Lessons you had in school that you’re not sure still happens

[Soubriquet]

I remember doing cookery, woodworking and something with a solder iron. I can still remember the smell of the solder burning.

I did those in year 7. I also remember having to rush to local supermarket with my parents cos I needed last minute ingredients for my cookery lessons

My dd is in year 8 but she doesn’t do any of these lessons

Scripture. (Not a church school either)

Maybe. I’ll ask her when she gets home, but I’ve never had to send her to school with ingredients
for cooking, she’s never said anything about building a book end like I did, or soldering some wire to make a little LED work

At one of my dc secondary school they just asked for a £20 donation at the beginning of term to cover all ingredients and stop students forgetting or buying more than was needed for the recipe. Could this be the case!

We did a similar class in first year, the teacher retired, and it was never a subject again.

Typewriting and childcare.

Wallington Girls

I can touch type. It’s a really useful skill. I also made a letterbox in metalwork class!

I dont think my DC did sewing or woodwork. I cant think of anything they've bought home if they did. No childcare option at their school either.

Wiring a plug, spelling (it seems it’s not a requirement now), reading an analogue clock.

I remember there was a time when they contemplated not teaching times tables to the same degree as we were taught it. Obviously not happening and it’s needed almost daily anyway. I hated learning it but it’s bloody useful and you understand later in life why it’s needed.

Our school didn’t teach us long division as ‘you’ll never need it!’. Well when my brother went to uni to do his Maths degree it seems he did need it.

@BashfulClam of course they teach spelling.
It's a big part of the primary curriculum.
It comes under "SPaG" - Spelling, Punctuation and Grammar.

I don’t know if health and social care GCSE is offered in all secondaries but in my DD’s it was and a friend’s daughter did it in hers so definitely a thing. It’s only appeared in year 10, before that this topic was covered in science lessons.
I always thought that DT is a compulsory part of the curriculum, it’s what they make/ sew/ cook is up to a school to decide.

Tbh DD was in a standard state secondary a few years ago and had cooking and sewing lessons, all known me teens did including those in academies and independent schools, a few friends children even did DT as GSCE option.

Schools do vary widely in what subjects they offer. Realistically a school would have to be massive to offer every single GCSE subject. Or every variation on the practical subjects in KS3 even on a taster basis.

(Which is why Sixth form colleges are a great idea... more scope for a wider range of subjects. Maybe we need more Technical schools for 14yos as well for those who will thrive in the more practical subjects

Defiantly not in all secondaries, my DCs being two where it wasn't. They definitely did some kind of DT, although I dont think it was called that. I think it was art and design as a combined thing. Whereas I did art as one subject and DT was separate.

We learnt how to curtsey in primary school (1980s). In senior school, skills I picked up include the waltz, basic car mechanics, how to make a Christmas cake (including the marzipan etc), following a pattern to make a skirt/blouse, Latin, Greek and basic Arabic and Russian.

An eclectic education I am very grateful for!

They still do cooking and woodwork until their options or at least they do in most schools.

dd3 hated cooking so she dropped it

Not in the same way it was hammered into my generation. My friend asked why more focus isn’t put on it as her sons spelling was atrocious and he wasn’t too bothered, the teacher said ‘well as long as he can be understood!’ Many of my younger colleagues write ‘could/would/should of’. A degree trained younger colleague recently used ‘shouldn’t of’ twice in an e-mail. I noticed someone else writing ‘opertunety’ more than once.

Haven’t done this either!

as said earlier, I was at school in the 1970s, and they set their own curriculum. some lessons do not seem to be done now or are under new names. The ones I remember are;
Music and Movement
commerce
typing
home entertainment where we cooked lunch for teachers, cleaned and kept a place tidy, had a room put by for this with full furniture, sofa, chairs, table etc
home economics
needlework, remember some girls making wedding dresses!
rural science was a very rural school lots of farmers kids so most of them knew all about country life
child care

DD is in Y8 and has done sewing, embroidery, cooking, knitting, jewellery-making and woodwork in DT since she started secondary school. She has made some very nice free range chicken goujons, cheese straws, bread, couscous salad, Swiss roll and jam tarts so far! More useful than my own Home Ec cooking thirty-five years ago (kedgeree, fried pizza, damson jam… though also a Swiss roll…)

In sewing they have mostly done sewing exercises by hand and on the machine. Probably better than making a nightdress case, as I did. (Well, I made half of a nightdress case 😆)

They only have DT in Y7/Y8 unless they choose to take it as an option in Y9+. DD is pretty academic so will be taking music, languages and extra maths instead; but actually she has really enjoyed DT during these two years.

At my school the lessons they wouldn’t have these dats include country dancing (primary school!) and typing (secondary). I didn’t do typing as I was in the top set, and at the time only girls who were considered to need secretarial skills did the typing classes! (Little did they and I know at the time that touch typing would have been the most useful thing I could have learned at school — if I’d learned it!)

Apparently teaching reading using phonics does have an effect on spelling because often they will write words phonetically too.
I remember doing some volunteer class reading in my daughter's class in Year 3 (so age 7/8). They had all made their own little story books and I read some out loud. So many words were spelled phonetically.
SPaG is a big part of Year 6 SATS in England so I am not sure when between Yr3 and 6 that learning how to spell correctly kicks in.

🤣🤣🤣

I went to primary school here in Ireland in the 80’s. Every morning for Irish the teacher would prop a projector up on a desk and pull down this screen thing on the wall. A series of pictures were shown telling a story. Could be about anything. I remember one that had an old man staggering home from the pub after too much whiskey. We thought this was hilarious. This was all in Irish. I’m not sure what we learned from it but I remember the curtains would be closed and we’d all have our heads down on our folded arms on the desk. Maybe some were asleep! I can’t remember what it was called. Does anyone else remember it? It was bizarre really.

I remember the tv on wheels being wheeled around and watching ‘ look and learn ‘ on tv. The silver space man story was very harrowing. Like a horror movie !
It taught us to read though ( and be scared of spacemen )

Picture box was a strange programme.
I remember one with a red balloon and the boy would follow it and I don't remember any dialogue in that one.

I am convinced ( so is my old school childhood friend ) that the 70s was an experimental time for children with odd phonetics being taught to some and weird films ( public information films were popular) and just odd goings on! Maybe it’s better now there is a curriculum.