Remember The Old School Days?

Hi Readers,

Been a bit slack lately with my posts, Easter, visitors, hospital visits etc.

Just a load of excuses, when really, if I got myself motivated I'd have done a few posts by now.

I actually did do a post a week or so ago, but deliberately didn't plug it or advertise it, just to see if it might be looked at without me promoting it. If you haven't read it, it's just below  this one.

Today's post is not an 'incense burner', so if that style turned you off, keep reading !

I do have posts on my mind a lot, as there is a notepad on the table and whenever I get an idea I scribble it down quickly. That takes all of 10 seconds, whereas the post itself may take an hour or more as I always tend to digress as I waffle !!!

As you may know, I have been visiting a family member each day in hospital due to serious illness. The nurses and doctors know I'm a teacher, and as we have all been to school at some stage in our lives, everyone has an opinion on school. 

Agree?

When people really begin to voice strong opinions on the state of schooling I tend not to engage them, I just let them have their rant. Usually it's a lost cause trying to reason with some people, so I just change the direction of the 'discussion' and say something like "Well, it was a lot different in our day". 

Safe and non threatening, and generally doesn't escalate their argument.

And this got me thinking.

How different was it "back in the day" ?

For some of you, this might only be a few years ago.

Many others I know who read this will go back more than 30 or 40 years.

Myself, my primary school days were pretty much in the 70's ( 1970's, and NOT the 1870's for those of you who are thinking this !!)

As soon as I thought about some of the things we did, or had done to us, I started to wonder about the safety, danger, carelessness, fun and everything else that these events presented, and although they were accepted back then, what would the reaction be if they happened today ???

I daresay most of them would appear on 'A Current Affair" in no time at all and be front page newspaper fodder.

And as I think about things from my primary school years, what things are we doing now that will be similarly cringeworthy in 30-40 year's time?

We might be doing things now that we see as 'best practice' that in the future will be looked back upon as reprehensible. And I put myself in this basket.

Kids that I'm teaching now could very well be telling their own kids down the track "We had this teacher called Mr K and he would....." and they would be gobsmacked.

Today they might see this things as great learning and fun, and in the future be totally aghast at what I was doing.

Probably more of the latter to be honest !!!

So, allow me to reminisce about some of the things we got  up to, and hopefully I'm triggering some memories for each of you. You'll be amazed at how many things will come back to you, things that you may not have thought about for years.

Leave some thoughts in the comments box below, it just takes one reader to start the ball rolling there, so who is going to be the first brave soul ??

Here we go...

The Incinerator

Many of my readers will relate to this as we went to the same primary school. I won't name it as in this world today everyone is looking to sue for anything and everything that has happened to them. Some rightfully, but many very dubious.

At our small country school, just next to the Boy's toilets was a little enclosure with an incinerator. Basically just a big steel box with a steel panel door on the front and a chimney.

Keep in mind that this was well before the days of recycling, as that word was not something that we had heard about then !

Every few days, usually at the end of the lunch break, the nuns would send a few of us (usually the older grades) down to the incinerator with whatever rubbish there was and in it would go. Mostly paper and cardboard, but I also remember general rubbish often being tipped in as well. 

Smoke would be going everywhere as we usually overloaded it in order to get maximum effect.

Of course, there was the obligatory 'smoking', where we would roll up a piece of paper to mimic a cigarette and 'smoke ' it, when in fact all we got was a mouthful of dirty smoke and perhaps singed hair as it was usually fully alight !

All sorts of fun would be had getting the biggest fire going, and how we never set the adjoining bush alight was a miracle.

If anything, the lighting of the incinerator at least killed the toxic smell of the Boy's toilets next door, that was just a rank place to enter at the best of times.

Can you imagine this happening these days? Driving past a school and seeing a group of kids having the time of their lives with a roaring fire. 

Unsupervised of course !!!

Maths

I really love teaching maths and enjoy it, but this wasn't always the case.

I can clearly remember a time in Gr 2 when we were learning all about using the multiplication symbol ( X ) and for some reason I just couldn't understand it.

I know it seems strange now, but at the time I just couldn't understand why there was an X in between two numbers eg 2 x 4

Each time I went up to the nun ( name witheld, but she was very tiny. That will be a clue to some of you ) she just got madder and madder at me for 'not knowing', as I was pretty good at maths at that point. Because I had always displayed ability at maths, she was just assuming that I'd understand this, which I clearly didn't.

The fear, embarrassment and shame I felt that day is something that I've never forgotten, and I hope I've never made anyone in my class feel that way.

But it was something else she would do sometimes that would get any teacher sacked on the spot nowadays.

When it came to drills for our "Times Tables" (I detest that term !!) we would line up in two rows.

The front people in each row would be asked a question, eg "Three times four".

If you answered it correctly first, you went to the back of your line and a new person for your team was at the front.

Get it wrong and you got a whack on the hand from a ruler she held. You then had to sit out.

Gradually the number of children was whittled down to the last two. Everyone got a whack at some point except the eventual winner.

I can vividly remember the looks of defeat on the faces of some of my friends who knew that they would get whacked early and then have to sit out. How this was ever going to help them learn still escapes me, and even back then I was questioning this approach.

But I never raised it with the nun, as I would have got a whack for doing so.

The Tank

At our school there was an old galvanised iron rainwater tank that had been replaced with a newer one. Rather than throw it out, it was left in the school yard for us to use. Those nuns never wasted an opportunity !!

Many of us scored our first 'pash' in the tank, as it was a great place to hide in during lunch and recess for a bit of 'privacy'.

At the school there was also a big hill in the playground. When I see that hill these days it hardly looks big at all, but back in those days it was huge to me.

We would take the tank to the top of the hill and a few kids would hop in it.

We'd then push it down the hill and the kids inside would hopefully not get thrown out as it rolled down the hill at ever increasing speeds.

Yes, there were some injuries, as I remember one classmate actually breaking her arm one day as we did this. In the classroom after lunch the poor girl was in such pain, but the teacher at the time just dismissed it as a silly playground injury that would be fixed by 'having a drink of water and sitting in the shade" !

The See Saw

You'd be lucky to find one these in any school these days, let alone in any playground.

We had a few at our school, and rarely were they used for the purpose for which they were designed.

Gentle 'Seeing' and "Sawing" ? No chance !!

One activity was to put one person on one end. They would lay on their stomach and wrap their arms and legs around it and hang on for dear life.

The braver ones would put their heads closer to the end of the plank, while the meeker ones ( or more sensible ) put their head facing the centre. Sometimes you would place yourself closer to the middle, and as you got braver, or just managed to survive, you'd edge close and closer to the end.

Meanwhile, any number of other kids would push down as hard as they could on the other end, trying to dislodge you. Often kids would get thrown off, often getting hurt, but as this was sort of expected, it was therefore accepted !

Sometimes we'd even have two kids on the one side trying to get dislodged.

As the planks on the see saw weren't of the greatest quality, I distinctly remember one of them being super flexible, which definitely gave the 'pushers' a distinct advantage.

Once again, how would you feel driving past a school today and seeing this !!

The Swing

We had a large swing similar to the one above, and as I write I can clearly remember the distinct squeaking sound it made.

Isn't it weird how a sound comes back to me 50 years later.

We would do exactly what these kids are doing, and the challenge was to stay in the middle for a s long as you could.

If more than one person was in the middle, big decisions had to be made:

1. Do we sit with our legs straddling the plank, or hanging over one side ( ie sitting side by side)

2. Do we all sit facing the same way or facing each other ?

3. Are we allowed to hang on or is it hands free ?

Decisions !!!

There was also the solo challenge, where there would be a child on each end generating the force ( see, it was educational too, Primary School Physics #101 !!) or kids standing on the ground at each end and giving it almighty shoves.

One child would be on the swing laying down in the middle with their arms and legs tightly wrapped around the plank. The challenge was to see how high you could go without coming off. Many times some kids were able to remain on it even as the plank hit the supporting bars at the top !!

The ultimate challenge was to do this standing up on the plank and doing it hands free.

Success at this meant you were were either brave, stupid, or a combination of the two.

Once again, the number of injuries sustained here are too innumerable to mention, but it was just seen as an accepted consequence back then !!

Guns

As we lived in a small country town, many of us grew up around guns as we would often go duck, quail, rabbit and fox shooting.

We had rifles, shotguns and air rifles and thought nothing of it.

Looking back, we were very safe with them as we used them so often, but people today would be horrified to know what we did with them back in the day.

I remember one year for the school play I had a role as an explorer in Africa.

To make my role even more authentic, I asked my teacher if I could bring a gun from home to make the character even more believable.

"Great idea" she said, and for the next few weeks I carried a shotgun on the bus to school each day ( no ammunition of course !) to use as a prop in our school play !!

Safety was paramount as you'd imagine, so mum and dad made me wrap it up in a towel !

There were days at school where kids would be picking it up and pointing it around and this was considered to be perfectly normal.

Another time, for Show and Tell ( better known as "Lies and Rubbish" !) I brought in our air rifle and a box of slugs for it.

The teacher then let me do a demo out in the yard and the kids all took turns at having a few shots at a target out in the playground.

Again, can you imagine the outrage if you saw a 10 year old carrying a shotgun onto a bus, or kids out in the playground shooting at a target ??

I know we can look back now and be outraged, but back then it was seen as completely normal.

So what are we doing now that in 30-40 years time will be causing people to be outraged?

I can't think of anything right now, as we believe that what we are doing now is 'best practice', but who is to say that in the future it won't be ridiculed?

While I ponder this, I'm thinking that it may be something around the use of phones and cameras, and how everything is immediately captured and posted on social media.

Like me, how many of you often think "I'm glad that mobile phones weren't around back in my day"????

Well Readers,

Just a few recollections, and I'm sure you'd have lots to share as well. Perhaps this post might just get you talking about them again ? No point worrying about them as we can't change the things we can't control, and the past is certainly one of those.

And there some other examples I would have loved to share, but I was worried about the implications if anyone wanted to launch a lawsuit against me, my classmates or former teachers !! I know I joke about that, but there is also an element of truth in it sadly.

I was just so lucky with my upbringing, and it was events such as these that I remember with such fondness.

I could have included more stories about growing up in the pub that our parents ran, and how we would sometimes sneak in and pinch a few beers from the storage shed now and then..... but that's a story for another day.

Until my next post Readers...

Cheers 😁

P.s. I sat down 2 hours ago to do this, it felt like 20 mins as it was just so good recalling these memories.

Flow !!!!