What your teacher said to you that they wouldn't get away with now.

I think I was lucky as I only had female teachers and mostly not violent. I did get the cane twice in primary school though, for fairly minor offences : walking on coke (for the boiler) in the playgraound , which was forbidden and calling a boy names (along with others. )
At my girls grammar school iI was in the 4th maths set(never liked maths) and so not allowed to take GCE maths. However i was put in for Certificate of proficiency in arithmetic . When I passed I was told it was a fluke!!!!
Incidentally in my 30s I went to evening classes in maths and took GCE O level and got a grade A. Wish I could have told her!!

The teacher that hit me Lupin was a woman, but reading through the posts they were all much of a muchness, at least I can spell saucer now!

When I left school at 17, as 'dux' of the school, with a shedload of prizes, one of my former infant school teachers remarked that she'd 'never have thought it' of me. No congratulations, of course! Words failed me.

Our sports field was just over a mile away as the crow flies but we we were made to run in our p.e skirts along the beach( which added another 1/4 of a mile) even in the worst storms the Scottish winter could throw at us whilst our very very chubby P.E mistress drove past us in her nice warm car ! but it was character building and none of us died.

I remember a teacher shaking me so hard my teeth rattled in the back of my head. I was only about 7 at the time and really thought she was trying to kill me. my sin? I was singing out of tune, after that I was made to stand at the back and mime. I am now 63 and to this day I still cannot sing out loud I have to mime

I was interviewed for my first teaching job before corporal punishment was finally outlawed. One of the questions was, 'Where do you stand on administering the strap?' I said I wouldn't do it. (I wasn't that desperate for the job although I didn't say that!) I got the job anyway.

I recall that when I started teaching in1959, the deputy- head gave me an address of a place in Scotland, from where, and at a cost of 1/9p , I should order a "cane". As I had been caned myself when in junior school ( this is another story!) I was reluctant to do this and managed my class without the aforementioned item. Good Old Days or what?

My teacher a nun used to hit us, shake us and generally smack us about. One day she went into the store cupboard and returned with a cane. She swished it about and said that she could use this whenever she liked. Quite honestly no-one was that bothered as we were used to daily violence. The head had a cane and a slipper although luckily this was only hearsay for me.

In primary school I got the ruler for 'joining my ds' as I ha been told to at the end of my work. I should have been listening.

In secondary school, my friend and I went back to our form room to get our library book to change. The short, florid, smelly breathed Latin teacher saw us and locked us in. ( Health and safety or what as the windows did not open far). We missed dinner and when I asked for a refund the next week, I got short shrift.

Smacked my legs because I only managed 3/20 in spelling tests.

I`ve had a really enjoyable afternoon reading all these things teachers did to us at school. I wonder how many would have been done for child abuse. I do remember one time in Junior school I was called out in class for playing solitaire not reading my catechism (catholic School). MY teacher then decided to shake me will telling me off. I fainted then got my own back as the teacher picked me up I kicked him in the face.

When I was at school, some of the teachers were so deeply unpleasant I wonder why on earth they chose the profession as they seemed to hate children! When I was about 5 and not long started school (be around 1955) my parents were heavy drinkers and argued a lot so even though I was unhappy in school, going home after school wasn't something I looked forward to, either!

One afternoon after school, I walked through the park which was at the back of the school and played on the swings for a bit before the long walk home (probably about 3 miles). Next day, the headmistress (a real battle axe) called me to the front of the class and asked why I didn't go home straight away the previous afternoon (she must have seen me on the swing). I can't remember what I answered but it couldn't have been cheeky as I was a meek little thing. Anyway, she belted me over the hands with the ruler.

Throughout my school days, I met good teachers and bad teachers. English I was good at because the teacher was kind and I wanted to please her. Maths I was bad at because I was terrified of the teacher who seemed to enjoy mocking me and the clothes I wore (drinking parents spent money on drink, not nice clothes for their kids).

I have never been an assertive person and never wanted to push myself forward as I don't want to fail.

Teachers can make or break a child's self-confidence for life.

Had a spelling test pinned to my back all day because i had got most wrong. Age 5, just started school.

There was a lot of smacking - with hands, rulers, board rubbers - at my small country primary, run by 3 female teachers. One child had his hand slammed in a stapler, some were locked in cupboards. There was an awful ritual on a Friday pm where we all lined up around the hall and were asked spelling and times table questions, moving up if we got one right, the bottom five being slapped mercilessly. Oddly enough the same five every week . A mother once rampaged into school at lunchtime after hearing her son being beaten from the bus stop outside - she slapped the head teacher repeatedly round the head and we all felt like cheering (but didn't dare). One good outcome for me was that I went for someone bullying a younger child and bust his nose, and nobody said a word....

When I went to grammar school, with its lines and sarky comments, I thought I'd died and gone to heaven.

But on the subject of the OP, what did teachers say: at DH's grammar it was "Intellectual cream of the district? Pah, skimmed milk."

And at mine: "girls at ... school do not fraternise with workfolk". We'd a couple of workmen in upgrading the science lab and the area was taped off so we had to keep our distance.

When i was at school we had a domestic science teacher whose hooby was needlework. I was always in trouble with her because I could not sew, (and still can't) !!. During one lesson she said loud enough for the whole class to hear "YOU will NEVER know what a needle is for will you?.

Move on quite a few years later when the same teacher appeared on a ward where I was nursing, and I was designated as her "named nurse".

I went to her bed during medication round and said to her, "Good Morning Mrs ???? Do you remember teaching me? Well I now know what a needle is for, and I have a very sharp one that I am now going to attach to your ...... syringe for your injection.

I was aged 8 in South Perth Australia. We had outdoor assemblies. I must have not been paying attention when the teacher who was taking the assembly called me to come up. I wondered why. This was in the late 50's. He got hold of my hand and slapped down hard with his. I still don't know to this day what I did wrong. Just wish I could go back to those days and slap him around the face. I wonder what would have happened then.

I went on supply in the early 70s to a.small.school.run by grey nuns in a Wapping, which was not as posh as now. Very Dickensian in fact. The head gave a savage rant in assembly about some children who chose not to go to mass on a Sunday but preferred to walk on the mud by the river looking for treasure. Sadly they drowned because they hadn't followed God and gone their own way. I was very shocked to hear her blatant propaganda.
The next week I went to a similar school with navy blue nuns Before school the head took me into her office and held my hand. She explained that a little.girl in my class had lost her brother recently. Would I please give her my special love and take particular care of her.

I never forgot those two women. One a real teacher and one who was not in my mind.

I have never forgotten Miss Reed who, when we were singing in class, put her hand over my mouth and said I was 'droning'.

Yes, I had that board duster thrown at me for yawning in an English Lesson. The same teacher also used to ask me to stand up and read poetry to the class and ask for comments on pronunciation. When the comments were finished. He said they were rubbish as it was perfect. So I liked him. I am a Liverpudlian so be told I had a good speaking voice was reward enough.

I was also no good at sewing. When I was about 10, working at a felt pencil case for over a term - a job which the teacher had set, mark you - she burst out with 'Are you still working at that soppy little piece of feltwork?' It turned out when I was 25 that I had no binocular vision, because of a disparity between my eyes, and it was then that I acquired my first pair of glasses. But I still can't sew, though I am much less clumsy than I was. I do think that children's vision should be checked for such problems - I could see the blackboard with no difficulty.

annodomini - I had a Miss Reed too.

As an OU tutor, I was told (about 20 years ago) by a woman in her 60s that I was the first teacher who had ever given her any encouragement or praise. What a sad indictment of education in the so-called'Good Old Days'!

I went to a convent school in Dublin. I don't remember my early years at school but I do remember several things after my father died when I was just gone 13. The head nun took me into her office and served me tea in china cups and scones with butter and jam. I was in seventh heaven but it did feel very awkward.

One of the other nuns hated the sight of me, for some reason, which I can't understand because I was shy, well-behaved and very timid. After my father's death (we were very poor) my mother bought a second-hand royal-blue gymslip, had it dry cleaned and put on new buttons in an effort to have me looking good for school. On the first morning of term we were all lined up on the staircase and this particular nun walked down the line inspecting us from head to toe. When she came to me she said 'of course Miss would have to be different'. The school gymslips were supposed to be navy, not royal blue. I was mortified.

On another occasion she asked me to read a part from Shakespeare in class and said 'and none of your BBC accent, if you don't mind'. Again, I was so embarrassed - and I didn't even know what a BBC accent was. I just had a generic Irish accent - in fact probably a slightly clearer accent than the other girls in the class.

And the bookkeeping class - I dreaded it because I didn't understand the difference between debits and credits. One day, she stood beside my desk hitting me on the side of the head with her silver ring every time I gave a wrong answer. I ended up with my scalp bleeding and had to hide it from my mother - I knew she had enough on her plate having just been widowed and left with three young children.

The other nuns were ok but I've never figured out why that particular nun disliked me so much.