The Happiest Days of Your Life - Or Were They?

Hated it from start to finish, couldn'tcwait to leave

School is no place for loners. I hated it from beginning to end. At various times I said to each of my DDs Nothing will ever be as bad as school, and they have all said I was right.

I have my school reports from junior school, where my teacher says he doesn't really know me at all as i am quiet and withdrawn.

I enjoyed both of my small village schools, but was sent to boarding school at the age of nine because my parents were divorced when I was a baby. I had an older sister there but I never saw her as she was in another “house” and dormitory and of course different lessons. Looking back it was quite spartan but this was in the fifties and probably all boarding schools were the same. The only things my mother had to supply was gloves and toothpaste. I was never aware of any bullying which seems to blight a lot of children’s lives.

I was good at English, language and literature, but only if I liked the set book. The worst ever was a Tale of Two Cities. I loved domestic science because we got to eat what we cooked. We started with making a proper cup of tea but could easily cook a three course meal by the time I left. I also loved all sports except hockey. I was useless at maths and physics which I loathed.

I understood why I was there but would never have sent my own DD to board and was lucky to always be at home for them after school.

I loved school, perhaps because my mother was very much a mother hen, and until I started school, I had hardly ever been out of her sight for more then twenty minutes. She actually cried in front of me at the school gates when I was five, at the mere thought of having to do without me for three hours!

I was eager to learn, and could like nearly everyone else in my class read at the end of the first year.

Spent junior school top of the class, or second top. Senior school was easy too.

However, I was happy to leave school at feel grown-up at 17.

Not sure they were the happiest days of my life though, Young adulthood was better.

Loved my primary school as it had everything I needed and was brand new in 1955. It gave us a calm, caring environment with dedicated teachers and opportunities. Then I passed the 11 plus so went to the only co-ed grammar school. It was elitist and catered for the top sets. Luckily I was very good at sport so got my school colours. When my mum left us ( I was 14) I was quite stroppy and went off the rails a bit ( no pastoral care, counselling , mentoring available) so I left just before my 16th birthday to attend a technical college instead of 6th form. It was the best decision and I thrived.

I loved school mostly. Primary , yes, in Wales and a lot of friends. Grammar school in England …not so easy to begin with because of my accent. But I loved the uniform, cycling to school and eventually just being there. Hated sports, all except hockey. I was good at English, art, history etc. But not Maths or Physics. Even so I left at 15 with 9 ‘O’ levels and went straight to art school. Absolutely loved that !!!

Went to a girl’s Grammar School at just ten. Was academic but utterly useless at any sport and was treated as a pariah because of this. I loved the academic side but lived in a constant state of fear and dread of mockery from other girls and the PE teacher. I’ve often wondered why no one ever picked up on my fear. My happy days came when I went to university. No sports and for the first time ever, praise for academic success.

I was quite happy at school and particularly enjoyed English, Drama and Gymnastics due to lovely teachers. Hated Maths and Geography due to evil teachers! However, I couldn’t wait to go to work so Careers Officer arranged an interview as a GPO telephonist. I do regret not staying on to take A levels but made up for it in later life and went on to gain a PGCE.

I liked the study part of school but hated it at the same time due to being bullied by the ‘cool’ kids. I was that kid who wore hand me down clothes that never fitted properly e.g. elder sister’s bras with tucks in, shoes that has newspaper in the toes to make them fit, skirts rolled up at the waist to make them short enough, I was simply an easy target

Looking through all the posts on here I am interested to see how many of us hated maths. I wonder if that was due to the way it was taught back in our day or because girls weren’t expected to like maths. In my case, as I said above, I had a horrible teacher who I was scared of and made me feel stupid. In later life I discovered that I am not so stupid but it took a while.

Loved all sport which I was good at. Drama & Art.
About really.
Started working at the psychiatric hospital which eventually closed down.

I did not hate maths. I was very good at arithmetic. less competent at algebra and geometry.

I genuinely enjoyed school I did well in the subjects I enjoyed, I obeyed the rules mostly. It was a technical high school, good discipline and plenty of sports, suited me well.

So school was good but college was better

Didn’t love school, didn’t hate it either.The friendships were nice and I enjoyed various subjects such as English, French, history and geography but other subjects not much.We had a wonderful drama teacher.

My children were horrified to hear that it was perfectly acceptable for me to be rapped across the knuckles with a ruler, have a board rubber thrown across the classroom towards me etc etc
I was quite happy at school, with the exception of PE, but, looking back, casual low level violence seemed the norm.

MT62

Loved all sport which I was good at. Drama & Art.
About really.
Started working at the psychiatric hospital which eventually closed down.

Just that really! Nothing else appealed.

I hated it.A place full of injustice !
Secondary school was horrific from start to finish , some quite dodgy characters to have as teachers in my opinion.

One amongst many things jumps out in my mind just now..
We were supposed to be having a maths test to determine what set you would get into.I found maths particularly hard but tried my best, only to look at the teacher's daughter and her friend who had got hold of the answer book.Another child accused them, teacher was cross and insisted that she wouldn't have cheated, just been checking the answers. A week or two later this girl got put in a really good year group, the teachers were the best ones and great results were achieved, and I think I nodded sagely to myself and thought sadly, so THIS is how life works, and I guess it pretty much is !!!

chicken

Went to a girl’s Grammar School at just ten. Was academic but utterly useless at any sport and was treated as a pariah because of this. I loved the academic side but lived in a constant state of fear and dread of mockery from other girls and the PE teacher. I’ve often wondered why no one ever picked up on my fear. My happy days came when I went to university. No sports and for the first time ever, praise for academic success.

You could be telling my story. I was rubbish at any sport and always last to be picked for any team. I endured a certain amount of bullying due to this not only from fellow pupils but the PE teachers as well.
Thankfully I gained confidence at Uni as for the first time I felt free of the crippling anxiety I felt every PE period.

Chocolatelovinggran

My children were horrified to hear that it was perfectly acceptable for me to be rapped across the knuckles with a ruler, have a board rubber thrown across the classroom towards me etc etc
I was quite happy at school, with the exception of PE, but, looking back, casual low level violence seemed the norm.

One male teacher hit me so hard round my head that my glasses went flying.
We heard in later years that he’d gone to prison for assault on a child.

Fallingstar. My sympathies to you, I know how you must have felt. To this day,I dislike Wednesdays. That was the day we had a class in the gym hall, full of instruments of terror to me. One in particular was a “window frame” hanging on chains, the bottom of it about 10 feet from the floor. We were supposed to climb the rope to it then wriggle through the empty panes, over the top, another wriggle through and back down the rope.I was paralysed with fear and jeered at by the P E teacher. The memory of it still terrifies me.

I absolutely hated the changing room for sports.
I just hadn't been bought up to strip down to my knickers amd gt chamged, or to shower in am open cubicle.

I never even saw my dad in hia vest!!!

Despite my parents being told that I probably wouldn’t pass the 11 plus I did so and turned out to be academic. I loved my girls’ grammar school in the late 60’s early 70’s. Except for PE which I was terrible at and was bullied by a sadistic games teacher.
I think an academic single sex school suited me well. Most of the teachers were very well qualified women and they encouraged the high achieving girls to apply for top universities. I didn’t realise until I got there that this was very rare for state school educated girls.
The girls who were not as academic tended to leave at 16 and go to secretarial college, nursing, or banking. There was no question that we would all get jobs if we wanted them. How things have changed.

I refused to take the 11 plus.
I had absolutely no interest at all.
I just wanted out.

My Primary school was OK but made tricky at times as my mum taught at the school. Several of the other staff members were frequent visitors to our house so there was always a bit of balancing between home and school.

I didn’t really settle into my grammar school, don’t really know why. I was happiest on the netball and tennis courts.

I enjoyed my job working for a local council in London after college. I then retrained as a teacher when my children were small mostly so that we didn’t need to find childcare for the school holidays. I did enjoy teaching for the most part and specialised in Early Years which was, and is, a lot of fun.