An Elementary School Classroom in a slum-Stephan Spender

Poem 2  : An Elementary School Classroom in a slum-Stephan Spender
Think
Is thee anything you would like to change in your classroom?
What is the picture of an ideal classroom?
A classroom in a slum is devoid of ventilation, light, furniture, often even teacher.
May have children of various ages, disabled, sick and unruly.
Let’s think about the important points of the poem……
Stanza 1
A Grim Picture of the despair and helplessness of the poor children in slum schools
They lack the basic necessities of both the slum school in particular and life in general
Their faces are a mirror of their miserable life full of and uncertainty.
They look stooped as they lack the confidence
They are all weak and undernourished.
They have been compared to rats-who live a life of fear and eat only what others leave on their plates.
Their inheritance is only poverty and deprivation-handed down through the generations.
However, in all this gloomy environment, the poet still finds some glimmer of hope-a student who still dreams and enjoys the simplicity of life around him/her .e.g. a squirrel’s game.
Stanza 2
The poet describes the slum classroom in Tyrol-A suburb in Austria
There is no hope in the lives of the children and their outlook tom life will continue to be dull and dreary unless they are removed from there.
There is a foul smell in the classroom which has some decorations which had been donated to the slum school having being discarded.
The pictures provide a peep into a different world which is far from reality. People like Shakespeare have no significance for them.
To these children the window which opens to them only shows a grey sky and a foggy future which never changes.
These children need to be rescued from such a dreary life and doomed fate. They should be given an opportunity to cross the rivers and oceans and be able to experience a better education and life.
Stanza 3
The poet feels that Shakespeare’s picture and other maps are not good as they show a picture which the slum children can neither comprehend nor achieve.
The slum children live in dingy, unhygienic holes which they call homes.
They have to put patches in the wall and roof to save them selves from the sun cold and rain.
They wear torn clothes and their miserable bones often protrude form them.
Even their glasses are repaired ones, as they cannot afford news ones- the lenses are like broken pieces of bottles.
Life for these children is very difficult and the poet feels they need immediate help and attention.
Stanza 4
The need of the hour is for everyone- governor, teacher, inspector and visitors to all join hands in order to educate and uplift these children.
A strategy to rehabilitate these children who live in home which are like the underground catacombs or tombs without any ventilation or light.
If there children get the opportunity like other children get, their world can also they get a good education they can spread the light and awareness to all. Thus iradicating poverty and darkness.
QUESTIONS:
What kind of freedom does Stephen Spender suggest for the children of elementary school in the poem and why?
What does Spender say about the future of the students there in the elementary school?
What does the poet mean in ‘Shakespeare is wicket, & the map a bad example’.
How do the pictures on the walls in the classroom present the picture of social disparity, injustice and class inequalities?
To whom does the poet request to help & raise the lot of slum children?