"I don't want to go back to school. I don't like the children, I don't like the teachers. I hate the school lunches."
"So do I."
"But you're the teacher, Mum. You're not allowed to feel like that."
"Oh, yeah? And what are they going to do? Dock five minutes of my playtime for being rude?"
Deborah giggles.
She's back at her school today. Mine starts tomorrow. And, as is usual, the mood is a cross between endless shaggy dog story and mourning for the time I could have spent in places that don't smell of cabbage and echo with screams. And that's only our house. School is 100 times worse.
"I'm just too old to be in a classroom," I whinge, overcome with sadness for myself and the parallel life I know was out there for me once, before thick blue veins started pulsing across my hands and I developed not so much a mono- but multi-brow that heads off down the side of my face in so many directions at once that I'm convinced somebody's given it a dodgy plan of escape that leads straight into my ear.
But the real problem is that, in my customary 'ignore the problem and there's just a chance that some superior being will magic it away' fashion, I haven't yet put together my lesson plans. Admittedly, these are short at the best of times, but even the most unobservant of heads of department can probably tell the difference between four paragraphs of lucidly constructed objectives and a blank piece of paper - though, given a severe enough hangover, it's certainly something capable of foxing me.
I'm waiting to collect Deborah from her first day at school when Cultured Mum's brother greets me. He is also a music teacher, though one who, bizarrely, appears to enjoy what he does. He also has boundless energy, enthusiasm and an encyclopaedic knowledge of techniques and instruments I've never heard of. I feel my heart sink.
"Are you using the Kodaly method?" he asks.
"How reliable is it?" I ask. "With three children already, I don't want to take any chances."
He looks confused. "You know, that marvellous Hungarian system of getting children to sing on their own, limiting the range of notes and encouraging them to listen as they sing. You get the most amazing purity of sound."
"You do? I mean, you do, yes, absolutely. Couldn't agree more. Good old Hungary. I'll certainly be rooting for them come the next Eurovision."
"Anyway," he says. "I'm working through the instruments of the orchestra with mine. It's the Cor Anglais this week, and then a Bass Oboe. If I can get hold of one."
I nod, dumbly. I've come to the reluctant conclusion that being a crap music teacher isn't just a case of playing the wrong chords consistently.
Later on, I ring Cultured Mum and ask her what a Bass Oboe is. "You mean, you don't know?" she says, laughing, and hangs up.
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6 comments:
oh dear - bad school memories here. but why do people keep going there?
Well, of course I had to look up what a bass oboe looks like and what the Kodaly method is, so now I know a little bit more about that. I really think you should try it, OM, the theory behind it is sound. As to the bass oboe, it may be hard to get your hands on one. It would take a lot of dedication, maybe some help from some sexy friends to impress some orchestra members?
OK. That was cruel of Cultured Mum.
Lesson plans - have you got last year's? Failing that, google for them and plagiarise.
And just have the kids chanting "bum chicka bum" in different voices and "instrument sounds" for an hour and you've varied the Hungarian theme.
Hope that helps. Good luck!
(Oh - and pour the Head a large whiskey before submitting lesson plans).
Who needs technique Omega Mum when you have unplumbed reserves of despair to offer your young charges. Maybe you could get them onto Kodaly inspired primal screaming?
Mine were at music workshop over easter and made, variously, a forked stick with beer bottle tops on a string (a "systre" apparently) and some large snail shells on a piece of string (this one did not have a name). Perhaps using similar materials you could have a class project to make a bass oboe? I think some loo roll tubes and a straw would be ideal.
Hope it has not been as bad as you feared. Is good to have you back anyway.
[And look! I got myself an identity and no longer need to be called anonymous! Am inordinately proud. ]
A bass oboe? Sounds like something a fish restaurant might serve. And the cor anglais is the sauce which goes with the desert.
Do you ever read Mrs Anonymous? I think you'd like her blog a lot.
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