The Heart of the Dales (4 page)

‘Perhaps you should have contacted the Education Office before this,' I said. ‘The situation sounds serious.'

‘I did think of doing just that, but a newly-appointed head-teacher running to the Education Office before he's got his legs under the table, complaining and saying he was having problems, would not have gone down very well, now, would it?' He paused, tugged nervously at his moustache again, then looked straight at me. ‘Actually, Mr Phinn,' he continued, ‘I had rather thought that you would have called in to see how I was getting on. In your report, you did say that you would be making a visit to check on how things were progressing. I rather expected that you would have got in touch before now. At my last school in London, the school inspectors were regular visitors and I always welcomed their support and advice.'

He had been right, of course. I had promised to return to the school and monitor progress but I had failed to do so. ‘Yes,' I replied now, rather sheepishly, ‘I did. I'm afraid I've been so very busy and I assumed, quite wrongly as it turns out, that things were improving. It was remiss of me.' Then I added defensively, ‘Of course, Yorkshire is the biggest county in the country – the size of Israel, I've been told – and there are so many schools to visit by a relatively small team of inspectors.'

‘I'm not blaming you, Mr Phinn,' the headteacher told me. ‘I am responsible for the effective running of the school and it is down to me to implement your recommendations and make the necessary changes.'

Nevertheless, I thought to myself, I should have followed things up.

‘I assumed,' Mr Harrison continued, ‘that once I had settled in and gained the confidence of the governors, parents and,
hopefully, my teaching colleagues, I could develop so many new and interesting initiatives and move the school forward. Sadly, I have not been very successful. Many parents of the children at the Infant School don't want their children educated at Ugglemattersby Juniors and opt for other schools when their offspring reach seven, rather than sending them here. Over the last few years, there's been a steady haemorrhaging of children from this school and I've not been able to stem the flow. Ugglemattersby used to have four classes ten years ago but now we're down to three and we lost our brightest pupil in the top class last week. She's gone on to a preparatory school in Ribsdyke. It's all very depressing.'

‘Well, I think we may have to consider competency here, Mr Harrison,' I said.

‘Mr Phinn!' Mr Harrison burst out. ‘I have tried, I really have and –'

‘No, no, not your competency but that of your teaching staff,' I hastily assured him. ‘I assume the governors are aware of your concerns?'

‘In some part, yes, but there lies another difficulty. I get little support from the present governing body. The governors who appointed me and were keen on the changes I suggested at my interview, unfortunately resigned – albeit for perfectly valid reasons – before I took up my position. They were replaced by Councillor Sidebottom, who is now the chairman of the board, assisted by the parish council nominee and that's Mr Battersby. The clerk to the governing body is the school secretary and she's Mrs Battersby's sister-in-law. Even the caretaker is a relative. They are all as thick as thieves. It's all terribly incestuous.'

‘Then the Education Office must assist you to grasp this particular nettle,' I told him. Whilst I felt sorry for the man, I did not relish such an unpleasant business, particularly at the beginning of the new term, but I knew it was likely to be the only course of action. ‘I've not seen the two teachers since my last visit when, as you are aware, I was not impressed. But if, as you describe, things have not improved, then we have to
go down the road of competency proceedings, which may lead to their dismissal. I will put the wheels in motion.'

‘You imagine that it might come to that?' Mr Harrison asked, clasping his hands tightly in front of him and resting them on the desk.

‘Children only have the one chance at education,' I told him. ‘They deserve enthusiastic, optimistic, committed teachers who have high expectations of the pupils in their care. From what you have told me, the children in this school are getting a poor deal.' I stopped for a moment. I seemed to be repeating the selfsame words as I had done when I had visited the school just over two years before and had delivered my report. Clearly my own efforts had produced little effect either.

‘It's not going to be easy,' the headteacher told me sadly, tugging at his long-suffering moustache once more. ‘No, it's not going to be easy.' He looked completely defeated and weary.

‘On the positive side,' I told him, attempting to sound cheerful, ‘the state of the buildings has certainly improved since I was last here, on the inside at any rate. It looks a whole lot brighter and more welcoming and it's good to see the children's efforts displayed to such good effect on the walls. I noticed coming in that you now have a small library and it seems well stocked with some appropriate books. This is certainly an improvement.'

‘I do try,' he said unhappily, ‘but I sometimes wish I had never left London. Being a big fish in a little pool does not have as many merits as I hoped for.'

Following the depressing conversation with the headteacher, I spent the next part of the morning observing the lower Juniors, a class of seven-to nine-year-olds and their prickly teacher.

Mrs Sidebottom, tall and thin with a pale, melancholy, beaked face, was like a heron in her prim white blouse buttoned up to the neck and tight grey skirt from which protruded skeletal legs. Her thick white hair was twisted up untidily on her head and speared with what looked like wooden meat skewers. When I entered her classroom, she fingered the cameo
brooch at her throat, drew her lips together into a tight little and stared at me with Gorgon ferocity.

‘Good morning,' I said heartily.

‘Good morning,' Mrs Sidebottom replied, with cool immutable gravity in her voice.

‘Good morning, children,' I said, turning to the class that sat in serried rows behind old-fashioned wooden desks.

‘Good mo-or-ning, Hinspector Phinn,' they chorused.

‘We were expecting you, Mr Phinn,' the teacher said in a coldly formal and superior voice. Her eyes refused to meet mine. ‘I rather assumed that you would be here at the very start of the lesson.' She glanced theatrically at her wristwatch. ‘I suppose the roads from Fettlesham were busy at this time in the morning.' There was a quiet sarcasm in the tone of her reply.

‘I was with the headteacher,' I explained, ‘and have been since I arrived at the school at eight thirty.' I was minded to add, ‘before you arrived' but I resisted the temptation.

‘I see.' She gave me a little smile – but still wouldn't look directly at me; it was not a very pleasant smile. ‘Well, now you are here, I'll explain a little of what we are about.'

‘Perhaps one of the children could tell me.'

‘Very well,' the teacher said, bristling a little. ‘Simone, could you explain to Mr Phinn what we do on Thursday mornings?'

‘We're learn in' 'ow to speyk proper,' a large healthy-looking girl with cheeks as round and as red as a polished apple informed me in her strong Yorkshire accent. ‘All on us in t'class 'ave to –'

‘I am endeavouring, Mr Phinn,' the teacher cut in sharply, ‘to encourage the children to speak clearly, expressively and accurately with distinct articulation so that they can be understood by those with whom they converse. Most of the children come from the immediate locality and it is so difficult sometimes to understand what they are saying.' She gave the unpleasant little smile again. ‘Mr Harrison, being a southerner, has experienced quite a deal of trouble deciphering the children's speech. Their accents do tend to be –'

‘An' on Thursday mornin', all of us in t'class, we'ave to –' Simone started to say.

‘One moment, Simone,' the teacher intervened, quickly and irritably, ‘it's rude to interrupt when someone else is speaking.' It had been, of course, exactly what she herself had done. ‘Put down your hand and sit up properly.' She turned in my direction again and this time our eyes met and I discerned in hers a flash of defiance. ‘I don't suppose in this politically-correct world of ours it is the “done thing” to improve children's speech and teach them correct pronunciation but I consider it to be of the utmost importance. One hears such slovenly use of the English language these days, doesn't one, the dreadful jargon, colloquial vulgarisms, sloppy expressions and awful slang, much of it gleaned from the television, I should add. So, once a week, we do a little work on our spoken English.'

‘I see,' I said, my heart beginning to plummet.

‘So, if you would like to take a chair,' Mrs Sidebottom instructed, ‘we shall continue.' She gestured at a wooden straight-backed chair in the corner of the room. ‘You might care to see my lesson plan a little later,' she added pointedly. ‘Now,' the teacher said, turning to face the class, ‘when everyone is looking this way – and that does include you, David Scrimshaw – we can resume. Where were we?'

‘Page forty-seven, miss,' the class chorused.

‘Ah yes,' the teacher said. ‘Exercise one on page forty-seven. Off you go.'

The children then proceeded to chant half-heartedly various elocutionary exercises.

‘Gertie Gordon from Glasgow grew a gross of gaudy gay gladioli.'

‘Good!' the teacher snapped out. ‘And the next.'

‘Careful Katy from Colchester cut and cooked a crisp and crunchy cabbage.'

‘Good! Next.'

‘They thought they had fought to defeat the fort but they found they had fought for naught.'

‘Good! Next.'

‘Wendy and William walked wearily down the wet and winding way to the water-swelled weir.'

‘Miss, what's that word?' a small pixie-faced girl sitting at the front enquired.

‘What word?' the teacher asked.

‘T'last un, miss.'

Mrs Sidebottom scrutinised the page before informing her, ‘Weir.'

‘Theer,' the child replied, stabbing the book with a small finger.

The teacher sighed. ‘A weir is a low dam built across a river to raise the level of the water.'

‘Tha can trap fish in a weir, miss,' a child at the back of the classroom volunteered.

‘I'm sure you can,' the teacher replied. ‘Let's continue.'

Exercise four caused some problems for the children who, I guessed, had all been raised in the heart of the Yorkshire Dales.

'Enery 'All 'ops on 'is 'eels.

What an odd 'abit.

'Ow 'orrid hit feels.

'Oppin' on 'is 'eels

Hisn't 'oppin' at all.

So why not 'op properly, 'Enery 'All?

There was a long deep audible exhalation from Mrs Side-bottom. ‘No, no, no!' she cried, shaking her head so vigorously that a strand of white hair escaped and fell over her forehead. ‘How many
more
times do I have to tell you not to drop your aitches?' She then demonstrated how the poem should be recited, over-enunciating every syllable. ‘
H
enry
H
all
h
ops on
h
is
h
eels…'.

When she had finished huffing, the teacher looked up from the textbook. ‘Now, children, let us try again.'

Despite several more attempts the children continued to drop every aitch possible and add the letter where none was required.

‘Let's try exercise number five,' Mrs Sidebottom said, sighing
again and colouring slightly. ‘First, listen carefully to how it should be said.' She declaimed another piece of doggerel.

Down the paaath and across the graaas,

The little children run,

To see the bird baaath by the bower

And the tall trees in the sun.

And so the lesson dragged on for a further wearisome and pleasure-destroying quarter of an hour until the teacher told the children to write out the exercises neatly and carefully in their books and to learn them at home for another practice the following Thursday morning. This gave me a chance to look at the dull and hurriedly displayed work on the walls and to examine the children's books as, heads down, the class applied itself quietly to copy out the silly exercises.

The door suddenly flew open and a boy with long black hair tied back in a pony tail and prominent, very white front teeth, burst in. ‘Sorry I'm late, missis,' he said breathlessly in a pronounced Irish brogue, ‘but the 'osses got out again and I 'ad to 'elp mi da get 'em back. It was the divvil's own job rounding 'em up.'

‘Come in, Niall,' the teacher said. She stared at the boy as a rattlesnake might stare at a rat. ‘Now you've arrived, sit down quickly and get on with your work.'

‘Yes, missis,' he said, heading for a desk at the back near to where I was sitting. He gave me a crooked smile when he caught sight of me.

‘We are copying out the exercises on page forty-seven in your textbook,
The Road to Effective Speaking
,' she told him and then adding, ‘To be practised at home.'

Mrs Sidebottom sidled over to me at this point and informed me
sotto voce
that the boy was from a travellers' family, ‘tinkers to be more precise', and that he missed more time at school than he attended, but that fortunately he wouldn't be with her for much longer. She went on to tell me that he could just about read and write and that his number work was extremely poor.

‘In my day, they were called gypsies,' she told me quietly,
‘but now, of course, we have to refer to them as travellers, tinkers, Romanies, whatever the “in” word happens to be. To my mind, this is another silly example of political correctness. After the Appleby Horse Fair in June, a gaggle of them always sets up camp near here for the summer, parking on the soft verges, disrupting the whole community, dropping litter, and making a general nuisance of themselves until they leave about now to travel south to some other horse fair. My husband, County Councillor Sidebottom, is trying to stop them coming here but to date, unfortunately, it has been to no avail. Have you met my husband, by the way?' she asked.