Nine Till Three and Summers Free

by Mike Kent

  Dorothy smiled. ‘Yes, they seemed to. Mind you, they’re always interested in watching a television. A lot of them haven’t got one at home. They do forget easily, though. I have to try and set an average pace for the class when I’m doing something with them all. It isn’t easy, because you’ve got to cope for the Freds as well as the Dudmishes. That’s why individual work or group work wins hands down every time. You’ll see. They have to go at their own pace.’

  ‘Dudmish doesn’t say a lot.’

  ‘No, he watches everything, though. And he listens intently. Mind you, even children like John Rouse have their talents. You might not believe it, but he’s pretty surprising with anything scientific. He had an old transistor radio to bits in the hall a few days ago and Brian bet him a pound he couldn’t put it back together again. Brian actually lost. Rousey’s father drinks a lot, unfortunately. John wouldn’t take a school guitar home to practise just in case his Dad broke it when he was drunk. He’s got a little brother in Deidre’s class. He’s much more withdrawn than John.’

  ‘What’s their mother like?’

  ‘She fools you at first. She seems to dote over them both. She’s quite reasonable to talk to, until you realise some of the things she does. The other night, for instance. Dad went out with her, for a change, and they left both the boys in bed. They didn’t come back until half past eleven. When they did get back, both boys were waiting for them on the pavement. Mum couldn’t understand it at all. Said she thought John was quite capable of looking after his brother for a few hours. It’s been reported to their social worker, but I don’t think anything much will be done.’

  ‘That’s awful.’

  ‘I know. That’s what I mean when I say it’s amazing the children grow up as well as they do. Little Julie, who sits in the corner. You’ve probably not noticed her yet. She’s being brought up by someone she calls her Nan, who really does her best but can’t afford to buy her very much. Mum walked out when Julie was very young and nobody’s quite sure who the father is. There’s a rumour that Julie was conceived on the back seat of a coach, coming home from a factory outing to Blackpool. She’s quiet, but a delight to talk to on her own. Poor little love! The others are very good to her, though. Even Rousey.’

  She took a pile of books from a cupboard and put them down on a table. ‘Anyway, no more case histories for the moment. You’d better go and get your lunch, before Brian eats it for you! They serve the food in the Infant hall. I’ll see you in the staffroom.’

  Lunches were served at two separate sittings by a line of white-coated kitchen staff standing beside trays of food at one end of the hall. The selection of food was good, and I was surprised at how much mealtimes had changed since I’d been at Junior school myself. All the teachers ate with the children, and they sat at a different table each day. Although the children chattered excitedly to each other, the noise was reasonable and Mr Reed patrolled the hall slowly and grimly, hands tightly clasped behind his back like a policemen who hated his job but still possessed a sense of duty. I collected my salad, smiled cautiously at Mr Reed, and sat down on the nearest vacant seat. Immediately, a beaming face looked up at me.

  ‘Ere, it’s the secret agent,’ said Bristow.

  ‘Oo?’ asked another boy at the table.

  ‘The bloke wot reckons ‘e’s a secret agent.’

  ‘Oo told you?’

  ‘E did.’

  ‘Well you be careful and don’t gobble your food down so fast,’ I said. ‘Or I won’t show you my cards.’

  ‘You ain’t got none,’ said Bristow. ‘You’re a noo teacher. I seen you in Mrs Bridgewood’s class.’

  ‘I’m gathering information to take back to headquarters. And you’re likely to gather a stomach ache.’

  ‘We don’t get stomach aches,’ said a girl with an adenoidal voice and an extremely runny nose at the end of the table. ‘Only Kim ‘ere. She’s the one what should eat slow. She’s usually sick after she’s ‘ad ‘er dinner.’

  A large dewdrop fell from her nose and splashed onto her potato. She pulled a small damp hanky from her sleeve, and blew her nose noisily. Then she thrust the whole potato into her mouth and sat chewing it open mouthed.

  Tomorrow, I decided, I’d choose my table with a little more care.

  Quite unexpectedly, I had the chance of teaching the class the following afternoon. Alice Ridgewell, who taught the third years, had developed a migraine and gone home at lunch time.

  ‘I suppose we’ll have to split her class up again,’ said Shirley, in the staffroom at lunch time. ‘You can bet your life Reedy won’t teach them. He’s bound to have some other pressing engagement.’

  ‘That’s the third migraine in a month,’ said Brian, ‘Or was it asthma last time? She ought to pack up smoking. Fancy smoking twenty fags a day when you’ve got athsma. You can hardly cut through the smoke in here sometimes.’

  His eyes turned to me, and he suddenly sat forward in his chair. ‘Wait a minute,’ he said, ‘Why doesn’t Mike have them for the afternoon?’

  ‘That’s unfair’, said Deidre. ‘You can’t expect him to do that.’

  ‘Of course we can. He wouldn’t mind at all, would you, Mike?’

  ‘No, not at all,’ I said, hoping I sounded more confident than I felt.

  ‘Look, I’ll tell you what,’ said Dorothy, ‘if Mike has my class I’ll have Alice’s. At least Mike knows mine. I’d better go and clear it with our dear headmaster though.’

  ‘He won’t mind. Anything to avoid taking them himself,’ said Brian. ‘That’s settled, then. Now who wants to take mine for the afternoon?’

  My mind raced. I didn’t want to start on my Thames topic because my lesson plans and the work I’d prepared were at college. It would be better if I did something short and simple. I wasn’t sure if I could even handle the class yet, and they’d been fairly lively during the morning. Dorothy had put it down to being a windy day, saying that a change in the weather always made them more unsettled. With a flash of inspiration, I thought of the large and carefully tended aquarium in the classroom. My father had kept fish, and I knew quite a lot about them. For the remainder of the lunch break, I went into the small school library to draw a large, colourful picture and find a few suitable books.

  After lunch, when the children came into the classroom, Dorothy explained what was happening. An expectant murmur of anticipation buzzed round the classroom as she went out and closed the door quietly behind her.

  ‘What we gonna do, Sir?’ asked Fred. ‘Can I do some drawin’?’

  ‘No,’ I said. ‘And I’m just like Mrs Bridgewood.’

  ‘No you ain’t,’ said Rouse. ‘You’re a bloke.’

  ‘I mean,’ I replied slowly and deliberately, ‘I’m not going to start until you’re all absolutely quiet.’

  The chatter died down and they turned attentively to me. I was very aware that at any moment during the afternoon Mr Reed could walk into the room, and I was determined that if he did, things should be perfectly under control.

  ‘Now then, put your hands up if you’ve got a goldfish at home.’ A dozen hands immediately shot into the air.

  ‘Tell me about yours.’

  I pointed to Julie, sitting at the back of the room with her hand partly raised, as if she was unsure of answering. Her face reddened and she put her fingers to her lips.

  ‘Let me tell you ‘bout mine, Sir,’ cried Rouse, waving an outstretched finger three inches away from my nose.

  ‘Wait a minute,’ I said firmly. ‘I’ll ask you about yours in a moment.’

  Rouse turned round and grinned at his friends.

  ‘Well Julie?’ She was still hesitant.

  ‘Imagine I’d never seen a goldfish before. How would you describe it to me?’

  ‘It’s a sort of golden colour,’ she replied in a faint, gruff voice. ‘And it’s got fins at each side
and it gets fed once a day…’ She stopped abruptly, and Rouse immediately began waving his hand in the air again.

  ‘Alright then,’ I said. ‘Tell me about yours.’

  ‘Well come ter think of it, I can’t really, Sir.’

  ‘Why not? Surely you can think of something that Julie hasn’t told us.’

  ‘Well the thing is,’ he said innocently, ‘I can’t, because me cat et it larst night.’ He turned to his friends again and a fit of giggling broke out. Adams chewed the end of his ruler, his eyes cautiously watching to see how I would react. Badger sat very still, arms tightly folded.

  ‘Oh shut up, Rousey,’ shouted Susan Davis.

  ‘‘Oo you talkin’ to?’

  ‘You. We don’t wanna listen to you all afternoon.’

  ‘You watch it, Davis!’

  ‘Don’t you threaten me, Rousey. I ain’t scared of you, mate!’

  This was obviously going to be one of Rouse’s less co-operative afternoons. He had been mildly difficult during the morning, and Dorothy had assumed there had been some trouble at home, though he had settled down quickly once she had sorted out his work for the morning. Now he seemed to sense an opportunity for finding out just how much I would tolerate. I ignored his remarks and turned to the rest of the class.

  ‘Goldfish are quite amazing creatures,’ I said. ‘Most people think they are only small, but they can grow to around fourteen inches long. Show me fourteen inches with your fingers…’

  The children’s hands opened to reveal distances that were surprisingly accurate. Fred looked distinctly unsure and parted his fingers for several inches. Then he looked round at Susan Brennan and with a cautious glance in my direction hastily adjusted his estimation.

  ‘Of course,’ I continued, ‘Not many grow to that length. They have to be properly looked after in a pond. It sometimes takes them twenty five years to grow that long.’

  ‘Cor, same age as my mum,’ said Badger cheerfully.

  ‘Is that all?’ said Susan Davis. ‘Your mum looks older ‘n that, don’t she?’

  ‘That’s what my Dad says,’ Badger agreed.

  ‘Come on, we’re getting off the subject,’ I said, moving to a different position in the classroom and watching their eyes follow me. ‘Now, goldfish were first bred by Chinese people…’

  ‘What’s ‘bred’ mean?’ asked Fred.

  ‘It’s stuff you eat, stoopid,’ cried Rouse.

  ‘You’re the one what’s stoopid,’ called Susan Davis. ‘‘E don’t mean that kind of bread. ‘E means like raisin’ babies.’

  ‘Propagating,’ called Jamie Dudmish. ‘It’s the same as propagating.’

  ‘Proper what?’ called Rouse, turning round to Dudmish.

  ‘Proper Charlie, that’s what you are, mate,’ retorted Susan Davis.

  ‘Anyway,’ I said loudly, ‘They were bred by Chinese people. Here’s China on your map of the world, look. There are lots of different kinds of goldfish, too. They’re not all yellowy gold. Some have even got patches of black and blue on.’

  ‘What, where they’ve bin bumpin’ into each other?’ asked Fred.

  ‘Of course not, stoopid. Sir means there are different kinds of fish, don’t yer Sir?’ said Susan Davis helpfully.

  ‘Thank you Susan. Now, the ordinary goldfish is the easiest one to keep as a pet. Can anyone describe its shape to me?

  ‘It’s oval,’ said Badger, moving his chair back and putting his knees on the table. ‘And it’s got a pointed ‘ed.’

  ‘Like yours,’ said Rouse quickly.

  ‘You’ll get a pointed ‘ed in a minute. It gets through the water easily ‘cos it’s got a pointed ‘ed…

  ‘Well, sort of. Actually, there’s something shaped very much like a fish, only man-made. Does anyone know what I’m thinking of? It can rise and sink in the water?’

  ‘Me dad, when ‘e’s ‘ad a few,’ Rouse retorted. ‘‘E lays down in the barf. ‘E don’t rise, though, ‘e jus’ sinks!’

  There was a chuckle of approval at his joke. I turned to him sharply but again decided to ignore his remark. It would be fine, I thought, if Mr Reed decided to wander in when Rouse was in this sort of mood.

  ‘Sir,’ called Dudmish, looking rather bored, ‘It’s like a submarine. That’s man-made. They built it in the shape of a fish so it would go through the water easily.’

  ‘Well done Jamie,’ I said warmly, wishing there were ten children like him in the class. ‘Now what was it that Julie said helps the fish move along in the water?’

  ‘Fins!’ chorused half a dozen voices.

  ‘Wings!’ shouted Rouse.

  ‘You’re almost right, John’, I said, turning and giving him a gentle pat on the head. ‘Not quite, though. Most young goldfish now have miniature propellers on each side and they’re wound up each day by the mother fish. You may have seen her doing what is known as the inversion movement to wind them up. Of course, once the fish has learned to swim properly it doesn’t need the propellers any more. We call this ‘shedding the propellers’, John.’

  Rouse’s mouth dropped open and he stared at me carefully. Then his mouth creased into a grin.

  ‘Cor!’, he exclaimed. ‘For ‘alf a minute I thought you was serious. For a minute I didn’t think you was ‘avin’ me on.’

  The class laughed, their sympathies shifting back to me again. I felt as if I was walking a tightrope and I realised I wasn’t going to get through anything I had planned at this rate. I drew the children’s attention to the large picture I’d drawn during the lunch break.

  ‘Now, Julie said that the fish swims with its fins, and you’d be surprised just how many fins it has. If you’ve got a goldfish at home have a good look at it tonight and see. This one’s called the pectoral fin, and there’s one of those at each side. They act like brakes when the fish moves through the water. This one’s the pelvic fin, and it keeps the fish steady. And this one is a very important fin, called the dorsal. It’s thin and it helps the fish move quickly. Now, I’ll show you how the tail fin works…’

  I took a piece of paper from the cupboard, cut it roughly into the shape of a fin and held it up in front of the class. The children turned to watch.

  ‘Sir, I know,’ called Dudmish, pleased that the lesson at last seemed to me making some sort of headway. ‘It flicks from side to side, and that’s what pushes it forward. It moves a bit forward when its tail goes straight after each flick, then the dorsal fin steadies it up again.’

  He stood up and moved his hands in the air to demonstrate exactly what he meant.

  ‘Good boy,’ I said encouragingly. ‘You’re quite right. Now, I wonder if anybody knows how it breathes?’

  Hema, the tiny Asian girl, raised her hand tentatively. ‘He opens his mouth in the water. He gulps in the water. He breathes the water,’ she said precisely.

  ‘Well, it doesn’t actually breathe the water,’ I said. ‘It takes in some water and…’

  ‘My Auntie Jean nearly drowned once,’ said Badger. ‘We was at Eastbourne, and she’d gone in for a dip and she went out too far.’ Interest swung round onto Badger and he sensed an attentive audience. ‘She ‘ad about five pints o’ water in ‘er lungs an’ they ‘ad ter pump it all out. My Uncle Den said it was the first thing ‘e’d known what’d kept ‘er quiet for a few hours.’

  ‘Oo rescued her, then? You?’ asked Rouse.

  ‘Nah. Me Uncle Den. ‘E swum out when ‘e saw ‘er strugglin’ in the water.’

  ‘She was lucky. A shark could’ve got ‘er.’

  ‘‘Course it couldn’t,’ Adams interrupted. ‘You don’t get sharks at Eastbourne.’

  ‘Course you do. You can get sharks anywhere it’s ‘ot. Can’t you, Sir?’

  ‘I don’t think you’d find many at Eastbourne,’ I said cautiously, thinking it might be best not to deny it completely in ca
se it gave rise to an argument I couldn’t keep in check. ‘Anyway, I was asking if you knew how a fish breathes. Do you know what we breathe?’

  ‘That’s easy,’ said Susan Brennan. ‘We breathe air.’

  ‘No we don’t, we breathe in oxygen,’ Jamie Dudmish corrected her.

  ‘You’re both partly right,’ I said. ‘There is oxygen in air, and we breathe that. But a goldfish breathes oxygen, too.’

  ‘Ow, Sir?’ asked Susan Davis. ‘It’s got its ‘ed stuck in the water all the time.’

  ‘Sir, I know,’ called Dudmish again. ‘Sometimes it comes to the top of the water and gets the oxygen. And sometimes it takes the oxygen out of the water. It takes a big gulp of water and uses up the oxygen in it. Then it gets rid of the water and does the same thing again.’

  ‘That’s why you ‘ave to use a big tank,’ said Adams. ‘Them glass bowls ain’t s’posed to be very good for ‘em because…’

  ‘The surface area is too small,’ Dudmish interrupted. ‘The water can’t get enough oxygen to it.’

  ‘How does the fish get rid o’ the water then?’ asked Badger.

  ‘Ow d’yer think?’ retorted Rouse. ‘Through its willy, same as everybody else.’

  ‘Don’t be stoopid. A fish ain’t got a willy.’

  ‘Course it ‘as. If it didn’t ‘ave a willy, it’d get so full up with water it’d burst.’

  ‘Well my dad goes fishin’ an’ I’ve looked at ‘is fish, and none of ‘em ‘ad a willy,’ said Badger, conclusively. The two Susans giggled uncontrollably.

  ‘They’ve got gills,’ said Dudmish impatiently, determined to bring things back to sanity. ‘They use the oxygen they need, and then get rid of the water through their gills.’

  ‘Oh yeah,’ agreed Fred. ‘E’s right. I’ve seen ‘em do that.’

  ‘Shall I bring mine in termorrer, Sir?’ called Susan Davis. ‘I won ‘em at the fair.’

  ‘They shouldn’t really be given away at fairs’, I said. ‘It’s very unkind, and they don’t tend to live long if they’ve been cooped up in a little plastic bag.’