When I was at school, we were…

[Cogsworth3rd]

My parents talked about school practices such as getting the slipper and caning, about shutting misbehaved kids in a cupboard (classrooms often had a large walk in cupboard to put supplies, my primary school also had them). My “I can’t believe they used to do that” moments are supervising showers after PE to make sure you were fully naked, board rubbers thrown at children and facing the wall all lesson if you misbehaved. Some other aspects were more relaxed though, so if
you needed the toilet during a lesson you could go, the teacher could talk about a topic in more depth if the children were engaged in it, we could play in the snow at break.

What will be the “I can’t believe they used to do that” or “I can’t believe they wouldn’t let us do that” that our children will tell their children?

The OTT detentions in some schools.

my French used to make poorly behaved children sit in the corridor copying out passages from the bible.
primary school 1970s we did pe in our pe uniform of maroon knickers, can’t remember the t-shirt we wore.
that was my school!
today - not letting children remove a blazer despite the hot weather.

I went to boarding school in the 90s (not in the UK) with some absolutely horrific practices. Two minute showers (older prefects had the job of standing outside with a stopwatch).

If you got in trouble (like grounded), you had to be watched at all times by staff or a prefect, they’d literally follow you to the toilet and you had to keep the door open while you had a shit.

They were very anxious about drugs and anything else naughty being brought in. On move in day, everyone was subject to a strip search. Literally a bend over and cough sort.

If you got like a really serious detention, a step away from expulsion, you had to go to this separate building where you did school from until the detention was lifted. If you weren’t doing school work, you were expected to sit and face the wall. The goal was pretty much to break you so you’d apologise and not do it again. I never got a detention (I was actually very good and didn’t stay there very long because my parents realised it was really f-ing weird after a few terms), so no personal experience, but I’ve been told there were students who stayed in there facing the wall for terms or a whole school year.

All sorts of other really messed up stuff happened. Headmaster supposedly invited some students to sleep over in his bed. I can’t say I saw it with my own eyes, but a group of us definitely was delivered to his private residence and came into his bedroom for a chat a time or two (about totally innocuous things and it didn’t feel weird at the time because he was quite jolly, but I’m sure that’s how he must have groomed students). A friend of mine was sexually abused by a teacher and ended up running away from school to go live with him. They lived together and had a ‘relationship’ 🙄 for several years.

It was an international school with campuses in several countries. I think carefully selected to avoid too much probing by authorities. Eventually the main school were I was got shut down (after all the above allegations of sexual abuse came out). They moved all students to the campuses abroad to avoid they being interviewed by the police as part of the investigation. The whole thing eventually crumbled and shut down when enough parents pulled out. I think there was a legal case by former students though not sure it went further than just a report and student testimony being made part of the public record.

It didn’t feel anything other than ‘really strict’ at the time, and I don’t feel in anyway scarred by it 😂 but as a parent now, I’m like, god, that is horrific. 😳

We had to do PE in our vests and pants if we didn't have our kit. If we were 'lucky', we could have a rummage through lost property for some manky kit.

I remember all of that. We used to have to run through a sort of corridor of showers with our towels held above our heads. As presently as the 70s.
also lines “I must not talk when the teacher is talking” type of thing - 100 times, or more.
Boys got the cane or the slipper.

We had to sign hymns and say the lords prayer every assembly.
Teachers were always called mr or Mrs.
In assembly we always said good morning mr jones, good morning mrs baker good morning everyone.
This was my secondary school in the mid 1980's.
Board rubbers were regularly used by certain teachers.
You didn't answer back, just got on with your work unless you had a question.
Some teachers were stricter than others.

@TeenToTwentiesdo you mean the length of detentions or the reasons for them?

Now- kids sent from every lesson to behaviour room - clearly not working.
dd got detention for not running in pe.

Good-/ private schools used to have assisted places

i never had detention

teachers staff room where they were all smoking

That’s horrific.

Started primary mid 80s and secondary through the 90s
Feel like that was actually a great time to go to school- not as ridiculously strict as a decade earlier, no corporal punishment, but also more discipline than these days.
The main thing I can’t believe now is how lax security was, no locked gates during the day. DHs school had a public footpath down the field so anyone could walk through whenever they wanted!

We wore navy blue knickers and an aertex for gym. If you forgot your kit, you did gym in your regular knickers

Some lucky girls got to take the board wipers outside to hang together to get the chalk out.

We sang the Lord’s Prayer every day. Totally non-denominational, multicultural and even international school. So odd.

School in the early 90s and we had to get naked in communal showers- unless we were on our periods.

Teacher would throw chalk rubbers or chairs across the classroom. Many had affairs with students or with each other and were very obvious about it. In sixth form teachers would come to the pub with us at lunchtime. The staff room was always thick with cigarette smoke.

@Cogsworth3rd In 1982 my year 5 report described me as sullen and the school nit and teeth nurse said in front of other children that she'd heard I had "funny turns". On reflection, I had depression, anxiety and Turrettes, but those words weren't part of anyone's vocabulary then. I was also being bullied, but in those days it was called being teased and you were expected to deal with it.

My secondary school was all-girls, and was a Catholic school attached to a convent..When I was in year 11 the female PE teacher (not a nun) had a relationship with one of the female pupils - I remember seeing them snogging in the bus shelter one night. A friend's parent reported it, but she said she didn't expect anything to be done because the headteacher was a nun who didn't believe that lesbian relationships existed.

I've no idea what my DC's will reflect on. They had a relatively good experience, except for Covid of course - that was mad.

The showers after PE. We all had to strip naked while the pe teacher stood and watched. Then she would watch us all shower. This was 1991 to 1996. I'm actually traumatised by it I think.

In the 80s I remember the blackboard eraser being thrown at kids. 90s, various students having relationships with teachers and inappropriate sexual behaviour from teachers towards girls.

I think future generations will look back at how children with gender confusion have been treated in schools, how that has impacted them and on other kids around them. I think they’ll be horrified that kids who in the main were same sex attracted, neurodivergent or had experienced trauma, were being supported to tell others to see them as the opposite sex in school, instead of the focus being on supporting the underlying issues.

Another reflection on my all-girls Catholic secondary school - in year 8 (1985) someone came to give us a "health talk" about periods and puberty and they brought us each get a free box of tampons. But the school said we could only have them if we brought a letter from our parents to the school office. My friend's mum told me the nuns thought using tampons destroyed your virginity.

I attended a few different schools due to house moves. The differences between schools was stark. Things that happened then, would not happen today:

Boys (NOT girls) being 'slippered' by the Headmaster.

Girls having to 'prove' i.e. show the P.E. teacher that they were on their period (you weren't allowed in the swimming pool if you were on your period).

P.E. teachers checked that you had showered after each P.E lesson. You had to open your towel to show them you were naked and had water on your body.

Then because no-one wanted to participate in the P.E. lessons, some kids got their ears pierced (this meant you were automatically excluded from P.E. for 6 weeks). My friend had her ears pierced 3 times to avoid P.E.

It was common for teachers to throw objects at pupils i.e. board cleaners or books.

The amount your Parents had contributed to 'School Fund' was written down and read out on 'deadline day'. The child whose Parents contributed the most became a 'Class Monitor' for that term.....

Scary when you think back!

I attended a Catholic sixth form college in the early 1980s, a night out for the college was organised at a local night club, termly. Everybody got very drunk and there seemed to be little regard for licensing laws given the obvious ages of most of the customers. I do recall having fake ID but don’t think it was checked. I remember these nights with great fondness, an early introduction to proper nights out, snogging and piling into taxis to get home at the end of the night. All quite normal I would imagine. What was not normal on reflection were the four or five priests (teachers) who came along and openly groped and kissed girls. We thought it was normal as it seemed to be such a regular occurrence.

The late seventies at a grammar school: cross country running through the snow in PE skirt and school PE top, we had to run through the grounds of the local psychiatric hospital, watched by patients. Our PE teacher followed behind us wrapped up in his sheepskin coat, driving his cortina, flicking ash from his fag out of the window.

The boys got the cane from the Head; a pathetic little man swanning around in his robe, for being late to lesson. The girls got kept behind for not handing in homework on time (two hours a night homework was normal). We had too copy lines off the blackboard.

If we had to deliver a message to a teacher at break or lunch, we needed a gas mask due to the fog of smoke emitting from the staff room. Students caught smoking got the cane from pathetic little man or detention, and their confiscated cigarettes were put in the staff room for teachers to share.

We had religious assembly for thirty minutes at 8.30 every morning, bible passages, hymns, prayers. All Church of England. No acknowledgment of other religions or beliefs.

Registration was at 8.15. School ended at 4.05.

My DM told me (in the 60s), when I’d a
ready started using them, that she thought you couldn’t use tampons unless you were married. I suppose she had thought you couldn’t physically do it (get them in) - it wasn’t a moral opinion.

But at least she was a lot more enlightened than the mother of my German exchange girl, who insisted to her dds that you couldn’t have a bath or wash your hair when you had your period. One of the dds actually had a tantrum at the dinner table over this. At the time I was amazed at such an old-wives-tale idea.

Junior school: Children would get the slipper, ruler or the blackboard rubber thrown at them. The headmaster came across two fighting boys once and bashed their heads together.

In the last year of juniors, we worked hard from September - then spent every sunny afternoon in the summer on the field playing cricket.

Some of these are so creepy and humiliating.

In the early 90s when we were 15/16 we would go to a pub or club and our teachers would be there and buy us drinks!

Also, the school minibus had wooden benches down each side inside and when we went round the corner we had to hold the back doors closed. And god forbid we asked to wear trousers when it was cold! Not allowed. And for pe boys were allowed to wear decent length shorts or tracksuit bottoms - girls had to wear very short netball skirts or indoor pe it was gym knickers only and a flimsy almost see through vest top - unless you were on your period then you could wear a netball skirt inside. This was when I was 15/16, again early 90s. Shocking looking back. Would love to know what teachers of that time think looking back. Just to add also had some amazing teachers!

It’s odd looking back isn’t it? We had some teachers that definitely had a sadistic streak, others had their own weird foibles, some were great, others just went through the motions. The teachers that seemed to get the most from the children didn’t sweat the small stuff, were respectful, knowledgeable, engaging and fair. It was a safe space to make a mistake or put your view forward. The overly strict ones cultivated resentment, put people off continuing that subject when allowed to choose.

Yes! I fell in love with history because my teacher was so passionate about it and was so supportive when my mum suddenly died weeks before my GCSEs. Sadly other teachers of subjects I loved were less supportive and told me to not let my mum dying get in the way of my exams 🤦🏽‍♀️
And several teachers clearly hated the job and were just waiting for retirement and didn’t teach us anything. Or mocked us if we dared showed an interest in something they didn’t perceive to be feminine.