What were you taught when you first started school.?

When I began primary school in 1948 I remember sitting on a tiny stool and being taught how to read, something that I had pretty much mastered already. At that time primary school focused almost entirely on Reading, Writing and Arithmetic. I loved reading but was not so keen on Arithmetic which focused on being able to add up columns of pounds, shillings and pence. Quite challenging bearing in mind that it was then 12 pence to a shilling, and 20 shillings to a pound. I used to love Writing. We used to practice Copperplate writing on lined paper - very elegant with light up strokes and heavier downstrokes, and capital letters full of flourishes. I hated it when it was my turn to be ink monitor and dreaded spilling the ink as I topped up the inkwells.

Happysexagenarian Apart from that I remember learning about animals that lived in different countries, probably a Geography lesson. And a History lesson about the Victorians and how they didn't have indoor toilets and bathrooms. Our school toilets were also outside!

That never came as a shock to me because like many we didn't have a bathroom at home. The toilet was out in the yard. This was the mid 60s.

The school toilets were at the furthest corner of the playground. There were no sinks. The boys urinal wall was just the other side of the girls toilet and the older lads used to pee over the wall.

I was milk monitor - trying to get paper straws through ice in the winter and it was often slightly off in summer.

I remember the little bottles of milk. Frozen in winter, they were put next to the radiator to defrost. I loved being "milk monitor" but hate drinking milk to this day!

My 9 year old granddaughter is currently learning about the Titanic, definitely on the curriculum here in Scotland in Primary 5. She loves history and we're off to the Titanic exhibition in NI at Easter.

We had a big rope climbing frame in my primary school hall and one of my first memories is having to be rescued sitting astride the top with no idea how to get down. I’ve been frightened of heights ever since!

Thankyou for the world so sweet/ Thankyou for the food we eat/ Thankyou for the birds that sing/ Thankyou God for everything We said that every afternoon too, I think it was called The Doxology? Or maybe that is just my childhood memory of the word. I remember standing beside the teacher doing an individual spelling/reading test, you went down the list for the teacher to see how far you could go, I was the only one in my class who could pronounce pneumonia with a silent 'p'. I don't remember learning to read, I just seem to have always been able to, we had blue and green readers, one to six, and it was a great achievement to reach blue book 6 which was the last one.

As for those of you who suffered at the hands of people who should never have been let near small children, who were taught by harsh nuns, let us be thankful that this cruelty will not be tolerated now. Some of you had desperately awful experiences of primary school

The teachers seem to be hellsbent on making children grow up too quickly . For goodness sake let kids be kids for as long as possible

Granmarderby10
Little Tommy, Gingers neighbour,
Called for Ginger every day
Took him out in wind and sunshine,
Out across the farm to play.
Oh the memories. I loved reading at school and still do, although these days very strong reading glasses are needed lol

Left in Italian is sinistrere (sinister) so that’s probably why people stopped children using a left hand. We know better now thank goodness,

You ask what I was taught when first going to school ? It was such a long time ago I barely remember . The things I do remember are country dancing and making our own headwear to show our parents the dancing skills we had learnt during the summer fair on the grass in the school !
I'm sure we also learnt the 3 Rs , but I obviously much preferred the dancing !

It’s taught in the curriculum now that events and festivals to be taught. We had a two minute silence for armistace day with my three year olds. It was hard explaining why but we were briefed on the simple measures to teach for effect. Strange but I must obey!

I remember a little boy at junior school who was left handed crying at the lunch table because he was being forced to eat right handed he just couldn’t manage, so cruel.

I learnt that the cane hurts. First day, age 5 I got into the wrong class line after morning break as I didn't recognise my teacher or the children. Lesson learnt... First of many!

essjay- did all infant schools have a rocking horse in those days? Ours was a great huge thing in the school dining/P.E/ assembly hall.

My first school was a tiny one in a small village and not only were the toilets outside, they were buckets with wooden seats. No washing facilities. I can still see a Mrs Illings walking down the road with a bucket in each hand to empty them. No idea where! My older sister taught me to read when I was three, but anything to do with numbers was, and still is, a complete mystery.

Oh yes, my mum said that too, that they got punished for using their left hand.She was a leftie-(& thats probably why my sister got slapped?) I'm left handed too but by the mid 60's it was not a real issue. My older brother was right handed fortunately for him.

I always thought nuns were only allowed the plain silver rings, for their 'marriage to God', but apparently that one nun had always had the big ring too.1?

The only thing u remember about my first term at school as a 4yr old was my teacher telling us all that to be lefthanded was evil and her rapping my knuckles with a ruler every time I took a pencil from her box with my left hand. Fortunately my DF was also a lefties so he went to the school to sort it out. I met the teacher at a reunion about 10yrs ago and she still denied it despite other classmates remembering it.

Yes, the Catholic schools were always more strict- my late mother said they would give slaps for punishments, for hardly doing anything- and by the late 50's when she sent my older sister to same school she had attended, the same nun was there, who had been the worst, but was quite old by then, when my sister was 11 the nun slapped her across the face with the back of her hand and left a mark with her big ring- my mum remembered that ring from her school days- so she went up to school and played merry hell with the head teacher- she took my sister to a different school. I never went to same one when i went.(i wasn't even born then but she told me the tale yrs later)

all i remember from my first primary school was doing jigsaws, having to wait your turn when a new jigsaw was introduced, topsy and tim stories on a friday afternoon and if you were really good being allowed on the rocking horse that was in the corridor. when i changed schools when i was 7 i remember doing maths with something called quisenaire(not sure of the spelling) blocks, they were different colours for 1 to 10. Now i have had my GS aged 7 telling me about how the moon influences the tides and the great fire of london

I was taught cursive handwriting- also if I got me spellings wrong I got caned on my hand……..I learned how to spell!

Bluecat-A very expensive week for their parents then, with the birthdays one after the other?? Hope they had a great day.

Always to take a handkerchief or you risked getting your face slapped. Children who weren’t taken to Mass on Sunday needed to learn pretty fast not to admit it or they would get a slap. 1946. I remember little else other than being scared.

I was horrified when my first child having started school in 1979, the following Lent was told the story of the Crucifixion in some detail. I was more bothered about it than she was but when they screened Watership Down when she was 7 she was terribly upset.

1928 At the age of five I went to a small private school run by a mother and daughter.
I could already read but learned to write on ready ruled paper. We learned French and had to greet everyone in that language every morning. We learned about the British Empire and on Empire Day paraded around with Union Jack flags. On May Day we also had a parade through the streets dressed in white and as it was my birthday I was The May Queen.

Oh yes, Mollygo, i had forgotten about the painting- we did a lot of that too- it was little pots of powder paint at first- and we had to wet our brush a bit & dip in, and we had little plastic pots for if we wanted to mix any colours- gosh i can still remember the smell of those powder paints! ? And the soap, at all the little sinks we had white buttermilk soap- i liked the smell of that. And also, school dinners back in those days were quite good in our school- a proper meal, quite nice then, not the fast food cr*p that schools get in ready prepared nowadays.?