You recently asked the question: were teachers taught how to use the cane or tawse as part of their training? A friend of mine saw this on the internet and I thought you might like to hear my recollections of this aspect of school life. I started teaching primary in 1971 at the age of […]
My teacher’s hairbrush
On the first day of school in third grade, we all got into our new room and settled down. Our teacher, a Mrs Siding, introduced herself and talked about what we would do and so forth. Then she got out her worn-out hairbrush. She pointed out that the bristles were mostly gone and it was […]
Going too far
I attended a school in the Midlands of England, in the late 70s/early 80s when corporal punishment existed, but was being phased out gradually. Only the headmaster at the upper school (for kids aged 14 to 16) and headmistress of the lower school (11 to 14) were allowed to administer the cane on boys and […]
Growing up right
The following are all posts from an internet forum set up to support a BBC project called ‘Scotland on Film’ in 2003. Here, several posters recount their memories of childhood discipline from the 1950s onwards… Sarah Forsyth from Edinburgh My father was quite a disciplinarian and as the head of the household, his word was law. […]
The tawse
I attended a primary school in the 1950s, where a tyrant of a headteacher ruled with a long, three-tailed tan-coloured tawse. On my first day, at the age of seven, I joined the rest of the school to witness a boy being given four strokes on each hand for stealing sixpence. This frightened me, as […]
Crossing into discipline
I was at primary school in the 1950s in the north-east of England, where spankings at home and at school were commonplace. My first bare bottom spanking occurred when my name was called out at assembly by the headmistress to report to her office. When I arrived, I saw the school crossing warden (commonly known […]
The hated coat
I was in the second year of senior school, so I’d be 12. I needed a new winter coat and one day, when I got home from my lessons, my mother excitedly told me that she’d been out and bought me one. To my horror, she brought out this black donkey jacket, of the type […]