“To be quite honest Mrs.Kay I think we should all be inside, looking after them, do you think it was wise just letting them all pour in there at once?”
This furthers my accusation that Mr.Briggs is a control freak and feels that he should be the one in control.
Conflict of opinions is evident as Mr.Briggs and Mrs.Kay continue talking about the children while drinking their coffee. Mrs.Kay was the teacher who organised the trip and she wants the children to have a good time and not to feel as if they were still at school. Mrs.Kay says to Mr.Briggs
“And I’ll have to say this to you, Mr.Briggs, I didn’t ask you to come on this trip” Mrs. Kay feels that Mr.Briggs is trying to take too much control over the children. Mr.Briggs replies
“No but the headmaster did”
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You can see that when these two characters speak a lot of tension is caused. Furthermore you can also see that clearly Mr.Briggs and Mrs.Kay have a personality clash and really cannot stand each other. The dramatic impact of this scene occurs behind the teachers backs as we see what the children get up to whilst unsupervised.
In the shop the children are asking the shop assistants around to get the sweets all of the children are filling up their pockets full of sweets because they feel that the shop owners have raised their prices for all of their products. Once the shop shelves were mostly empty the children left the shop and headed for the coach. The two shop assistants John and Mac have a conversation stating that they will have to re-order all of their stock. John says to Mac
“There were sixty quid’s worth of stock on those shelves an’ most of its gone”.
John is really pleased that most of the stock had gone.
Mac replies with
“Come… let’s count up”
He then goes over to the till and opens it up, but upon opening it up he doesn’t find any notes just a lot of loose change.
“ Was you looking after the notes, ”
Mac asked. Mac was worried about the money that they had supposedly taken in. “Which notes I thought you were taking care of them”
John replied. They both looked at the empty shelves in disbelief. I’m the coach the children were weighed down with the sweets that they had stolen. This part of the scene tells us that the children do misbehave when unsupervised. At the back of Mrs. Kay’s mind she had a feeling that something went on in the shop but wasn’t sure what.
Mac ran out of the doors with John following into the car park to see that the coach was just leaving. “The thievin’ little bastards” he shouted. The back window of the coach was just a mass of two fingered gestures. The two men were left standing in the middle of the car park. The main part of this scene is when the shop owners found out that the children had stolen all of the sweets.
The second key moment in which I have chosen to illustrate the conflict between Mr.Briggs and Mrs. Kay occurs at the zoo. The main conflict in this key moment is again the different teaching styles and the way that the two teachers want to organise the children around the zoo. Here we see Mr.Briggs talking to the children about a bear in one of the pits.
“And so you can see with those claws it could give you a very nasty mark” This is one of the few sentences that show Mr. Briggs educating the children in an organised manner. Andrew asks Mr.Briggs
“An’ could it kill y; sir”
Mr. Briggs caries on the conversation about the bear while Mrs. Kay is walking around the zoo with another group of children. Mr. Briggs walks around the zoo while two girls are linking arms with him one either side he tells them to walk properly. This shows the difference between the two teachers. Mrs. Kay and Mr. Briggs meet each other as they walk around the zoo.
“I’m just going for a cup of coffee”.
Mrs. Kay asks? Mrs. Kay is being very polite to Mr. Briggs.
“Well I don’t think these people can be trusted on their own, Mrs. Kay”
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Mr. Briggs believes that the children shouldn’t be allowed to walk around the zoo unsupervised. The children persuade Mr. Briggs to let them walk around the zoo on their own. Mr. Briggs agrees with Mrs. Kay and says to her
“ All right Mrs. Kay we’ll trust them to go around this place on their own”.
While they are drinking their coffee all of the children are in the children’s zoo looking at the animals. The humour and dramatic impact of this scene is where the children betray Mr. Briggs trust while they are unsupervised and he is having a cup of coffee. All of the children are climbing over the fence trying to stroke the animals. Ronson is bending over the fence trying to stroke the animals.
“Ey’ y’ not supposed t’ touch em”
Carol informs Ronson.
Ronson doesn’t listen to her but he starts to pick up the animals and stroke them. Carol also picks up the animals. When no one is looking all of the school children pick up the animals. Many of the school children are now clutching furry friends. Mrs. Kay and Mr. Briggs have no idea what is going on at the children’s zoo. The animal pit is now empty and all of the children are on the coach. All of the children were on board and the coach starts its engine and starts pulling away. Just before the coach leaves the zookeeper waves down the coach.
The zookeeper strides onto the bus
“ Are you supposed to be in charge of this lot?”
He shouts at Mrs. Kay.
“ Why what’s the matter”
“ Children. They’re not bloody children. They’re animals. That’s not a zoo out there. This is the bloody zoo, in here.”
The zookeeper shouts at everybody. Neither Mrs. Kay nor Mr. Briggs has a clue what the crazy zookeeper is going on about. The zookeeper is still rambling on
“ Right. Where are they?”
All of the children are trying to look as innocent as they can. The keeper walks down the isle of the coach. Two more zookeepers arrive on the bus. The first keeper heard a clucking hen he turns around to see a little boy playing with his coat, he walks straight up to him and pulls his coat back and reveals a bantam hen. “ Right! And now I want the rest!”
The coach goes silent for a couple of seconds the animals appear from every conceivable hiding place on the coach. Mr. Briggs goes of the coach to talk to the zookeepers. As Mr. Briggs walks back on the coach the children try to hide their faces. Mr. Briggs pauses for a long, staring, angry and contemptuous moment.
Mr. Briggs hits the roof and starts shouting
“ I trusted you lot…I trusted you. And this, is the way you repay me…I trusted all of you, but its obvious that trust is something you know very little about.”
You can tell from this scene that Mr. Briggs is a very hotheaded character.
In my opinion Mr. Briggs is a very strong disciplinarian and moody teacher. Therefore my sympathy lies with Mrs. Kay’s style of teaching because she is a very sympathetic and tender teacher. There are many sentences that show the different style of teaching between these two very different characters.
It has therefore been established that Mr. Briggs and Mrs. Kay have very different personalities and there are many conflicts that show this.
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Willy Russell added a lot of dramatic impact and humour. These two characters are so diverse that I believe that they would go on arguing throughout their teaching career.
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