SuitabookFarm Boy
Michael Morpurgo
- Reading
- Read it as a family story, pausing after the grandfather’s revelation and the ploughing contest. If wartime scenes trouble the reader, discuss the feelings they raise without requiring detailed retelling.
- Themes
- Grandparent and grandson: The grandson visits his grandfather, hears family stories and agrees to help him learn to read and write. The relationship is presented warmly, with shared effort and growing closeness at its centre.
- Learning and perseverance: The grandfather’s inability to read or write is revealed, and the grandson commits time to teaching him before travelling. Persistence and shared learning are treated as meaningful rather than incidental to the family story.
- Tradition and change on the farm: Albert and his father enter a ploughing contest in which their horses compete with a new tractor. The contest creates a clear contrast between established farming practices and mechanisation, but its wider judgement is uncertain.
- Worth knowing
- War memories include shelling, injuries and deaths of people and horses, described without graphic detail. Beer, cider and drunkenness also appear, including drink influencing an unreasonable bet.