Strange school traditions

[HarmonicGenerator]

This kind of thread's been done before; I've probably done this exact post before. But it's been a while.

For reasons I don't know, this morning I woke up and for the first time in years I thought about our first (primary) school's annual Pea Hunt.

 

Once a year, towards the end of the summer term, everyone would be gathered in the school hall and the head teacher would tell us about local woman Mrs Green, who had been to the shops for her husband and took a shortcut back through the school field. Unfortunately for Mrs Green, the shopping bag split. The peas she'd bought just went everywhere, and she needed us to help gather them up again.

We were split into our school houses (Red / Blue / Yellow) and sent out to the field for the afternoon to collect dried peas that were scattered around. Each house had a tube to put them in, and at the end of the afternoon, they were counted up and the winning house got the Pea Hunt trophy.

This was a perfectly normal thing to do.

Years later, I discovered the truth behind the kayfabe.

There was no Mrs Green. There was no shopping trip. The winner was predetermined (always the house that hadn't won Sports Day or got the most house points that year). The whole thing was just a way of getting an easy summer afternoon in that kept the whole school busy.

 

I haven't come across another school that did an annual Pea Hunt but did yours have weird or unusual annual events or traditions?

[Accident Prone]

1 hour ago, HarmonicGenerator said:

Years later, I discovered the truth behind the kayfabe.

There was no Mrs Green. There was no shopping trip. The winner was predetermined (always the house that hadn't won Sports Day or got the most house points that year). The whole thing was just a way of getting an easy summer afternoon in that kept the whole school busy.

 

Although not as devious as that, whenever the whole year group would come together to run a pageant/sports day/jumble sale/charity drive/weekend mass, each pupil would usually be awarded one house point during the following week's assembly. The headmaster would do a big old rally, talking up how great we were, then would shout, "EVERYONE...GETS..ONE HOUSE POINT EACH!" and we'd react like we were on the set of Fun House.

This happened all the time; everyone would cheer like all their hard work was justified despite the fact that the standings were still the same. Everyone got a point so there was no actual movement in the house rankings. What a scam.

[Keith Houchen]

Our primary school had a swimming pool. During swimming, one lad would nip back into the changing rooms and check everyone’s underwear. The one who had the worst skiddies had their pants hung on the peg. When we all went back to the changing rooms, the shame would begin. The winner was surrounded by his classmates, who all pointed at him and sang the following Houchen penned victory song to them. 
 

The Skidmark Boy

The Skidmark Boy

The Skidmark Boy

The Skidmark Boy

 

Proper character building stuff. 

[FLips]

We had Country Dancing, which was where boys and girls got paired up seemingly at random and made to put on a show for the parents outside on the field. The show was pairs of kids who felt like dickheads, dancing like dickheads to hits like "Wind The Bobbin Up" played on a knackered old tape deck while all the parents laughed.
Looking back I feel it was some sort of retribution the parents and teachers planned together.

Not so much a "tradition" but during one assembly one of our teachers fell off a chair in front of everyone so without fail every single time a child had to speak during any sort of assembly or meeting for the next several years I was there, they'd squeeze in a "Remember when Mrs Hogg fell off her chair, eh?" to get a cheap pop like a prototype Peter Kay.

[waters44]

More general school memories to be honest but...

we had a science teacher called Mr Tucker who was a sweet little bloke with a really awful hunch. Whilst teaching he would be talking to the floor, and every now and then he would kick his leg out in the air to the front, balance it in the air perfectly still, and lean back so he could see us and check that we hadn't left the room. All the kids found the way he would balance on one leg to lean back really endearing to be honest, and he used to play on it too - for example instead of looking at his watch for the time he would do a really big swing of the leg and lean back to look at the clock on the wall, it got a pop every time

We also had a head of house who was convicted and sent to prison for sexual abuse, his name believe it or not was Mr Lively

Edited February 7, 2022 by waters44

[RedRooster]

Once a year, in my primary school, we used to get eggs from a local farmer, which we reared in an incubator until they hatched. Whoever had the best attendance record in the senior classes got to name them (this could end up being more than one person, of course), and while I can see the teacher's logic in this, no one wanted to be seen as having the best attendance record, so it actually led to a lot of us pulling sickies so that we wouldn't win. 

[SuperBacon]

Our school head, unfortunately, had a drink problem. She once came into one of our lessons with her shirt on backwards, and then someone daubed in 5 foot high letters on the PE Hall "mrs Semen is a whino" (sic) Her name was Selman, so it couldn't have been done by someone in Set 1 English.

We also had a Geography teacher who burst a blood vessel in her eye once getting irate which filled red and was then forever known as "Mrs Terminator" 

And one poor lad who after seeing Hanson on TOTP the preceding Friday said he'd love to "shag the lot of them" and was then affectionately known as "mmmbop" for the rest of his school days.

Halcyon days.

[hallicks]

10 minutes ago, scratchdj said:

At the end of every school year, the house with the most points throughout the year was announced as the winner but the head master would wait for the applause to die down before awarding extra points to the house which had his favourite kid in. One year, it was for ridiclous achievements like being brave, being a bit clever and for one kid who'd played chess quite well. Once the exrta points were awarded, the house that had already been decalred the winner slipped into second place and his favourite house were announced as the new winner.

Proper cruel bastard he was.

Clearly loved a dusty finish, that bloke 

[Your Fight Site]

13 minutes ago, scratchdj said:

At the end of every school year, the house with the most points throughout the year was announced as the winner but the head master would wait for the applause to die down before awarding extra points to the house which had his favourite kid in. One year, it was for ridiclous achievements like being brave, being a bit clever and for one kid who'd played chess quite well. Once the exrta points were awarded, the house that had already been decalred the winner slipped into second place and his favourite house were announced as the new winner.

Proper cruel bastard he was.

Alright, Potter?

[Mr_Danger]

We used to get a special award at an annual assembly for having 100% attendance. My biggest achievement at school was getting said award then bunking off the day of the assembly. 

[LCJ]

A lot of schools probably had this too so maybe not that strange but I recall our secondary school having a rule whereby every time a teacher walked into the classroom, the whole class would have to stand up in silence and drop what they were doing. I always found that to be a strange and boot-licking thing to do.

[69MeDon]

1 minute ago, LCJ said:

A lot of schools probably had this too so maybe not that strange but I recall our secondary school having a rule whereby every time a teacher walked into the classroom, the whole class would have to stand up in silence and drop what they were doing. I always found that to be a strange and boot-licking thing to do.

We had that but it only applied to the head and deputy head. Weird as fuck.

[Wretch]

Whenever there was a scrap in the yard between two lads at our primary school, the rest of the school would circle around them and chant this bizarre fight song that went something like "A.G, A-G-R, A.G.R.O, R.O" which I'd only realised was the word aggro years after I finished up in that school. This would be sang on repeat until the fight was finished or one of the brothers broke it up.

Haven't thought about it in years but popped straight back into my head as soon as I seen this thread. I was born and educated in west Dublin, so @Scott Malbranque or any other Dubliners reading, did this happen at your school too? I've been going mad on Google this morning searching for it but there's fuck all to be found.

[Cousin Jim Bob]

Only odd thing I can remember is they used to keep our house points in bags hung up each classroom. Anyone could fuck with them but no one ever did. Until my older brother and his dodgy mates were old enough. You would just go to the toilet at playtime and check if each classroom was empty, then take points out of each teachers desk and load up your teams point bag. A tradition he taught and passed onto me. Team green was full of loads of the worst behaved kids and none of the popular or clever ones. Yet we went went on a run that Alex Ferguson would be proud off that lasted 5 years between my brother and me cheating.

 

Surprised they didn't pull some of the sneaky stuff some of you guys mentioned and screw us over last minute.

[Duke]

We had these big columns in our common room in 6th form. There was a tradition form that if it was a lads birthday we would all pile on him, hold him horizontally like a battering ram, open his legs and ram him, tackle first, for each year of age.

One of our Latin teachers had a replica of the helmet from gladiator that he wore around the junior school, in his words, to scare the children. He wasn't a particularly big man, but he had a big, deep, booming voice and a terrifying stare. The rumour was that he'd split up from his wife because she'd been sleeping with another teacher and he had decked that teacher in the canteen, which DEFINITELY happened. He once came in to one of my lessons and asked the teacher if he could cover his next lesson, because he'd broken a rib in the gym and needed to go lie down.

One of our history teachers came into Ola lesson before the teacher taking the class arrived, told us it was his birthday and got is to sing happy birthday when he arrived. The teacher came in, we all sang happy birthday and he said "Mr. Thomas has been in here hasn't he? It's.not.my birthday"

In my primary school we had a week where boys from the year below got to be house leaders etc for a day before they moved into the final year. I got to be head boy one day. If was Saturday.