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AIBU?

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Original poster

My Ds has brought this poem home from school and been told to learn it. Please come and give me your thoughts on wether I should speak to the school.

476 replies

MTPurse · 11/02/2016 20:26

As the title says, Ds has came home from school today with a Poem to learn, He has to learn it to be read out between a group of them(apparently he was chosen to read it as he is good at drama/being dramatic).

This is all I know, I have no other info on what it is about and why he has to learn it yet

Now I am not into poetry at all so maybe I just don't 'get it' but I really think this is completely unsuitable for Children due to the context. I am not a strict parent at all but Guns , Knives, Swords and Violence have no part in my family life and I will not allow my ds to play cod and stuff like that, in fact we have had numerous arguments about this.

Personally, I get the humour in it and think it would be fine on a staffroom wall but aibu to think it is not suitable for children?

Here is the poem:

The Lesson

Chaos ruled OK in the classroom
as bravely the teacher walked in
the nooligans ignored him
his voice was lost in the din

'The theme for today is violence
and homework will be set
I'm going to teach you a lesson
one that you'll never forget'

He picked on a boy who was shouting
and throttled him then and there
then garrotted the girl behind him
(the one with grotty hair)

Then sword in hand he hacked his way
between the chattering rows
'First come, first severed' he declared
'fingers, feet or toes'

He threw the sword at a latecomer
it struck with deadly aim
then pulling out a shotgun
he continued with his game

The first blast cleared the backrow
(where those who skive hang out)
they collapsed like rubber dinghies
when the plug's pulled out

'Please may I leave the room sir? '
a trembling vandal enquired
'Of course you may' said teacher
put the gun to his temple and fired

The Head popped a head round the doorway
to see why a din was being made
nodded understandingly
then tossed in a grenade

And when the ammo was well spent
with blood on every chair
Silence shuffled forward
with its hands up in the air

The teacher surveyed the carnage
the dying and the dead
He waggled a finger severely
'Now let that be a lesson' he said

Roger McGough :

OP posts:
LittleLionMansMummy · 12/02/2016 11:46

Ubik1 Which is fine for an older child who can understand this idiosyncratic nuance, as I have also repeatedly said.

snowymountaintops · 12/02/2016 11:48

imactuallytherealjeff glad that you find it funny Hmm. As another poster has said what on earth makes you think that we are outraged at the poem but letting them play CoD at aged 10? Funnily enough we might just think neither is funny or appropriate.

It's a hideous poem and I would be very upset if my DC were to study it at school. God in the light of Paris etc, just because that wasn't a school targetted these things do happen in Europe not just in American schools. Things have changed so much I really do think it's totally inappropriate.

LaContessaDiPlump · 12/02/2016 11:55

Yeesh. I can see what it's trying to do but I don't think it's particularly witty or funny - just dark wish fulfilment for teachers. I'd have found it a bit strange and frankly a little intimidating when I was 10, I think.

FinallyFreeFromItAll · 12/02/2016 12:06

It's in very poor taste and makes violence humorous. Just too close to the bone in the context of the American high school massacres of recent years.

This^^

AmyLouKin · 12/02/2016 12:09

I remember this poem from when I was at primary school. It was in a book by Michael Rosen and Roger McGough. I think I remember first reading/hearing it about age 7 or 8 (so in the 80's) and I have to say that while it wasn't my favourite in the book (there was also one about eating a babysitter and another about snot) I'm pretty sure we all thought it was quite funny and requested the teacher read it to us. Maybe it's a poem the teacher liked as a child.
I do get that in this day and age, that maybe it's not going to be seen in the same light it was in the 80's.
I think maybe the teacher has just been going through a certain book and picking a different poem for each child to learn. Like I said before, that book was really popular at our school!
If it offends you though OP, tell your son not to learn it and tell the school you are not happy with it and why!
I don't think it would bother me if my child was sent home with it (unless my child was distressed by it) but I think it would spark some interesting discussion.

CrushedVelvet · 12/02/2016 12:22

Read this report about ISIS-controlled schools in today's BBC Online, and then tell me whether you still think a poem about violence in schools is humorous:

www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-35552391

ChazsBrilliantAttitude · 12/02/2016 12:28

I don't particularly like the poem but I don't know how much that is due to me looking at it with an adult perspective. The graphic videos posted by ISIS and even the war footage and pictures of drowned migrants on the news take away the cartoon nature of the violence in the poem. Unfortunately, it too closely resembles reality (or widely accessible reality - violence has always been there) now so it is no longer extreme enough to be laughable. However, for a child it might still be comic. DS2 will be just 9 when he goes into year 5 and I am not sure that he would be OK with this poem. I wouldn't have an issue with DS1 who is 12 studying it.

LittleLionMansMummy · 12/02/2016 12:34

I thought that Crushed - that tiny child being shot at as he crawled under that cargo net Shock I actually sat there open mouthed for some time after I watched it. And I'm a fully grown adult.

LarrytheCucumber · 12/02/2016 12:34

I think that if you are unhappy it would be worth asking the teacher if you can have a chat about it.

IamactuallytherealJeff · 12/02/2016 13:19

Do people have similar objections to
-grandma being eaten by the big bad wolf in little red riding hood? Things like that?

IamactuallytherealJeff · 12/02/2016 13:24

Who said anything about call of duty? Keep your pants on.

More thinking donkey kong and fight my monster, that kind of VIOLENCE! Better watch that my kids don't go rolling barrels at their class mates and killing them.

Going now to read the gingerbread man and cry myself to sleep over the poor thing having his head savagely ripped off by a fox.

Then I'll read chicken lickenSmile
To my 2 year old.

ChazsBrilliantAttitude · 12/02/2016 13:32

Iamactually

Have there been many news reports recently of little old ladies being eaten by wolves?

As opposed to school shootings, videos of drowned children, children holding severed heads, children in hospital beds thanks to the Syrian bombings, children as collateral damage as their UN school was shelled.

That is the point people are making. Violence in fairy stories is relatively divorced from day to day reality. Unfortunately, this poem is no longer as far from the truth as we would like and that alters its impact.

LittleLionMansMummy · 12/02/2016 13:36

And my memory of Little Red Riding Hood was that the wolf ate grandma in one big gulp. I don't recall it becoming a bloodbath as the wolf shredded her limb from limb. Maybe my parents dumbed it down for me though, y'know, made it age appropriate....

Seryph · 12/02/2016 13:51

I really hope that all the people who object to this poem haven't allowed their poor sensitive children to watch any of the Star Wars films then, considering they contain:
Slavery
People being blown up
People having limbs severed by swords
People being shot to death
People being strangled to death
People being electrocuted as a form of torture and murder
People being stabbed
Children being murdered by an authority figure
The glorification of violence and warfare (the Jedi are knights after all)
The training of children for warfare (most Younglings are taken from their families in infanthood around a few months old. This is discussed in the Clone Wars cartoon)

Have I made my point yet?

Kids are very good at coping with things that as adults we may over think and find disturbing. They just don't see it the way do and find the grosser things in life pretty funny.

Passthecake30 · 12/02/2016 13:56

I remember studying that poem when I was about 13....but sadly the world is a different place now.

Blu · 12/02/2016 13:57

I am always loathe to wish restrictions on literature in schools, but if I were a teacher one thing I would take into consideration would be my individual students. There were children in 'our' primary who had arrived as refugees having witnessed acts described in the poem. I think it is good for children to grapple with difficult ideas, to appreciate how to criticise material , to view things as metaphor, irony or just plain wrong, which they cannot do if everything they are given is 'palatable' . On the whole I trust the professionalism and experience of teachers, and as with any different arena in which our children learn and grow there will sometimes be things we don't agree with. But the outcome is not often likely to be catastrophic.

stopfuckingshoutingatme · 12/02/2016 14:21

I slept on thus, and gut reaction is its just unnecessary

there is enough violence in the world already isn't there? If we want violence there is no shortage, we don't need this poem

seeing children the same age as my DS being trained for ISIS Shock

LittleLionMansMummy · 12/02/2016 14:27

Star Wars is a 12A so no, I haven't allowed my 'poor sensitive' 5yo to watch it. Am I still qualified to voice an opinion on the poem's appropriateness?

MyFriendsCallMeOh · 12/02/2016 14:34

I think the teacher was hoping to find a poem that would appeal to the children, something a bit borderline, a bit daring, as way of showing herself to be on the same level as the kids, but I do think she misjudged it massively.

BoboChic · 12/02/2016 14:35

I don't censor violence, juste as I don't censor a whole host of works of art/literature/film etc that treat difficult topics with skill, finesse or humour.

I do censor crap, however!

ArielisALiar · 12/02/2016 14:49

I'm a teacher and I think this poem is tasteless and crude. In a world in which school shootings actually happen, never mind the recent events in Paris, this poem is hideously poor judgement by the teacher. But also, it just isn't a very good poem!

There is no way the head of my school would tolerate this. I can't imagine any of my colleagues even WANTING to introduce such a thing...

Zipitydooda · 12/02/2016 15:02

No no no!

I have a ds age 10
He's a thinker, he links things together.

I try to keep news of violence in schools away from him but he hears it at school.
School is a place of safety and I want him to think of it as safe.
Unfortunately times have changed since this poem was written 30 odd years ago and real violence in school is a possibility in a way that it wasn't when this poem was written.

He would link the poem and the real life stories of violence in school that he's heard and it would affect him. It might give him nightmares and confuse him.

Just no way!

NickiFury · 12/02/2016 15:06

COD was mentioned earlier in the thread actually iam.

bearleftmonkeyright · 12/02/2016 15:14

[http://www.poemhunter.com/roger-mcgough/]

In the above link there are two comments from different 10 year old children with very differing views on The Lesson. This has been a really interesting thread.

zenaria · 12/02/2016 16:36

I am mortified at this poem! I am an American (and now a British citizen) and as someone has mentioned above, the poem sickens me - especially in light of the massacres in the US. How can one associate this as appropriate for school aged children? How can people make light of killing children? I don't normally post on this, but felt compelled given how horrifying and sickening this is.