III. Post-reading

3.1. Feelings.

Bogles, or simply ghosts, seem to have a lot of spirit in them. They are sad, and merry, and lonely, and excited sometimes. Describe the feelings of the bagpipe-playing bogle who found a home at last.

3.2. Roleplay.

Dramatize vari­ous episodes of the story in which the members of the family tried to de­fend their right to have a decent bogle in their house.

3.3. Visiting Scotland.

On your left, you can see a house that still stands in a quiet street in St. Andrews, Scotland. It seems to be a perfect place for bogle dwellers, doesn't it? Describe it as if you were the owner of the house her/himself. Be proud of your family history, just like a real Mac, you know.

3.3. Project work: bagpipes.

Study the information below and find more facts about the 'five-legged beastie'. Present your findings in class.

A bagpipe band in traditional kilts, playing the national instrument of Scotland, is a familiar sight. The bagpipe is indeed an old instrument whose great-granddaddy was probably a simple reed whistle.

In the sixteenth century, King Henry VIII of England both played and composed pipe music. He had five sets of pipes in his collection of 380 musical instruments. Later piping declined everywhere except in Scotland, where the bagpipes were used to communicate over the hills, vales, and rivers.

In 1707 Scotland, Wales, and England were united into one kingdom-a union that did not please everyone. In order to control the wild, unruly Scots, the government of Great Britain banned pipes, along with kilts, the Gaelic language, and firearms.

This practice was stopped eighty years later, and with the forming of Scottish regiments, bagpipe music returned. The British army brought bagpipes to countries where they had never been before.

The Great Highland Pipes of Scotland consist of a leather or canvas bag with five wooden pipes sticking out, giving the appearance of a "five-legged beastie". The pipes, made of African blackwood, include a blowpipe for inflating the bag, an eight-holed chanter for playing melody, and three drones, each of which produces a single note when air is squeezed through it.

The classical music of Scotland is called Piobeareachd, meaning "big music". It is generally slow and sad. The new music, written within the last 150 years, is band music. It is divided into jigs, and competition music, as well as marches and dances.

SOME LIGHT ON THE PROBLEM

I. Pre-reading

1.1. SHARE the most frightening experience you've ever had in your life, be it your childhood years or your school days.

1.2. SAY if fear is something that is always there. Are you always able to explain why this or that scares you?

1.3. PROVE that it's absolutely necessary to master the ways of keeping your fears in check. At what age should one begin?

II. Reading

2.1. Understanding the title.

Do you see any double meaning in the title of the story written by David Hill? Try to do that together with your group mates.

2.2. Reading for pleasure and enrichment.

Read the story and answer the question: Why did the boy's be­haviour change in the end? The following words will be useful for better understanding of the events.

Grotty — nasty and dirty

Jerk — to move in short sudden movements

Wriggle — to twist from side to side with small quick movements

Sniff — to breathe air into your nose noisily

Glossy — shiny and smooth

When I was about ten, Mum and I lived in a house beside the main road. It was a grotty old place. It had tiny windows, and the rooms were dark most of the time. The roof leaked when it rained, and we had to put a bowl in the middle of the kitchen floor to catch the drips. We lived mostly in the din­ing room and the big back bedroom. We hardly used the front rooms at all.

Mum worked in the school office on the other side of town where we used to live. She only worked in the mornings, because she wanted to be home when I got back from school in the af­ternoons. Mum got a lift to her school with one of the teachers, Mr. O'Rourke. He picked her up at the corner at eight o'clock. Ev­ery morning she left home as late as she could so that I wouldn't be by myself for long.

We made a game out of it. Mum stood by the back door with her bag and her jacket, and we both watched the clock's second hand jerk round. I'd count the last few seconds out loud: ''Five, four, three, two, one, zero!"

Mum would yell, "Blast off! Bye, love!" Then she'd rush out the back door, lock it behind her, and race off round the side of the house. I don't think Mr. O'Rourke minded waiting — he liked Mum. But she always made sure she was on time.

After she left, I'd dry the breakfast dishes and read a book till it was a quarter past eight and time to go to school. I was supposed to go out the front door and close it behind me so that it locked itself. To reach the front door, I had to go along the front hall. And I was scared stiff of the front hall.

It was just a little short hallway, but it was dark. There weren't any windows in it, and the front door only had four little squares of red glass that made weird colors on the hall walls. The wallpaper had a pattern of wriggly green lines, like snakes. There were two doors into the front rooms that we hardly ever used. The doors were always half-open, and the rooms behind them were dark. Every time I opened the dining room door at a quarter past eight and stared down the hall, the whole house seemed to go still as if something were listening to me. I'd feel so frightened that my back would start prickling. What was I frightened of? Oh, all sorts of silly imaginary things. I was frightened that the green lines on the wallpaper would start to wriggle like real snakes when I went past. I was frightened that some­thing would be waiting in one of the front rooms and jump out at me. I was even frightened of the hall carpet. It was old and brown and went along the middle of the hall. There were black wooden boards on either side of it. I was scared that the boards would be missing under the carpet, and when I stepped on it, I would fall into a terrible, deep hole.

At a quarter past eight every morning when I had to leave for school, I would open the dining room door as quietly as I could so that no one would know I was coming. It was just six steps to the front door; I'd count them as 1 tiptoed. I wouldn't look at the wallpaper in case it started to move, and I held my fists squeezed tight. When I got to the door, I'd open it without making a sound. Then I'd rush out, slam the door behind me, and tear off down the path.

Why didn't I tell Mum I was frightened? I don't know. Maybe I thought she'd laugh at me. Maybe 1 was scared that telling someone would make the things I was frightened of really happen. Maybe I thought that if I didn't say anything, it might all go away.

It didn't. I got more and more scared. I asked Mum if I could leave home when she did, but she said no, eight o'clock was too early for me to be at school all by myself.

One morning Mum went rushing off to meet Mr. O'Rourke the way she usually did. I dried the dishes and tried to read my book. But I was so frightened that I couldn't even understand the words.

I started talking loudly to myself. "I'm off to school now, Nick. You keep the place tidy."

Then I said, "Yeah, right," in the deepest voice I could, to make it sound as if I had an older friend there with me.

I opened the dining room door into the dark hallway. I could hear my heart banging. I just knew that today something was going to open one of those hall doors and jump out at me. Suddenly, a door did fly open. Someone did come jumping through it. It was the back door, and it was Mum, all pink-faced and noisy.

"I'd forget my head if it wasn't glued on!" she was saying. "I've left my office keys behind. Mr. O'Rourke had to drive me all the way back. Why, love, whatever's the matter?" With the shock of her rushing in so suddenly like that, and then feeling so glad because it was her, I'd burst out crying. And now I couldn't stop. Mum put her arms around me and hugged me. She made me sit down on the sofa and tell her what the matter was. I told her everything — all about the hall and the wallpaper and the carpet and the front rooms and what I was scared might be there. It took ages, in between crying and then sniffing. I can't imagine what Mr. O'Rourke was thinking out in his car!

Mum kept hugging me till I was finished. Then she gave me her hanky to blow my nose and she smiled at me.

"You are a silly old frog," she said. "Keeping it all to yourself like that! If you tell someone when you're scared, it always makes things better."

She stood up.

"Now," she said, "I've got a bright idea. Let's have a little light on the problem."

We went into the hall. Just on the other side of the dining room door there was a light switch. Mum pressed it down. And straight­away the front hall wasn't a dark scary place any longer. It was ordinary. The wriggly snakes on the wallpaper were just green lines. The doors into the two front rooms needed a coat of paint. The black boards on the floor were glossy in the sudden yellow light.

"There!" said Mum. "I'll turn the hall light on every morning before I go to work. We'll leave it on till I come back in the afternoon. It'll make the place look bright and cheerful. It'll stop any burglars, too — they'll think there's someone home. O.K., love?"

"O.K., Mum," I said; after a couple more sniffs.

And it was as simple as that. From then on, the front hall was just another part of the house, and I was never scared of going into it again. In fact, after I told Mum, and after her bright idea of turn­ing the light on, I suppose you could say that the front hall made me feel quite ... light-hearted.

2.3. True of false?

The boy always left for school together with his mother.

Mother gave her son a lift to school. While in the front hall the boy imagined all sorts of scary things.

He discussed his fears with his friends and felt much better.

One day the boy grew out of his fear and was able to laugh at himself.

The family had to move as the boy's fear grew from bad to worse.

Mother's solution was as simple as it was wise.

2.4. Verbs in focus.

Match the verbs with their definitions. Translate the sentences below using the newly defined verbs.

1	burst out	A	collect someone who is waiting for you
2	blast off	B	move quickly especially in a dangerous way
3	pick up	C	suddenly start crying, laughing, etc.
4	rush out	D	leave a place
5	tear off	E	leave in a hurry
6	be off	F	move very quickly, especially if you're late

1. The child didn't stop at the curb but... across the road.

2. The girl was waiting for her boyfriend ... but he never turned up.

3. The teacher ... the classroom angrily.

4. Learning the test results the girl... crying.

5. The rocket... the ground.

6. We have little time left, it's about time we ....

2.5. More light on English.

Make sure you can see the light when giving correct written definitions to the following expressions. Light-heartedly, describe select episodes of the story using these expressions.

1	come to light
2	bring to light
3	throw light on
4	be out like a light
5	stand in someone's light
6	put out somebody's light
7	give someone the green light

2.6. Storing vocabulary.

Fill in the gaps using the words given below.

1. Mike's got a really ... sense of humour.

2. Don't you ... at me like that! I've done nothing wrong.

3. Jane lay on the floor trembling and .... She was too fright­ened to move.

4. I missed my bus today but was lucky from one of my colleagues.

5. He ... across the hall and followed her into the kitchen.

6. ... climbed into the house through a window carelessly left open.

Choose from: get / give a lift, be scared stiff, weird, tiptoe, burglar, yell.

2.7. Grammar in focus.

Remember various small episodes of the story when the charac­ters made themselves do something — unwillingly, perhaps.

e.g. Every morning Nick made himself go through the back door. As for mother, she never made Mr O'Rourke ...