If he needs to paint, it’s normally the walls at home and it’s math he teaches occasionally in the classrooms at Brauer College. 

But since 2008 he’s been counting one thing — pencils. 

With the help of several cleaners, the teacher amassed more than 1500 pencils dropped in the hallways. 

“They’ve all been dropped by kids on the floors over the years,” Mr Henderson said. 

“It would have been $2500 worth of pencils.” 

The teacher couldn’t stand to see them thrown out. 

“I can’t handle waste. I was brought up by parents who were brought up in the Great Depression,” he said. 

The pencils aren’t worthless either. Nearly all of them are from expensive sets and brands. 

A pack of 72 Derwents typically sells for about $100.

“We disinfected them so they were clean and sharpened them,” he said. 

With the help of a few friends, the pencils made their way to schools in Mozambique in 2011 and East Timor in 2009. 

In September, he took the final 350 to a school in Bali where a friend helped find a primary school. 

The irony is now there are fewer pencils than ever in the modern classroom.

“The number of pencils has really dropped off because students are now doing their design work on netbooks,” Mr Henderson said. 

“It was just a way to make a difference.”