The teacher was very forgetful: "Being cross, she'd forgotten she hadn’t taught him time" and "My goodness, she said, I forgot all about you." Also the little boy was too scared to ask her about 'half past two' showing that maybe the little boy was afraid of his teacher.
Reports is a poem about the comments that are written on school reports. "Has made a sound beginning" and "finds the subject difficult." In the last two verses of the poem it is using words that are often used in school reports to describe someone going through their life. Starting with "Born at sound beginning" then "learning at last we could have done better."
In this poem school is a place where teachers don’t try very hard to write helpful comments for the parents and the children. "Echo the common-room cliché must make more effort." It sounds as though the teachers aren’t too fond of the pupils and don’t think they deserve very much credit: "unmanageable oaf." In the poem the school seems to be a quite a negative place to learn: "so don’t bother", "don’t give them anything to take hold of", "converts oaf into idiot". Perhaps the teachers aren’t too familiar with the pupils, so they put comments such as "fair" and "quite good" which could mean anything, good or bad.
The pupils, parents and Head teacher are the three people who would be interested and who would read the school reports. The poet uses religious language in order to describe these three people reading the report: "Parent, child, head, unholy trinity, will read your scripture backwards."
The reports which are written by this teacher sound as though the teacher is not very knowledgeable about the pupils and isn’t prepared to make much effort with their reports. Personally I would not like to get a report from this teacher as I would not find it very encouraging or helpful.
Dear Mr. Lee is a poem about a pupil who is writing to Mr. Lee telling him that she was very fond of his book: "your book's the one that made up for the others." It seems that she was not too keen on her English teacher 'Mr. Smart' and is complaining throughout the poem about him and about her dislike of the whole English subject. She explains how much she doesn’t enjoy all the other books she is studying including Shakespeare: "and as for Shakespeare (were doing him too) I think he's a national disaster."
In this poem school is a place where the pupils have to do work that maybe they don’t particularly enjoy: "not exactly a laugh a minute, pretty gloomy really." Also it comes across how pupils may have to work with teachers that they aren’t too fond of: "Mr. Smart is roughly my least favorite person." Maybe the teachers don’t think much of the pupils either: "(Mr. Smart says for anyone with my punctuation to consider poetry as a career is enough to make the angles weep."
The pupil sounds as though she is quite chatty, I can tell this by the way she has written the poem. She has written it the way in which she would talk, with very little punctuation. She seems like a nice girl: "PS Dear Laurie, please don’t feel guilty for me failing the exam, it wasn’t your fault, it was mine" and "so Dear Laurie, I want to say sorry."
The teacher seems very negative in everything he says: "Mr. Smart says it's rude to call you Laurie" and "Mr. Smart says your view of the class struggle is naïve." Also she thinks it may have been Mr. Smart's fault that she failed her exam.
The studying of English Literature for exams from the perspective of the poem is that some of the stuff including Shakespeare and the anthology is 'not exactly a laugh a minute'. On the other hand, there can be some enjoyable parts: "bits of it I know by heart."
In all 3 poems U.A Fanthorpe's attitude to school is not very positive. For example in Half past two it describes how a little boy was told off, said that he had to stay in the school room 'til half past two when he didn’t know what that meant. He was left in the classroom on his own. The teacher seemed too busy for him and forgot all about the little boy and the fact that he was in the classroom on his own. In Reports it shows the same negativity as before. There was no praise for the children at all, just simple comments that could mean anything, good or bad. In Dear Mr. Lee, Mr. Smart does not strike me as being very inspiring or encouraging towards the writer of the letter.
Her attitude to the pupils is very supportive in a way that she can see it from the pupils' perspective and can sympathise with them. From what she has written in all these 3 poems it seems as though she is writing from personal experience and perhaps she wasn’t too keen on school in her younger years. All of the poems are putting the teachers down and from the pupil's point of view.
Her attitude to the teachers isn’t very positive at all. In half past two she refers to the teacher as being very forgetful and too busy for the pupils. And also she showed irresponsibility when she left the child unattended in the school room which she shouldn’t do. Reports shows that the teacher doesn't really care what they put in the reports, just say the easiest thing and things that parents and other people can't argue with. In Dear Mr. Lee the writer doesn’t actually like her teacher and thinks that partly because of him she failed her exam.
The tone of her poetry is sometimes a bit sarcastic in a way that some of the things she says seem as though she doesn’t mean them in a serious way. Most of her writing in these poems is sympathetic towards the child, making out as though the child is just the little innocent one: "Gettinguptime" "timeyouwereofftime" and "timeformykissnowtime." She does sound quite resentful in her poetry because it sounds as though none of the experiences seem very pleasant and also it sounds as though all three of these experiences are written from personal experience.
She uses language to make her poems easy to read by using simple but effective words: "even pronouns are dangerous." She also used some legal and religious language in her Reports poem but the majority of it is just basic everyday English.
She uses italics to show when someone is speaking in Half past two for example: "oh my goodness." But in Reports it is used to highlight the words that are relevant, the words that would be used in school reports: "sound beginning" "fair" and "satisfactory." And in Dear Mr. Lee italics are used for the language that would be used by an examiner: "social welfare in the rural community."
In Half past two and Reports the poems are organized into verses to show how time is passing. In Reports the first line includes the words "a sound beginning" and finishes with "rest in peace." This really helps to show the journey through life from birth to death. In Half past two the first verse starts with "once upon a schooltime." And once upon a time is a very traditional way of starting a children's story. Right near the end of the poem it says "he got home in time for teatime." This shows the cycle of a day in the life of the little boy.
In Dear Mr. Lee the poem is not organized into verses. This gives it a good and different effect to most poems and the other two poems I am comparing. It is set out a bit like a letter, and with only two full stops in the whole piece, you can tell it has been written by a young person. It is supposed to be read quite fast as well for maximum effect. In this poem it shows only a very short space of time unlike the other two poems.
In U.A. Fanthorpe's poems Half past two, Reports and Dear Mr. Lee she shows her attitude to our education system is one of an unpleasant experience for lots of children both at primary (Half past two) and secondary (Dear Mr. Lee) schools. She does not seem to have much faith in the teachers and in all the three poems she is on the pupils 'side'. As a mature woman the poet is still able to get her feelings about schools and teachers down onto paper by writing poetry.
She does this by sounding as though she really understands the people who she writes about in her poetry, particularly the little boy in Half past two and the writer of the letter in Dear Mr. Lee.
I liked the way in Half past two she wrote the times that the little boy knew: "gettinguptime" "timetogohomenowtime" said as one word. I thought it was good the way in Reports she quite cleverly used the words that would be in school reports to describe life as quite disappointing going from "sound beginning" to "could have done better." In Dear Mr. Lee especially when read aloud sounds good because it has a lot of speed and rhythm. It sounds just like how a young person may talk.
I particularly liked Half past two because I can remember not knowing how to tell the time and can imagine how the little boy must have felt left in the classroom all by himself.
