by Mike Kent
‘We don’t mind,’ said Susan Davis, putting the yardsticks back in their corner. ‘We often stay in and put stuff out for Miss, anyway. Unless Mr Reed comes along and chucks us out when Miss ain’t ‘ere. I don’t like ‘im, do we Sue?’
‘We tidy up the class as well,’ said Susan Brennan quickly, thinking that her friend had been a little indiscreet. ‘Honestly, Sir, some of the boys never clear up properly. We’re always doing it for them. We like our classroom to be really tidy.’
Susan Davis began rearranging the chairs in the book corner, and Susan Brennan straightened the books. Dorothy was stacking some maths equipment into a cupboard.
‘Hello,’ she smiled. ‘How did it go?’
‘They were very good,’ I said. ‘I had an embarrassing moment about the chalking on the wall, though.’
She laughed. ‘I bet! You’ll get a lot worse than that once they’ve sounded you out properly. We don’t really get much writing on the walls now though, especially inside, where all their pictures are. Sometimes somebody scribbles on a picture out of jealousy. We had a spate of extremely earthy words in the cloakroom last year, but as Brian said, at least the spelling was correct.’
‘I don’t suppose Mr Reed saw it that way?’
‘Oh, he ranted and raved for half an hour in the hall and said he wasn’t having filth written all over his school. He’d have done better just to ignore it. Whoever wrote it must have been tickled pink listening to him. Susan, can you put those other bottles in the crate, please.’ She perched herself on the corner of a table for a moment and took a roll of strong mints from her bag.
‘Here,’ she said, ‘have a mint. I gave up smoking a while ago and I’m a bit hooked on these. Susans, do you want a mint?’
‘Cor, thanks Miss,’ they said together.
‘Once you’ve been here a little while these children are very little trouble,’ Dorothy continued. ‘It’s amazing they’re are as nice as they are, considering what some of them have to go through at home. I think you have to be absolutely straight with them, tell them exactly how you feel about something and never hedge their questions. They sense it if you do. They’re incredibly loyal and they look on you as a friend as well as a teacher. And that’s not a bad thing. They spend most of their day in school and you’ve got to put yourself out a bit. Teachers who don’t rarely survive in a school like this.’
‘But they’re very mixed in ability…’
‘Yes, they are, but you can cope with that. It’s important to make sure the really clever ones like Jamie Dudmish actually inspire the others a bit, without losing out themselves. You haven’t come across him yet. There’s really no-one to compete with him in here, but I don’t think his work suffers. In fact I know it doesn’t.’
I grinned. ‘It’s all down to administration, then, is it?’
She laughed loudly. ‘Oh, Mr Reed told you that, did he? He’s never involved himself with the children, so he has to look for a reason to justify his existence. He ends up ordering masses of stock we’ve already got. Or lots of text books that are totally unsuitable because he never consults anybody on what they might need. I think quite a few people become headteachers just to get out of the classroom. It’s certainly not for me.’
‘Really?’
‘Well, I’d do it differently, put it that way. Susan, I should wet that duster if I were you. You’ll get your dress filthy.’
‘Okay, Miss,’ Susan agreed, moistening the duster under the tap. ‘What are we doin’ after play, Miss?’
‘Making you write your tables out, I think.’
‘Aw, Miss!’ said Susan, wrinkling her nose.
‘Actually, there’s a TV programme about Australian wild life, and I thought I’d show them that,’ she said to me. ‘They had a smashing talk by an Australian teacher a couple of weeks ago and now she’s gone back they’ve started writing letters to her class. Anyway, let’s go and get some coffee before the children come in again.’
The staffroom was a small converted mezzanine room at the top of a tiny staircase, and nine battered easy chairs were grouped around two tables smothered with leaflets, newspapers and educational circulars. A pile of plastic hockey sticks and balls stood in one corner, and bookshelves occupied another. On a small table by the sink an urn steamed frantically, watched suspiciously by a teacher with tidily cut hair, steel rimmed glasses and a small, neatly trimmed beard. I noticed that all the other staff in the room were women. Dorothy introduced me briefly.
‘This urn is ludicrous,’ said the bearded teacher angrily. ‘It breaks down, it overheats, it breaks down again. Dorothy, can’t you get him to buy a couple of decent kettles? I mean, we are in the age of the electric kettle, for God’s sake.’
‘It packs up because you keep shouting at it,’ said a slightly overweight woman with dyed auburn hair and piercing dark eyes.
‘Look, Deidre, all I want is a cup of tea. I’ve been trying for an hour to get subtraction into Emily Bennett’s thick head and I reckon I deserve a bottle of gin, let alone a cup of tea. It’s alright for you Infant teachers. You only have to teach ‘em how to fill a bucket up with sand…’
‘You cheeky bugger,’ Deidre laughed, and hurled her newspaper at him.
‘You see what I have to put up with from these women?’ said Brian, turning to me. ‘Thank God you’ve arrived. Now, do you want the badly chipped cup, or the even more badly chipped cup?’
‘Oh Brian, give him a decent one,’ said a slim woman on the other side of the room. ‘It’s his first day. Give him one of the china cups.’
‘Are you trying to get me into trouble, Janice? You know the bone china is reserved for the school governors. And as the elected teacher representative, I must put it to you…’
‘Oh just give him a cup of tea,’ said Janice. ‘God, the fuss you make. You only have to make it once a week.’ I took the cup offered to me and went to sit in a chair by the window.
‘I shouldn’t sit there, Mike,’ said Brian immediately.
‘Take no notice,’ said Dorothy. ‘sit where you like.’
‘Well, don’t say I haven’t warned you. That’s Alice’s seat. She’s ripped people’s heads off when they’ve sat in her chair. You’re for it now, Mike.’
‘Don’t be silly, it’s not her chair,’ said Deidre. ‘It’s a school chair, for heavens sake.’
Brian drew a deep breath through pursed lips. ‘Well, you’re a braver man than me,’ he said.
‘Oh leave the poor bloke alone,’ said Janice. ‘You’ll turn him into a nervous wreck before he’s even started. Who’s got the spoon?’
‘There we are, you see,’ said Brian. ‘The spoon. We’ll be borrowing each other’s cup of tea next. I think the kids knock the spoons off and flog ‘em down the market. Unless they haven’t got any at home, which wouldn’t surprise me.’
‘At least Rousey has stopped taking the school milk,’ said Dorothy. ‘It took a while to cure him of that. I’m sure his mother put him up to it.’
‘I thought gin was more her line,’ said Janice.
‘I wonder what he’s nicking now,’ said Brian. ‘He’s probably got his eye on Dorothy’s Mini. So what do you think of ‘em, Mike? Dorothy’s class, I mean, not Minis.’
‘They seem very pleasant,’ I said. ‘I don’t know them very well yet, though.’
‘Yes, they’re not too bad. Rousey’s good on Euclid, and Susan Davis knows her Russian novelists. I should watch Fred though. He’s a bit weak on his Latin.’
‘Honestly, Brian, you’ll put him off for life,’ laughed Janice.
‘Come off it, Jan, you know they don’t actually learn anything until they get to me. All that creative muck you and Dorothy do just gets their clothes in a mess. I did painting last Friday, so that takes care of my creative work for this term. Andrew Kearns actually spoke, too. Mind you, I made him stand on a desk with
a paint pot on his head for an hour, so that shut him up.’
‘You’re a bugger, you really are,’ said Deidre.
‘Don’t take any notice of him,’ said Dorothy.
‘Does anybody?’ said Janice.
‘Heaven knows what the kids see in him,’ said Deidre.
‘Now come on girls,’ said Brian, pulling a broken chair towards him and putting his feet on it. ‘You know my presence in the staffroom is a constant joy to you all. Hello, look, Wilson’s on the scaffolding again. I wonder if he’ll fall off…’
‘Oh God, I hope Mr Reed doesn’t see him,’ said Deidre. ‘That boy is fearless. You have to admire his climbing skills.’
‘Now there you are, you see,’ said Brian, ‘You child-centred teachers should be harnessing his interest in it and using it across the curriculum. He should be climbing it, measuring it, painting it, and writing about it.’
‘Mr Reed said there hasn’t been an accident for a long time,’ I said. There was a burst of laughter from the other side of the room.
‘He’s never here when there is one, that’s why,’ said Deidre. ‘He’d be a lot happier if he could spend all his time going to conferences. Dorothy should have his job. She’s the one who organises everything in this place.’
‘And me, of course,’ said Brian. ‘I keep you all happy and contented. What would you do without me?’
A short, well built woman in a track suit looked up from the athletics magazine she was reading and spoke for the first time. ‘What have we done to deserve this on a Monday morning?’
‘Look Shirley, I was just putting Mike here on the right tracks,’ said Brian. ‘He’s a student. I want him to succeed. If he tries all that creative stuff they’ll crucify him before he’s had a chance to find out their names.’
The door opened, and a frail, nervous woman with a scarf covering her hair put her head hesitantly into the room. ‘Oh, um… has anyone seen the key to the PE cupboard?’ she asked tentatively. ‘I need some bats and balls. They are kept in the… um… aren’t they?’
‘Do you want the big ones or the small ones?’ asked Shirley.
‘Oh. I don’t know which would be the best. I just…’
‘Wait a minute Liz and I’ll get them for you,’ Brian offered. ‘Don’t you want any tea?’
‘I don’t think I’ve got time. I’ve been in a bit of a muddle with the biscuit money. There are so many things to add up on Mondays…’
‘Have a cup of tea.’
‘You’re pushing it a bit,’ said Janice. ‘Have you put something in it?’
‘No. I’m just a very considerate man. When I make the tea, I like everybody to appreciate it. Would anybody like to sit on my knee and drink it? Deidre? Liz? Dorothy? Mike?’
The bell rang for the end of break and with a soft gasp Elizabeth’s head disappeared from the doorway. Brian looked at the clock on the wall.
‘Hey, that’s a bit quick, isn’t it? Who’s on duty?’
‘Alice,’ said Dorothy. ‘And it is time. That clock’s slow.’
‘Well, she’ll have to watch it, then. That’s two weeks running she’s rung it on time. I think I’ll have a teacher’s benevolent lesson and let them fling a few balls about in the hall.’
‘You can’t,’ said Deidre. ‘Elizabeth’s in there. Then I am.’
‘Oh, well, that’s that then. Another burst of inspiration bites the dust. We’ll have to do silent reading, then.’
Dorothy smiled, took my cup and washed it quickly under the tap. ‘Will you look after them for a moment?’ she asked. ‘I left some pictures I need in the car. I’ll only be a few minutes.’
She had left the classroom unlocked and most of the children were already sitting down continuing with their work. A few were taking turns at peering through a microscope in the science corner, and the two Susans were turning a giant plastic globe on its axis and asking each other questions.
‘Come and help us, Sir,’ said Susan Brennan, taking my hand and pulling me over to the globe. ‘We’re finding the places on here that we’ve got on our wall map. Susan and me like doin’ this.’
‘Cor, Sir!’ cried Susan Davis, ‘You want to see what Rousey’s got under the microscope. ‘E’s got an ant, Sir. It’s still alive and you can see its legs movin’. They’re really hairy.’
‘Like yours then, ain’t they,’ called Badger.
‘You shut up, Badgerbrain,’ said Susan Brennan.’’Oo’s talking’ to you?’
‘Miss lets us put a lot of things under the microscope,’ Susan Davis continued. ‘She showed us some of Fred’s blood the other day, when ‘e hurt ‘imself in PE. You could see them corsle things.. what are they, Sue?’
‘Corpuscles,’ answered Susan Brennan.
‘That’s it, them. We could see ‘em Sir. There are white ones and red ones in your blood an’ if you get too many white ones you die. Or is it red ones? I’m not sure, are we Sue? Oh look, Sir, I’ve found Tasmania. It’s down ‘ere.’
I left them turning the globe and went round the classroom to see what sort of books the children were reading. The choice of material was wide ranging, but there seemed to be something at an appropriate level for everyone. I asked Rouse what he was reading.
‘‘E can’t read,’ Badger offered. Rouse slammed his book shut. ‘Oh yes I can. ‘E weren’t askin’ you, anyway.’
‘You can’t read. You jus’ look at the pictures. You was readin’ that book about dinosaurs for months an’ when Miss asked you about it you never knew nothin’ about it.’
‘Yes I did. You watch it!’
‘What was it about, then? Tell us somethin’ about dinosaurs.’
‘I wouldn’t tell you nothin’, mate.’
‘That’s ‘cos you don’t know nothin’.’
‘I do, though.’
‘Well tell us somethin’, then. You don’t even know the name of a dinosaur.’
‘Tyrannosaurus Rex.’
Badger sniffed with contempt. ‘Well, we all know that one, don’t we! Even my little brother knows that one. Even my pet ‘amster knows that one.’
Rouse stood up, and took a deep breath. ‘D’you want your ‘ed smashed in?’ he asked.
‘Oo by? You?’
‘Why are you standing up and looking like that, Master Rouse?’ called Dorothy, walking briskly into the room. ‘And Alan Badger, why are you being a nuisance?’
‘I’m not, Miss. I was just sayin’ Rousey can’t read.’
‘That’s being a nuisance. And you’re wrong then, because he can read. Almost as well as you, when he tries. It would have been nice if I’d found you helping him instead of being mean.’
‘I was only sayin’…’
‘I can imagine. Funny how these ‘only sayings’ always end up with you half killing each other, isn’t it.’
‘Sorry Miss. Are we going to watch a film?’
‘Only if you’re good. Children, line up by the door quietly. We’re going to the Audio Visual Room.’
‘Can I help you connect the TV, Miss?’ asked Rouse eagerly.
‘No thank you. John. I can manage that bit myself.’
‘Aw Miss,’ Rouse grumbled. ‘Me dad lets me change all the fuses in our house.’
‘Well that’s your dad’s responsibility. I’m not prepared to take the chance.’
‘You could get sued, couldn’t yer, Miss?,’ said Adams thoughtfully, unravelling a thread at the end of his pullover. ‘If ‘e got a shock you could get sued.’
‘I’d probably get a reward,’ said Dorothy. ‘Now come on, or we won’t have any time left.’
They filed down the stairs to a converted classroom on the next corridor. The floor of the room was completely carpeted, and there were thick curtains at the windows which doubled as blackouts. The tables under the windows contained an assortment
of musical instruments, and two tape decks had been set up with a microphone to record children using them. Badger tentatively struck a xylophone, withered under Dorothy’s all-seeing gaze, and then turned to his friends, still eager to continue the previous conversation.
‘I knew a bloke once wot shoved a screwdriver in the mains,’ he said with grim delight. ‘It melted the screwdriver right down to the ‘andle. ‘E was dead lucky though, ‘cos the ‘andle was made o’ some thick plastic, and…’
‘What difference ‘ud that make?’ asked Rouse.
‘Course it ‘ud make a difference.’
‘Like what?’
‘It’s an insulator,’ said Dudmish, speaking for the first time in a soft Scottish accent. ‘The electricity can’t get through. It’s like rubber.’
Badger paused for a moment, and then made a determined effort to retrieve his audience.
‘Jamie’s right,’ he said seriously. ‘Anyway, this bloke could ‘ave ‘ad ‘is ‘and taken right orf.’
‘E’s off!’ cried Susan Davis. ‘‘Ere ‘e goes again!’
‘I think we’ll all have to go if you don’t sit quietly now,’ said Dorothy. ‘And I’m not going to start until everybody’s absolutely ready.’
She switched the television on and the screen flickered into life. The class settled immediately, turning their full attention to the programme. After it was over Dorothy talked about the programme and showed pictures of Australia and its animals, adding pieces of information, filling in details she thought had been missed, and relating it to the talk they had been given by the visiting teacher. I noticed that she held the children’s attention with almost deceptive ease.
‘That was great, Miss,’ said Fred with intense enthusiasm as the programme ended.
‘Yes, I thought you’d like it. It’s almost time for lunch. Don’t forget to wash your hands before you go into the hall. And make sure you’re back right on time this afternoon. The group by the door go first.’
The children stood up and went out quietly as the bell rang, and Dorothy closed the doors on the television stand.
‘Well they certainly liked that,’ I said when the last child had gone.