Saturday 26th September 2009, day 344, 7,196 miles. 11° 59’.86 N, 061° 45’.71 W. Prickly Bay, Grenada.
Westley and Tyrell are a pair of jumping beans in human form. Around seven years old, they come along to the Mount Ayrie young readers’ programme every Saturday morning, to suffer the dubious pleasure of having their reading skills forwarded by a group of yachties. There are about thirty children, and around half that number of adults, so we settle down in little groups of three or four to work our way through the sterile adventures of Jane, Spot and Peter. I don’t remember learning to read (apart from sitting on the loo one day, and spelling out with a delighted thrill of recognition “ant-i-septic”), but was it always as insipid as this? Nothing in these books would make any child think reading is fun. Faced with page after page of not a lot, my reaction now would be: “Tell you what. Let’s go outside and find a real ball and a couple of real trees and run around and have some fun. And if you’re so keen that the words should be read, why don’t you do it?” Perhaps it just belongs in that vast collection of unfathomable activities that adults attach great store to and children unquestioningly comply with.
Anyway, the children turn up every week, of their own free will, to get even more of this than they had in school. The first 10 minutes or so are pure chaos, with everyone trotting round putting out tables, ferreting out chairs from the basement, the children scuffling to find their workbooks and get the best pencils (none of them have their own). Then it’s down to work. Westley and Tyrell are at the stage where they can genuinely read some words, can work out others, but the rest are a combination of guess-work and luck – and memory. We quickly come up short on “in” and “on”, and use this as an excuse to leave Peter and Jane and find lists of things that you can be in or on. Back to the task in hand. Spot has stolen the ball. Stop, Spot, stop. Tyrell is momentarily distracted by the book, and now Westley has stolen his pencil. Give it back, Westley, give it back. Much grinning. Peter is pushing Jane on the swing. Westley is kicking Tyrell under the table. More grinning. Jane has fallen out of the boat. Come back Jane. Tyrell is running across the room. Come back, Tyrell. Peter asks his mother for some cake. Westley asks Miss if he can draw a picture. Jane is tired. Westley wants to demonstrate the scars on his knees from the last time he fell out of a tree. Spot is tired. Tyrell is bouncing with unused energy. Peter is tired. Miss is exhausted.
How do real, full time teachers do it?
Meanwhile I (Anthony) had two six year old girls and we had a go at Peter and Jane as well, 3A in the Ladybird series. The trouble with Celia is that she did not learn to read, she just woke up one morning when she was ready and read!! I find the books ideal for this age group with a lot of repertition of key words on each page. But half an hour is more than enough time for their brains to concentrate and we moved onto pelmanism with some lovely coloured cards. Somehow they cannot grasp that you can only turn over two cards every time it is your go unless you turn up a pair.
