Primary School was Awful

[simonworden]

Saw some chat in different off topic threads about singing and present exhibitions people had at primary/infant/middle/junior (whichever one it was) school when they were growing up and it made me think about how god awful and experience it was at times for children.

In the 99's where I'm from the village schools were basically run by older teachers who had secured a cushy little job somewhere pleasant and couldn't really break their old school programming for the modern ways. They didn't emerge until around the time I went to secondary school and a new head came in. 

Some of the stuff I and others experienced seems unfathomable looking back. I've already posted the singing story but here's a few prime other memories of things that clearly would be totally unacceptable now. 

Being physically dragged by the arm back to class by a teacher because I had my trousers legs rolled up after a packed boring assembly sat on the floor. Her yelling at me the whole way. I was 6!

Mental junior lunch rules. Due to space they would make the junior school students in years 4 to 6 have lunch in the middle of lunch break. So we got like 15 mins play, then had to line up by class in the cold, walk single file to lunch, sit where told, eat and wait until the whole table had finished before we could be dismissed at the whim of some old bag dinner lady which meant some people didn't get let out until bell time. Heaven forbid you got put on the table with bullies or slow eaters then you had a miserable lunch. They did eventually change the system after my teacher noticed his class was coming back absolutely miserable every day and it worked much better.

Buying nice picnic benches then having the dinner ladies ban us all from touching them or sitting on them. No idea who they were for then. 

Being chastised Infront of several classes for my awful handwriting for years until one teacher got me tested for dyspraxia through speaking to my mum. Then the old bags when they found out would say "oh yes I knew you had a problem". Didn't do anything do you though? Just talked to the TA right behind me and everyone about how I was slow and needed more help. 

And my final rant to make the point. Saying pre lunch grace in year 2, so again 6 or 7 years old. Having the teacher decided I'm not doing it properly, pull me by the scruff of my polo collar and choke me. I defended myself with a wallop to her head using my lunchbox. After that I rember her yelling but letting me go straight to lunch. After I just got my name on the board. I never told my parents until she did at parents evening. It took years for me to convince them she was in the wrong as if she wasn't she would've made a far bigger deal out it. I wish I'd had the courage to tell my parents back then and quite honestly get her sacked, hopefully with her pension being removed. 

Before anyone's asks, I'm ok Hun don't need to PM me. Just came up and thought it might be an interesting conversation point. 

 

[Surf Digby]

I have vivid memories going back to nursery, which would be 1980-81. The staff, while not shouty, were very into humiliation for anyone that didn't meet their expectations. The main targets were Tracy, a girl who would make herself throw up almost every day, another girl (possibly called Helen) who didn't know the entire alphabet, and anyone that took a poo. 

If any child (and we're talking 4 year olds here) went into a cubicle to take a shit, the staff would loudly announce to the entire building what a terrible thing this was, and then make a big song and dance about emptying half a can of air freshener across the toilet area. This led to several kids preferring to shit themselves and deal with it at home than risk going into the toilets, however they would inevitably get rumbled, and they'd be stripped and sent home in the nursery's spare clothing, which involved a pair of vivid purple trousers with a curly gold buckle on the front.

And lo begins a lifetime of feeling inadequate......

Primary school was, I suppose, kind of modern for the time. I mean, a man brought in a computer to show us once. Later the school got their own computer (just the one!), the infamous BBC Micro, and we would play Granny's Garden on it.

Teachers were not soft. They liked to shout, and liked to send kids out to stand in the hallway and think about what they'd done. If you were caught spitting, then the standard punishment was to have them stand in the middle of a playground and spit into a margarine pot until it was full, usually with the kid being reminded that it's only a margarine pot, and if it had been Mrs Ward, then they'd be filling a bucket.

Being excused to go to the toilet during classtime was a rarity. They would happily watch you squirm until you eventually wet yourself, and then they'd tell you off for that.

One thing I was good at from a young age was spelling, One day, because the line for the teacher was long, a girl asked me how to spell "people". The teacher (the aforementioned Mrs Ward) overheard this and went apeshit. The fact that I'd given her the correct spelling wasn't even acknowledged.

The top three years at primary school only had a girls toilet in the building. The boys had to go out to the one in the playground, which was probably built in the 1920s along with the school. A big drafty brick outhouse with a high ceiling and corrugated concrete roof. The cubicles were massive, built of that shiny glazed brick, and had big shed style doors on them. Instead of urinals, you pissed against a concrete wall and down into a trough. There was no heating, so during winter you might as well have been outside. They also had that toilet paper that's pre-cut into squares and is more like greaseproof paper.

You quickly learned to be in and out of there as fast as you could, because if one of the boys from the top year came in while you were pissing, they'd either grab your shoulders and shake you from side to side, or they'd just shoulder barge you into the wall of piss. 

At age 9 (September 1985 onwards, and doing a project about space to tie in with the Challenger launch), I actually had a great teacher. Miss Kirk. Note the Miss. She was considerably younger, a lot less shouty, and tried to make class enjoyable. Okay, in hindsight playing us Jake The Peg was a bit iffy, but it was perfectly acceptable at the time. She would read stories about the adventures of a class of whacky schoolkids, and change all the character names to ours. She also had us do a project (I've no idea what it was now) that involved cutting up old Grattan catalogues, which still had the lingerie pages in.

Unfortunately, she had a lengthy absence through sickness, and we had some classes covered by Mrs Spears, the headteacher. On one such occasion, I was caught talking during class and had to sit out in the hallway by myself. Halfway through she called me back in to see how I was getting on, and she had me stand at the front of the class while she used a load of fancy long words that I didn't understand to describe what I'd done, and then demanded that I agree with her. Eventually, she sent me back to the hall, after we had both(!) agreed that I'd employed intentional frugality of gumption with my work. 
On the way past my desk, the two kids I'd been caught talking to asked if I was okay, and offered the opinion that what she'd just done to me "wasn't fair". 
"She was just making fun of me", I replied, in a voice that I would very shortly learn was not quiet enough.

I got hauled back to the front of the class, where she loudly reminded me that she had every right to say whatever she liked about my work, and ranted at me until I cried. 

Fuck her. 

Edited January 12, 2025 by Surf Digby
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[westlondonmist]

I left primary school in 96 so probably had it better than most. My teachers early on were shouty but year 3 onwards it was alright. The school I went to was the shit one of the area, had some of the poorest estates in its catchment area (including the estate Liz from Motherland lives on). So you often had young teachers come in and leave after a bit of experience and go to a better school. Not the most experienced but still had passion and wanted to modernise. 

 

I'd say a big issue is bullying was basically ignored. As if the headteacher sort of thought it was part of your life so deal with it. She was a miserable old cow. My old landlord was a teacher there and he said she was a cunt who wanted you to essentially be mean to the kids without hitting. He thought hitting would actually be more humane than verbal embarrassment. 

 

The bog roll as mentioned was izal I think. It was fucking cheap, and that's why it was used. When I got to secondary school and got proper big roll I couldn't believe my eyes. It wasn't just used for being cheap, as mentioned above many schools had outside toilets and as it didn't absorb it was good for those outside toilets. No absorbtion meant it was uselessI, lack of cleaning properly so kids went with a shitty arse and girls couldn't dry properly leading to urinary tract infections. No absorbtion though meant  It was a false economy though as it caused a shit tonne of plumbing problems as it stayed solid in water. 

 

 

 

[FLips]

School was fine for me. I got bullied for being “fat” (in hindsight I was just a bit stocky) in the early years but only by a couple of kids who were generally bullies anyway.
This was up until maybe year 5 when we all discovered wrestling and then suddenly the bullying stopped when people saw me picking up and chucking lads twice my size.

That reputation followed me all the way through senior school where my ability to lift the year 10s and 11s up in a fireman’s carry started spreading rumours I was “hard”. That and when I tackled the actual hardest lad in school because he was about to trip my best mate up in PE and we got into a bit of a tussle that had to be pulled apart and he shook my hand in front of the whole class like we’d just went broadway.

In actuality I’d never actually been in a fight and my hobbies and interests of games, wrestling, rock music and cartoons meant that I essentially had it both ways during school. I got on with everyone from the moshers, the geeks, the troublemakers. I played footy every day for the full 5 years but would also listen to Nirvana and my WWF The Music Volume 4 and 5 CDs and play PS2 all night. I had a great group of mates and had no bother with anything really. I got very lucky.

[TheBurningRed]

33 minutes ago, FLips said:

I got bullied for being “fat”

I got bullied for being skinny in primary school. I was a bag of bones tbf. Then I got bullied for being fat in secondary school. They could all fuck off. 

[TibBo]

I have fond memories of primary school, but definitely remember some of the stuff mentioned before like kids peeing themselves because they had already been to the toilet once etc…

Only years 5 & 6 were allowed to play for the school football team, but I remember being asked to play from year 4, and being told ‘If anyone asks your name, tell them it is ….(saying one of the older kids names)’ which is pretty dodgy (but ace for me coz I got an extra year playing for the school team).

We had a BBC micro which had a robotic ladybird on wheels which you could make drive across the floor by typing-in commands/directions etc.  I never got to play with it because I was always a good kid, and it was used as a reward for the naughty kids when they were slightly less naughty than usual.

Not sure why, but we were never allowed an actual football to play with at lunch time, so you would have 120 kids chasing a tennis ball or an old bottle filled with bricks around the playground.

[The King Of Swing]

Physical punishment was still pretty common in junior school despite I'm pretty sure, being banned by the time I went.

The headmaster in particular was a horrible cunt. Family legend is that my father knocked him out, after I was falsely accused of stealing.

Never saw my father get that angry, so no idea how true that story is. 

Edited January 12, 2025 by The King Of Swing

[Gus Mears]

My first primary managed to be even worse than the nursery attached to a pie factory I attended before. I still can't hold a pen properly and was about half a year behind the rest of the class by the time I was moved to a different school. That came when my Grandad (former teacher) accompanied by mum to a parents evening and was so impressed by what he saw that he immediately called in a favour at his old job and got me moved despite being out of the catchment area.

Subsequently put in special measures and then demolished for housing. 

 

[davertfnewman]

My primary school experience wasn't too bad, nor was high school. Not without challenges, but if it was so bad I wouldn't be doing what I do now (teach high school English).

Started in January 1987; there was some process back then that you only started in September if you were born between September and December, then January start if between January and March (February for me), then April if between April and July, corresponding with the three terms. Wasn't too much of a concern, I was identified as a quick learner for reading so was off the "The dog is white. The dog is big. The dog is friendly. The dog has a ball." books. Slow handwriting, but I could write reasonably well, good spelling and vocabulary. Had to do some exercises at home to try and improve handwriting speed, but it's still a challenge today of neatness versus volume.

Recollections I have are of them always putting Santa Claus: The Movie on at Christmas, which is why I hate the bastard thing now. My mate enjoyed it, so he can still watch it, but it would be a Room 101 punishment for me now. Bloody Patch!

Left in July of 1993. Still have the inscribed dictionary we got off the head. As we got to the end of that term, they decided to play a movie they'd bought in, possibly not watched. Based off how much people love The Snowman at Christmas, they played When the Wind Blows after lunch. We all watched it and went out to last break, after watching an old couple die of radiation poisoning, with our first feeling of depression.

The original head we had was a scruffy guy called John Bucknall. Could talk for hours energetically, great historian, nobody had a clue what he was on about, though. Had a book published called An Age of Kings about steam trains. Self-published a book about the local area titled Old Heath Hayes. Would set a stall up in the foyer of the new Tesco to sell them, sing/bellowing "OLD HEATH HAYES! OLD HEATH HAYES!".

[hallicks]

My mum was a very earnest churchgoing lady, and as a result was “in” with some useful people. This meant I got a scholarship to a private school for years R, 1, and 2 that was run by nuns.

The nun that taught reception was probably one of the most overtly child-hating people that ever lived. And because it was a private school, it wasn’t yet bound to the new law banning corporal punishment, which meant all these 4 year olds were still up for getting smacked around. And boy, did that nun ever love smacking the children. The slightest foot put wrong resulted in a smacking. Reception children! They don’t even know what day it is. Fucking bitch.

Luckily year 1 and 2 had lay teachers who were not into physical abuse, and by year 2 we also got one of the BBC computers, which was instantly the most exciting thing ever. I was quite happy there by the end.

Then my dad uprooted us because he was jealous of the time my mum spent with my nan, so across the country we went. The state primary school I ended up in was the most alien environment to me. The year 3 teacher was also one of these old battleaxes who was about 100 years old and who was desperate for the good old days of the cane. There was no sympathy or help for me to go to this new environment. After a few weeks, I was so miserable, I just ran away. I ran and ran and I got all the way home. I went up to my brothers room and sat there reading a comic. Then I remember seeing the headmaster walking down the street to our house… Pretty fucking damning assessment of your school that a child would just take a chance crossing some main roads and make a run for it, rather than spend another minute in your fucking hell hole with that bitch teacher. Eventually made it through year 3 after another (sadly) unsuccessful escape attempt,  made some friends and we had a nice teacher in year 4. But we all generally hated our lives there for 2 years and moved again. 

[SuperBacon]

4 hours ago, TibBo said:

Not sure why, but we were never allowed an actual football to play with at lunch time, so you would have 120 kids chasing a tennis ball or an old bottle filled with bricks around the playground.

You what? ?

[TibBo]

Welcome to 1990s Dudley lol. If no-one had a tennis ball you had to improvise…

[Mr_Danger]

I remember shitting myself when I was poorly and having to wear my Popeye shorts until my mum came to pick me up. I had a good run of not shitting myself from then on. Turns out wearing inappropriate shorts and shitting myself is cyclical though….

[Lion_of_the_Midlands]

I was an argumentative little git even as a child. I once got sent out of class for arguing with the teacher about Isambard Kingdom Brunel, she was wrong about the launch date of the SS Great Britain and I wouldn't accept her wrong answer so she sent me out. So I went home, we lived about a 10 minute walk away. I got my book on Brunel and went back to school. By the time I got back they were looking for me and I got sent to the headmaster for leaving school premises. They rang my mum at her work and made her come to school. The headmaster said to my mum and me that I had to apologise to the teacher for arguing in class and leaving school premises. I said I would apologise for leaving but not for arguing because I was right. The headmaster said unless I apologised for both I would be suspended until I apologised. My mum told him that I would be suspended a long time then because I never apologised if I didn't mean it and as I was right there was no chance of an apology. I ended up been suspended for a week but I never apologised for arguing. I was 9 years old at this point, so as you can no doubt tell I've always been a twat. I did get my own back on the headmaster by repeatedly fouling his son when our two schools played eachother at football. 

[davertfnewman]

Just prompted by the story of going home to make a point, it's not during primary school but high school, there was a teacher with a form in my year group who had a loud voice but couldn't control many. One of his lads asked to go to the toilet, which he was allowed, then started putting his coat on and picked his bag up.

"WHERE DO YOU THINK YOU'RE GOING?!"

"Home!"

"HOME?! WHY?!"

"Have you seen our toilets? I'm not shitting in them!"

For contrast, we had the equivalent of what would be called an ECT now (rookie teacher), who bought a Phillips CD-i out of his first paycheck and brought it in for us to have a go on. Nothing dodgy, thoroughly decent guy, although he ended up becoming an area manager for betting offices after going as far as he could.