(1/20) Village School

by Miss Read

  As they rattled their nibs in the inkwells and thumped their blotting-paper with fat fists, I marked the compositions which had been written that morning. The subject was 'A Hot Day.' John Burton who has a maddening habit of transposing letters had written:

  A HOT DAY

  I feels tried when it is hot. I likes it best to be just rihgt not to hot not to clod. I wears my thin clothes when it is hot and my shaddy linen hat we bouhgt at a jumble sale it is a treat.

  I called him to my desk and corrected this piece of work while he watched.

  'You must make an effort with these 'ght' words,' I told him, writing 'bought' and 'right' for him to copy three times. I explained, yet again, the intricacies of 'to, too and two' and wrote 'too hot and too cold' to be copied thrice.

  There has been much discussion recently on the methods of marking compositions. Some hold that the child should be allowed to pour out its thoughts without bothering overmuch about spelling and punctuation. Others are as vehement in their assurances that each word misspelt and incorrectly used should be put right immediately. I think a middle course is best. On most occasions I correct and mark the work with the child by me, explaining things as I did to John, but sometimes I tell the children before they begin that I want to see how much they can write, and although I should appreciate correct spelling, I would rather they got on with the narrative and spelled phonetically than hold up their good work by inquiring how to spell a particular word. In this way I can assess any literary ability more easily and encourage that fluency, both written and spoken, which is so sorely lacking in this country school.

  As a rule, the girls find it easier to express themselves than the boys. Their pens cover the page more quickly, they use a wider choice of adjective, and make use too of imagery, which the boys seldom do. The boys' essays are usually short, painstakingly dull and state facts. John Burton's account of a hot day is a fair example of the boys' attempts.

  Cathy's contribution on the same subject made much more interesting reading:

  A HOT DAY

  There are no clouds today and we shall have P.T. in the playground which I like. I like to run and jump and feel the wind through my hair. But I hope Miss Read does not make us sit with our legs crossed up for our exsersises because my knees get all sticky at the back on a hot day.

  On the way home we all walk in the shade by the hedge. The cows stand under the trees and swish their tails to keep the flies off.

  My mother likes hot days because her washing bleeches white as snow, much whiter than the flowers on the elder bush where she always spreads out our hankys.

  Everyone is happy when the sun shines on a hot day.

  The glorious weather continued unbroken and here in the schoolroom were all the tokens of an early spring. The nature table against the wall bore primroses, cowslips and bluebells. The tadpoles were growing their legs with alarming rapidity and were due to depart, any day now, for the pond.

  The weather chart pinned on the wall above the table showed a succession of yellow suns, bright as daisies, and out in the lobby a few cotton hats and light cardigans were an indication of the heat. To Mrs Pringle's well-disguised gratification the stoves had been unlit for two or three weeks and the most that she could find to grumble at was the wallflower petals that fluttered from the jug on the window-sill to the floor.

  After the hard winter it seemed an enchanted time, and the reading of 'The Wind in the Willows' on those blissful afternoons matched both the freshness and youth of the listeners and the spring world outside.

  Through the partition I could hear the hum of Miss Gray's class at work. She seemed happy and in better health than when she arrived. Mrs Moffat had turned out to be the perfect landlady, and was herself much happier now that she had an appreciative lodger to admire her cooking, needlework and the other domestic virtues which her husband was apt to take for granted.

  I hoped very much that Miss Gray would stay with me at Fairacre School. The children adored her and responded well to her quiet but cheerful manner. I could see that she was providing for them, as Miss Clare had done, an atmosphere of security and peaceful happiness in which even the most nervous child could put forth its best. With her top group's reading, particularly, she had worked well, and I was looking forward to having them in September in my class, confident that they would be able to hold their own with the older children. It was a fortunate day indeed, I told myself, when Miss Gray was appointed to Fairacre School and I hoped that she would stay with us for many years. A small doubt arose in my mind—wordless, but shaped like a question mark.

  'Well, naturally … if that happened—' I answered aloud, and had to change the mutter to a cough, as the children's eyes met mine in some bewilderment.

  April 9th came at last, and the excitement of the last day of term kept the children chattering like starlings.

  As I was giving out the hymn books for morning prayers, Eric appeared at the door, with his father behind him. Mr Turner was carrying in his arms a small girl, who could not have been more than three years old. He looked dishevelled and agitated, and motioning Eric to his desk, I went into the lobby with his father.

  'I've come to ask a favour, miss,' he began anxiously, dumping the child by his knees. She put one arm round his legs and looked up at me wonderingly.

  'If you want me to have your daughter for the day,' I answered—this sort of emergency crops up occasionally and I always enjoy these diversions—'I shall be very pleased indeed.'

  Mr Turner looked relieved and grinned down at the upturned face.

  'Hear that, duck? You can stop at school along of Eric, like a big girl, and I'll fetch you as soon as I gets back from Caxley.'

  'What's happened?' I asked.

  'It's my wife. I had to get Mrs Roberts to ring up doctor at five this morning, and she's been took to hospital. Appendix, they thinks it is, and I'm to go in early this afternoon. Mrs Roberts would have had the little 'un but for it being market day. Ah! She's a good sort—been real kind, give us breakfast in her kitchen and all. And you too, miss,' he added hastily, fearful lest I should take umbrage at his praise of Mrs Roberts and his neglect of me, 'I'm truly thankful, miss … you knows that!' He fumbled in his pocket and brought out some coppers. 'For Lucy's dinner, if that's all right.' He counted out the money carefully, promised to fetch his daughter before the end of afternoon school, if he could get away from the hospital in time, and, with a final knuckle-grinding shake of my hand, made his farewell.

  All through the morning Lucy sat perched up on the seat by her brother. Eric had been sent through to Miss Gray's room for a box of bricks, a doll and a picture book and these she played with very happily, keeping up a soft running commentary on her activities.

  The children were enchanted to have a baby in the classroom and made a great fuss of her, offering her their sweets at playtime and picking up the stray bricks that crashed to the floor.

  They reflected the attitude of the grown-up village people in their relationship to young children. I am always amazed at the servitude of the parents in these parts to their children, particularly the little rascals between two and five years old. These engaging young scoundrels can twist their doting parents round their fingers by coaxing, whining or throwing a first-class tantrum. The parents thoroughly spoil them, and the older children are also encouraged to pander to their lightest whim. Sweets, ice-cream, apples, bananas, cakes and anything else edible that attracts the child's fancy flow in an uninterrupted stream down the child's throat, as well as normal meals and the quota of orange juice and cod liver oil which is collected from the monthly clinic at the village hall, and, I must say in all honesty, that a more healthy set of children it would be hard to find. They seem to stay up until the parents themselves go to bed, and I see them playing in their gardens, or more frequently in the lane outside their cottages, until dusk falls. Then, sometimes as late as ten o'clock on a summer's evening, they finally obey the calls to 'Come on in!' which have been issuing from th
e cottage unheeded for an hour or more and dragging reluctant feet they resign themselves, still protesting, to bed.

  And yet, as I have said, under these methods which are a direct violation of the rules of a well-regulated nursery, these children thrive. Furthermore, when they enter school at the age of five, one might reasonably expect some trouble in maintaining discipline; but this is not so.

  They prove to be docile and charming, obedient and happy in their more restricted mode of life. The truth of the matter is, I think, that they feel the need for direction and authority, and if this is offered them with interest and kindness they are more than ready to co-operate.

  They love to have an outlet for their creative ability. To be shown how to make a paper windmill, or a top that really works, to learn to sing a song with actions, to make a bead necklace for themselves, or a rattle for a baby at home, or best of all, something for their mothers—a paper mat with their own bright patterns adorning it—all these things give them infinite pleasure because they have had an aim and they can see something for their labours. Their prc-school play has on the whole been aimless. Their parents buy for them expensive toys, dolls' prams, tricycles, model cars and the like which have restricted scope in a child's hands. Sand, water, clay and other creative media are not encouraged. 'Too messy … don't you go mucking up that clean frock now with that old mud,' you hear the parents call. 'Leave them old stones be and come and nurse your dolly! What's the good of me giving a pound for it if you never plays with it, eh?' What indeed?

  In the infants' room Miss Gray was unpinning the Easter frieze of yellow chicks which had been the apple of the children's eyes for the past fortnight. Her cupboards were packed full of the objects which normally were stored in individual boxes under each child's desk. Counters, plasticine, chalk, felt dusters, first readers, boxes of letters and all the paraphernalia of infants' work had been sorted, checked and repacked.

  The dregs of powder paint had been poured away and gleaming jam jars awaited next term's mixture-as-before. Vases were stacked on one shelf, and below them the great black clay tin, weighing half a hundredweight, had been packed with moist flannel to keep the balls in good condition for a fortnight.

  The babies were busy polishing their desks, on top and underneath, with pieces of rag brought from home and a dab from Miss Gray's furniture polish tin.

  'Waste of time and good polish!' was Mrs Pringle's sour comment as she carried in the clean crockery to put away in the tall cupboard. On top of this stood a mysterious cardboard box, out of reach of prying hands. The label said 'Milk Chocolate Easter Eggs' and was carefully turned to face away from the class. Each one had a small label tied on, either blue or pink, and each child had to find the one with his own name on it. Miss Gray was going to hide them about the classroom while the children were out at afternoon play.

  'Which reminds me,' she said to me, grovelling painfully under a low desk for a stray drawing-pin, 'I must see that they bring the eggs to me to check up on the names. It will never do to eat the wrong egg!'

  In my room there was an equally interesting container, but mine was a round moss-lined basket, like an enormous nest, filled with eggs wrapped in bright tinfoil. The arrival of Lucy in our midst would mean a trip across to the school-house to fetch one more for the basket.

  We too were in a fine bustle of clearing-up when the vicar came in at the door. His cloak and leopard-skin gloves had been put away with his other winter garments, and he presented a summery appearance in his pale grey flannel suit and panama hat.

  'I wanted to remind you all of one or two things,' began the vicar, when the children had settled back into their desks, and he went on to explain to them the significance of the next Sunday, Palm Sunday, and invited offerings of pussy-willow and spring flowers for the church.

  He followed this by a brief homily on Easter, the significance of the eggs which they would receive, and the hope that they would be at church with their parents on both these days.

  He then spent a few minutes looking at the Easter cards which the children bad crayoned ready to take home to their parents, and deciding that this was as good a time as any to present the eggs, I fetched two extra from the house and then passed the basket round.

  The children's faces were alight with joy as they chose their eggs, little Lucy having to be restrained from scooping all that were left into her pinafore.

  When it was found that there was one left and I asked them if they could think who might like it, the children rose to their cue, and, as one man, chorused: 'The vicar, miss! The vicar!'

  And so, with great cheerfulness we broke up, and the children of Fairacre School, clutching their treasures to them, clattered out into the spring sunshine—free for a fortnight!

  PART THREE

  Summer Term

  17. Ancient History, Doctor and the Films

  IN the bottom drawer of my desk are three massive books, with leather covers and mottled edges. Embossed on their fronts are the words 'Log Book' and they cover, between them, the history of this school.

  The third one, which is nearly filled, has been in use for the past twenty years. If anything of note happens, such as a visit from an inspector, the outbreak of an epidemic, or the early closing of school through bad weather, illness or any other reason, then I make a note to that effect in the book, following in the tradition of the former heads of Fairacre School.

  The log books thus form a most interesting account of a school's adventures; the early ones are particularly fascinating and should, I sometimes feel, be handed over to the local archivist who would find them a valuable contribution to the affairs of the district.

  Our first entry at Fairacre School is at the latter end of 1880 when the first headmistress set down the details of her appointment and that of her sister as 'An assistant in the Babies' Class.' It has thus been a two-teacher school since its inception.

  These two ladies would appear to have been kindly, conscientious and religious. Their discipline seems to have been maintained with some difficulty, and the rule, laid down by the local authority and still in force, that canings must be entered in the log book, leads to several poignant entries. The ink has faded to fawn in this first battered book, but there, in rather agitated handwriting, we can read:

  'February 2nd, 1881. Had occasion to cane John Pratt (3) for Disobedience.'

  And a little later on:

  'April 4th, 1881. After repeated warnings, which have in nowise been heeded, had occasion to punish Tom East (2), William Carter (2) and John Pratt (3) the Ringleader, for Insolence and Damage to School Property.'

  The figures in brackets refer to the number of strokes of the cane, usually (2) or (3) seemed to be the rule, but gentle Miss Richards was evidently driven to distraction by John Pratt, for before long we read, in a badly-shaken hand:

  'July, 1882. Found John Pratt standing on a Stool, putting on the Hands of the Clock with the greatest Audacity, he imagining himself unobserved. For this Impudence received six (6).'

  During the following two years there are several entries about the sisters' ill-health and in 1885 a widow and daughter took over the school. Their first entry reads:

  'April, 1885. Found conditions here in sore confusion. Children very backward and lacking, in some cases, the first Rudiments of Knowledge. Behaviour, too, much to be deplored.'

  This is interesting because it is echoed, at every change of head, throughout the seventy-odd years of Fairacre School's history. The new head confesses himself appalled and shocked at his predecessor's slackness, sets down his intention of improving standards of work and conduct, runs his allotted time and goes, only to be replaced by just such another head, and just such another entry in the log book.

  After a number of changes the headmistresses were replaced by a series of headmasters. One, Mr Hope, had his wife as assistant and their only child, Harriet, figures in the log book as the star pupil for several years.

  '16th June, 1911. The Vicar presented the Bishop
's prize to the best pupil, Harriet Hope. The Bishop was pleased to say that this child's ability and endeavour were outstanding.'

  I like to think of Harriet accepting her prize Bible in this old schoolroom, her hair smoothed down and her pinafore dazzling white over a clean zephyr frock, while her classmates, resplendent in Norfolk or sailor suits for the occasion, clapped heartily.

  But in 1913 come two tragic entries.

  'January 20th, 1913. Have to record sad death of pupil (and only daughter) Harriet Hope,' and

  'January 25th, 1913. School closed today on the occasion of the funeral of late pupil, Harriet Hope, aged twelve years and four months.'

  Mr Hope's entries go on until 1919. He records his wife's long illness, his work throughout the Great War in the village, the school's War Savings accounts, the return of old pupils in uniform, the deaths of some in battle, and finally:

  'May 18th, 1919. Have now to enter this last. My resignation having been accepted I leave Fairacre School for an appointment in Leicestershire.'

  Mrs Willet filled in some of the gaps for me when I went down there to buy some rhubarb for bottling.

  'I remember him well, of course, though I was only a child at the time; Flarriet was a year or two older than I was. He went all to pieces after the child died. They both took it very hard. Mrs Hope was never well after it, and the headmaster—well, he just took to the bottle. I can remember him now bending down to mark something on my desk, his hand shaking like a leaf and his breath heavy with liquor. As soon as the school clock said ten, he'd put up another few sums on the blackboard, dare us to make a racket and then saunter down to 'The Beetle' for a drink. Us kids used to stand up on the desk seats and watch him go. The boys used to pretend to be upending the bottle and hiccup and that-all very naughty, I suppose, but you couldn't hardly blame them with that example set them, could you, miss?'