What a wicked world we inhabit currently. There’s a catalogue of gloom facing us “out there” at present.

We’ve witnessed a spate of terrorist attacks by radical Islamists, and then the attack on Muslims in Finsbury Park by an alleged right-wing white extremist.

Then there was the Grenfell Tower tragedy, a tower block blaze claiming a shocking toll of lives and homes alike, and giving rise to understandably angry questions about corporate greed, austerity and penny-pinching: the disregard for the poor and failings in regulatory enforcement within both local and national government was profound.

Wednesday saw calls for a “Day of Rage” from the Movement for Justice By Any Means Necessary. This organisation jumped on the bandwagon of the Grenfell Tower inferno (largely in defiance of the wishes of victims and local inhabitants alike, it would seem), hoping to see a million people take to the streets in order to “bring down” Theresa May’s government. Perhaps the tiny turnout was a reflection of the temperature in the capital that day: a more likely reason, I think, was the fact that ordinary people accept that the election result is legitimate, even if deeply unsatisfactory.

For unsatisfactory it is. We have a minority government or hung parliament (delete according to your political opinions). An arrogant, overconfident prime minister and government called a snap election, only to discover that they had lost the sympathy of a large swathe of the electorate, receiving a political bloody nose as a result. Weakened and lame, the new government cut all the tricky bits out of its Queen’s Speech. Some even seem to believe that the Tories have lost their mandate to govern - which isn’t constitutionally correct, as it happens.

‘Making senes of a confused world’

How can we in schools make sense of this confused world for our pupils, let alone point them towards ways of making it better? A colleague tangled with that very challenge in a school assembly this week.

The first angle to take on all the lies, perhaps, is the observation that we’re not entirely helpless in the face of these difficulties.

From mayhem, murder and disaster emerge stories of great human courage: the heroism of the firefighters in Grenfell Tower; the outpouring of support, kindness and goodwill from local residents there, and from bystanders and witnesses at Westminster, London Bridge and Manchester. Add to that the amazing medics dealing with the casualties (if you missed Tuesday night’s BBC2 programme about how St Mary’s Hospital, Paddington, saved lives and worked medical miracles around the clock, I suggest you catch it on iPlayer).

I can’t be the only person irritated by headlines (mostly from observers abroad) describing panic and terror in London. On the contrary, we Brits, moaners and complainers as a rule, tend to prove ourselves stoic in the face of real disaster: resilience, generosity and heroism have been the qualities most in evidence following these tragedies. Above all, though, what has shone through is a determination to get on with normal life - which perhaps explains why so few were prepared, notwithstanding public anger, to join in political agitation or riot.

We shouldn’t underestimate that strength of character, demonstrated not least by the way life carries on as normal. Even the cut-down version of the Queen’s State Opening of Parliament, short of planning time, remained a piece of pageantry and ceremony that few nations can match.

Meanwhile, life goes predictably on. As the south swelters in an unprecedented heat wave, the north suffers thunderstorms and potential floods. And Britain’s (and the world’s) top tennis player goes out in the first round of a major tournament (OK: that was a joke, if true).

Business as usual? Yes. And the business of schools must involve teaching the young about healing divisions, not widening them: supporting one another; giving help and even putting our own safety on the line when others need us; and always appreciating that, as ever, compassion and thoughtfulness for others are what really make the world go round as we would want it to.

It’s not rocket science - creating a humane and caring society never was - it’s both way more simple and much more complicated than that.

Dr Bernard Trafford is headteacher of the Royal Grammar School, Newcastle upon Tyne, and a former chair of the Headmasters’ and Headmistresses’ Conference. The views expressed here are personal. He tweets at @bernardtrafford

To read more columns, view his back catalogue

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