WORKING with children, one must be braced for brutal honesty - and the occasional dressing down, usually delivered with a butter-wouldn't-melt po-face.

Over the years, former school inspector and best-selling author Gervase Phinn has been privy to their incisive cracks, surprisingly quick wit but also withstood more than his fair share of blunt snubs; not to mention the odd wee-soaked mishap.

And lucky for anyone within earshot, having hoarded 40 years' worth of anecdotes in boxfuls of notebooks - and committed them to posterity in as many novels - he remembers every last putdown and unfortunate caper like it was yesterday.

"I was in a school and a little four-year-old was putting sand in a bucket and it was spilling out," he reels off. "I said, 'It won't work, you need to put some water from the water tray'. And she said 'I don't want to'. I said, 'I've got four grandchildren and we make lovely sandcastles on the beach, I'll show you how to do it'. I mixed the sand and water and made a lovely sandcastle. I said to the little girl, 'Now you have a go'. She said, 'Don't want to!'", he adds in a shrill voice, aping the stubborn toddler. So I said, 'Why not?', he coos. "And she looked at me angry with big eyes, 'Because Jamie just weed in the water tray that's why!'", he bursts out laughing.

"It's such a privilege to be in the company of children - the things they say and do," he hastens to add. "Some people have this impression that young people are naughtier than they used to be, that they're not as well behaved but I'm very optimistic about children."

Even when not unknowingly mucking about in questionable sandpits, there was always a bairn to knock his confidence a few pegs, he volunteers, stifling a chuckle.

"A little six-year-old came to me once, took my coat and she said, 'Have you ever thought Mr Phinn that when I'm 21, you'll probably be dead'," he guffaws.

But this is only the tip of the iceberg, and the raconteur insists, he has kept the best yarn for his show at the Wyvern.

"My humour is not cutting-edge. It’s traditional, about children, ostensibly, who are naturally very funny and often come out with the most amazingly observations and commentaries on life. They don’t know anything about skin colour, race, background, religion, they are brutally honest and will ask questions we as adults feel a bit tentative about asking.

"I’ve been doing stage shows for ten years and when they first asked me, I said ‘Let’s do four or five nights in Yorkshire and see how they go’. Then they sort of snowballed. I’ve got people who come and see me again and again."

If his glut of light-hearted anecdotes is not quite enough to win over the public, his bonhomie and soft Yorkshire lilt surely will. Provided they don't mistake him for his almost namesake, anyway.

"I had a few youngsters in the audience once, which doesn't happen very often, but they left after two minutes because they thought they'd come to see Ricky Gervais," he says by-the-by.

Determined to study English at a time when boys were pushed toward scientific subjects, Phinn was one of just three boys in his native Rotherham to enrol at the local girls' high school, the only place to teach the subject. He went on to read literature in Leeds where one astute tutor encouraged him to scribble down any scrap of conversation, fun fact or eavesdropped gossip worth remembering. He picked up the habit and carried on, first as a teacher, then school inspector. His amusing snapshots of life on the frontline became handy fodder for his memoirs.

"You become a bit of a maniac," he confides. "You become a sharp observer, you take your notebook everywhere and write everything down, whatever you see."

But not everyone took an interest at first - and he would likely have remained a virtual unknown, jotting down anecdotes in the comfort of his "bolthole" were it not for a chance encounter with Esther Rantzen, campaigning against school bullying. She invited him to speak on her TV show and within days, he had secured a book deal with Penguin. He has since penned countless books recording the highlights and some of his most heart-wrenching experiences as a school inspector in the Yorkshire Dales, short stories and his best-selling Little Village School novel series.

"It changed my career," booms the 69-year-old. "I received 2,000 letters after the show and one was from Penguin. I had already written short stories and three or four collections of poetry but until then I couldn't find an agent. I'm really indebted to her."

Banter and gags aside, the former teacher, who credits his loving family and supportive teachers for instilling in him the drive to achieve, will touch upon a few hard truths about the state of education and the growing pressures on already overextended teachers.

"I'm saddened at the direction it's going," he deplores. "Teachers should be given a degree of independence so they can be creative. I don't think the masses of paperwork that bombards teachers is helping them or the constant change in education. Everytime there's a new Government there's changes. And teacher try to implement them, then it's all thrown up in the air and they start again."

And it's not merely teachers who are paying the price for politics' tug-of-war: disadvantaged children are falling through the net every day.

"Some children come from loving, encouraging supportive homes but some do not," adds the Childline patron. "I worked in Rotherham where you might have a mum living in a flat with three children, rented accommodation with damp, the children come to school dirty. And how can these children perform well in school, if they don't feel happy and secure and want to learn? We've got to do an awful lot more in education to support disadvantaged children.

"I believe children deserve the best the world can give them. That's what this is all about."

Gervase Phinn will be at the Wyvern Theatre on November 19. To book go to swindontheatres.co.uk or call 01793 524481.