In Mrs Tilscher’s Class Flashcards
You could travel up the Blue Nile with your finger, tracing the route while Mrs Tilscher chanted the scenery
By using ‘you’ and ‘your’ she involves us ad if we are in the class, following the lesson. ‘Chanted’ makes the lesson seem hypnotic
Tana. Ethiopia. Khartoum. Aswan.
The single word sentences form a list of all the different places, each one seeming huge like a world itself, that Mrs Tilscher has taught them about
A skittle of milk
This links to mothers feeding their babies and protecting their innocence
The laugh of a bell swung by a running child
Playtime is fun and happy
This was better than home. Enthralling books
The short sentences are facts that the classroom is more interesting than anywhere else
The classroom glowed like a sweetshop
The simile shows how magical it is, filled with all your favourite things that you can touch and see on the walls
Brady and hindley faded
These are symbols of evil which mrs tilscher protects them from
She’d left a good gold star by your name
The alliteration emphasises how you can achieve perfection in her class
Over the easter term, the inky tadpoles changed from commas into exclamation marks. Three frogs hopped in the playground.
This metaphor shows the children changing in stages l. First they were small, then they grew longer and then they ‘hopped’ ready to jump up into secondary school on the way to becoming adults
A rough boy
This is childlike language showing she hasn’t grown up yet
That feverish july, the air tasted of electricity
The growing children are not at ease, they are charged with energy and hormones
A tangible alarm
There is a physical warning of danger that the growing children feel
You asked her how you were born and Mrs Tilscher smiled, then turned away
Mrs Tilscher will not cross the boundary of the primary school classroom. Someone else must tell them about sex
The sky split open into a thunderstorm
This is a metaphor for the adolescence, showing the emotion turmoil, the danger, unprotected, beyond Mrs Tilscher’s classrom
And the chalky pyramids rubbed into dust
There are never ending possibilities of what was on the board
