A KESTRAL FOR A KNAVE ASSIGNMENT
In my view, education in those days was satisfactory but the methods of teaching were very bad. An example of this is shown when Mr Sugden unfairly asks to re-take a penalty after the first attempt at it had failed because the pupil in the goal saved it.
There are very good teachers in the school. Mr Farthing, one of them, understands his students and listens to what the student has to say. You can tell Mr Farthing understands his students because when Billy had a fight he rectified the matter in favour of Billy because of the problems Billy has to deal with. He didn’t send them both them both to Mr Gryce as some teachers would have so both students get the stick.
After the fight Mr Farthing gives Billy a real chance to shine he lets him tell the entire class how he trained his hawk. This speech gave Billy confidence because at the start of the speech Billy had a slight reluctance to share his feeling with the rest of the class. The whole class was interested in the speech about Falconry and several students asked him questions on it at the end. This was one of the high points in the book as no one cussed him or laughed at him. This alone proves that Billy is very bright and has a lot of confidence because he stole the falconry book from a store just to train a hawk (not normal). Billy can express what ever he has to say aloud brilliantly but using hand gestures and speaking verbally. Mr Farthing is extremely sympathetic to Billy as oppose to teachers that bully students like Mr Sugden. Mr Sugden has a very abdomen personality. A good teacher would never let Billy suffer in the cold showers without letting him out on purpose.
