the class.

‘Doctor!’ She exclaimed excitedly. ‘It’s actually you! And not regenerated Matt Smith style you, proper David Tennant you! Please tell me I’m not dreaming!’

‘No, you’re not dreaming.’ The Doctor replied. ‘But I feel like I am. Who are you and, urm, how exactly did you create huon energy?’

‘Long story,’ Hannah piped up, finally finding the courage to speak. ‘We were having a mechanics lesson, you know, the maths sort, and there was this question that didn’t quite make sense, well, sort of half made sense, so we thought we would, like, try it out so the boys made this pulley system to model it. They were measuring the angle exactly and everything and the pulley worked like the book said even though we thought that the heavier weight moving up the slope didn’t sound quite right and then you sort of just turned up. Urm... would now be a bad time to want to hug you?’

‘Hang on, slow down. Yes, you can hug me in just a minute but who are you all?’

A nervous voice piped up from the end of the table. ‘I’m Rosanna; the one who wants to hug you is Hannah. Ellie is the small but over excited year 13 standing over there; Alice is sitting next to me and Terrie seems to be off sick today but I think you’ve met her. Or if not you’re going to meet her soon. Scott and Ali were the boys making that pulley system and Liam and George and the other two. Our teacher went to get something just before you arrived...’ Rosanna tailed off.

‘Well then... Hi everyone!’ The Doctor looked round at everyone giving a big grin. ‘You still want that hug, Hannah?’

Hannah smiled back, suddenly becoming incredibly shy. ‘Thanks.’ She said quietly, walking over to the Doctor’s outstretched arms. After an awkward but warm hug the Doctor turned back to the rest of the class.

‘Right then, how’s about a mechanics lesson Doctor style?’ Skipping over to the projector he zapped it with his sonic screwdriver. ‘Time for a software upgrade I think.’ He winked at the girls sitting nearer the back. ‘Alons-y! Mechanics. Mechanics, mechanics, mechanics, mechanics. I hope you’re getting all this down!’

Over the next fifty minutes the Doctor gave them an unforgettable lesson. The sonic screwdriver made numbers and letters dance over the walls and the class was mesmerised. Half way through their teacher slid back in but a flash of psychic paper was enough to let the Doctor continue.


In what seemed no time at all, the end of period pips went brining the class back to reality.

‘Weeeeell, I better get going.’ The Doctor said, glancing around the room.

‘Do you have to go?’ Ellie asked hopefully. ‘Or can we come with you?’

‘Why not?’ The Doctor replied, giving a massive grin. ‘Just one trip, mind you! Just this once. Alons-y!’

They all scurried into the TARDIS ready to face whatever adventure was to confront them. But that’s another story..."