Unit Two
Comprehension 2
Who finds the annual school Speech Day enjoyable? Certainly not the following writer!
IT'S MUM AND DAD
One of the more fiendish tortures to which
parents are annually obliged to subject
themselves is the school speech day.
We received our invitation the other
afternoon. It's speech day on Thursday
week,' one of our daughters said, ´and
you'd better come becauseI think I'm go
Ing to get a prize."
My wife watched as Iflinched. My eyes
rolled back in my head. I quietly started
gibbering in the corner. Take no notice of
your father, she said, 'he'd love to go. AS a
matter of fact, all the years since you
children started going to school, the one
function he looks forward to more than
anything else is speech day.'
The thing that depresses me most about
speech day is the way nothing ever
changes. It's still the same wretched ordeal
11 was 30 years ago, when I was a kid.
Regular readers will know that l'm a man
of reasonable enthusiasm, ready to re
spond tO most of life's calls. But during a
generation in which we've seen the advent
of colour television, the landing on the
moon, the invention of the Glad Bag and
Bert Newton's blossoming from a sallow
youth to a middle-aged bloke with ahair
transplant, nothing about schocl speech
day has ever progressed.
WHO DESERVE THE PRIZE
The headmaster willcome out, welcome
all the dreary guests, parents and children,
then proceed to deliver the annual report,
followed by a lecture on what he believes is
some vital social issue. When I say head
master, by and large the same applies to
headmistresses too. Typical subjects in
clude the need for greater discipline in
today's changing society, education as it
has evolved over the last 20 years, what
ever happened to the family unit, the need
to pull together as a team, you only get
back from life what you put into it, and
Television Friend or Foe'. Realising
that this is the one day of the year on which
he has a captive audience over the age of
12, the headmaster seizes upon the oppor
tunity to hammer you with his personal
philosophy on life for at least a mind
bending 20 minutes.
It'salways stifling in the auditorium. On
the evening before school speech day, the
cleaner is instructed to securely bar all the
windows so that we can suffocate in the
early December heal.
Honoud guest for the show is usually
the local MP, who takes the opportunity to
blow his bags about what his government
is doing for education. There is then a
musical interlude in which the choir sings
18 Unit Two
composition from medieval times about
a fields on a
milkmaids frolicking in the
once in my life
warm summer's day. Only
speech day
can I recall ever going to a music was
where a contemporary piece of
performed. The children sang a Bob Dylan
the
song. They did it superbly. I'm sure
teacher was sacked. Whatever happened, I
haven't heard anything fresher than nine
teenth-century since.
With guests fanning themselves with
their programs and gasping for breath,
one by one, year byy year, the various prize
winners are called up to receive their
awards. These are usually book tokens
which can only be used to buy books from
a warehouse that's closing down on the
other side of town.
The sportsmaster, Jim Jockstrap, deli
vers his report and declares that despite
the fact that the school got rolled again in
the annual athletic championships and
that two runners in the mile still haven't
finished, everyone tried hard and we
should do better next year. The head of the
Parents' and Citizens' Associationdelivers
her report and publicly castigates the pa
rents who mistakenly believed that by
sending their children toa public school,
government was going to look
the
them. Parents who don't
attend P an4
better the
meetings are painted as littie
child bashers whose children would
better off living on a diet of gruel in the
workhouse.
The Schoo! Captain, Tess Truchear
thanks everyone for coming and hands
over to the next year's School Captain.
whopromises to do her best to uphold the
example Tess has set her. By this time.
women in the audience are on the brink of
passing out, and the little boy in front of
you is demonstrating that he clearly suffers
from some form of severe intestinal dis
order.
The choir bursts into a madrigal about
a young man who once went a-wOOing,
before closing with the school song and
Advance Australia Fair. No-one joins in
because no-one knows the words. The
doors are thrown open, and as the
crowd
spills-and-staggers
gushing mums
out into the fresh aír,
and Waynes wonwhose
prizes
Sarahs, Dorothys,
best speech day the declare it was the
school ever had.
from The Best of
Mike
Gibsom
by MIKE GIBSON
 Comprehension 19

How WellDid You Understand? that he is not looking forward to

part of the writer indicates
K) What behaviout on the
another speech day? transplant
does the inclusion of the Glad Bag and Bert Newton's hair
(2) What effect have on therèader?
among recent social changes
writer make of the local MP?
13) What criticism does the choir items at school speech
most frustrating about typical
4) What does the writer find
days?
respond if the school jazz band played a bracket of
How would the author probably
(5)
numbers?
make of the book-token awards?
the writer
(6) What criticism does convey about school captains?
Trueheart' intended to
(7) What is the name Tess the school
feel that a has been the best speech day
speech day
(8) Which parents tend to
ever had'?
here held at a primary school or a high school? Explain
described
(9) 0sthe speech day
vour reasoning.
speech-day changes that the writer would approve of.
(10) Suggest three

Dictionary Words like to use the back-of

the article. You may
Give the meanings of the following words from
the-book dictionary to help you. castigates () gruel.
advent (d) sallow (e)
fiendish (b) gibbering (c)

BoOK

PRIZE
roucHee

Language 2
Ambiguity meaning is
language in such a way that more thn one of two
Ambiguity involves the use of an ambiguous statement, we are unsure whichderives
or hear understand.Much humour
possible. Thus, when we read writer wishes us to
speaker or following
(or more) meanings the such a way as to create ambiguity.For example, the aware of its
trom the use of language in sentence we are all familiar with, and makes us
poem deliberately presses a
ambiguity.