What were you taught when you first started school.?

Thank you for the enjoyable and interesting thread Maywalk. I'm sure your talks about your WW2 experiences were enthralling for the children and must have brought history alive for them.

Yes Bellanonna I had a book published in 2005 that takes the reader from when I was born and through the war years up to my farcical wedding day in 1949.
All proceeds from that after printing costa are taken out has gone to my local Childrens Hospice and I am more than pleased to say it has made a four figure sum for them.

I have also been invited to talk to the children who have re-enacted being evacuees during the WW2 re-enactment weekends at the Great Central Station in Loughborough.
This was where we finished up in 1941 after being bombed out the second time. Also machine gunned on the train when being evacuated from London.

It has been a very busy time since I had the book published although it was originally written for my family and any ancestors. It was the chap who printed it who contacted the local paper who then contacted me and from that came the interview by BBC.

Many thanks to all who have answered and its been a good read to see how you all started out in the world.
Keep well and safe everyone.

tictacnana

I doubt that the Titanic was part of the early years curriculum. I taught EY for many years and have friends who work in this area as teachers and TAs. I think your great grandson was probably sitting in on an assembly performed by much older children and it’s just caught his attention.

I mentioned your explanation to my granddaughter tictacnana
but she said no, it was just my grandson's class.

Scotsmum
I was given The New Book of Knowledge when I passed the scholarship. They still sit on the shelf!
I did read through it when I was young, especially the stories.

Strangely I was taught a North American Indian song (and, yes, I still remember it), a lot of painting (which I hated as I wanted to learn not play!) and how to play a triangle/tambourine/castanets/drum.
I could already read and write so I was held back by the others. I saw the other kids getting attention and praise when they stumbled over words and quickly realised that I'd have to do the same if I wanted attention. It didn't work as the teacher expected better of me. 4 years old and I couldn't win, whatever I did.
As for the Titanic. Kids are resillient and I very much doubt it's troubled them.

Scotsmum - yes, Arthur Mee’s Children’s Encyclopaedia. I was brought up on that, too. I loved the Poetry section, and also “Things to make and do”. Not that I ever made or did any of them, but I liked reading about them.

Scotsmum we had the Arthur Mee encyclopaedia, and also Wonderland of Knowledge in 12 volumes. It was a much read and much thumbed series. Far fewer books then so you made a lot of use of what you had,

I was 4-and-a-half when I started infants school in 1945. I wasn’t there long before I got measles and had to stay home till half term. The infants school was in one room. The older children were reading and writing, while we played with toys until we progressed to writing letters with chalk on slates. I remember being intimidated by the older ones who could read out loud and thought I’d never be able to do it. Saying prayers was important and we all had to recite them from memory without having a clue what they meant.

We had to say “please may I be excused?” to visit the outside loos and this wish was not always granted. We didn’t learn about the Titanic, but certainly learnt about hell and what would happen to us if we were disobedient.

I learnt to read at home in the indoor shelter when my brother, seven years my senior, taught me basic words when we had to spend the night in there after warnings of an air raid.

I can’t really say “those were the days” although in many respects they were better. DD has just spent a fortune on DGDs forthcoming 10th birthday. We were content with jelly and ice cream and home-made games. Today’s sophisticated
and expensive events w ere just not available, but we had great fun and parents didn’t compete with one another.

Maywalk, I hope you have written about your early life because it is fascinating.

First school, small independent nursery, aged 2, mixed age class. Every morning we all had to stand and recite times tables whilst the two thin scary owners prowled with rulers to hit anyone who made a mistake. We two year olds only had to do the first couple, but the only slighter older mites had to get all through to x12. I remember one lad called, I now assume Dustin or Justin, but at the time I thought it was Dustbin, always got hit; number s were not his forte. I ached for him. Fortunately moved on to Kindergarten in the High School, which was terrifying but not in a physical way!
Two year 2 month old grandson who goes to nursery, spends most of his imaginative play with little animals, cars, dinosaurs etc, having 'disasters' befall them. "Oh no!" is the most used phrase, followed by crashes, and cries of "Help, help". I think how things are taught is more important in many ways than what is taught.

jenpax

My daughter was told the original Dracula story at her first school, she had nightmares for months!

I remember seeing a poster for a Dracula film at a railway station (a pre Christopher Lee Dracula - Vincent Price?) when I was old enough to read the caption, but still small.

Under the very scary picture it said, ‘Every night he rose from his coffin bed to seek the warm flesh and blood he needed to keep himself alive.’ See, I still remember it!

My father explained that it was just a story, vampires weren’t real, but the mere idea of them freaked me out for ages.
Years later I borrowed from a granny a very old edition of the Bram Stoker Dracula - even the hard cover was scary - all Gothic writing!
I did read it, but afterwards couldn’t sleep with that book even in the room!

All I can remember is the times tables over and over again. Manchester education authority 1950s.

What wonderful memories! And some not so wonderful ones. Like others, I could read long before starting school - older brother would commandeer all the toys and left me with the Arthur Mees Encyclopedia (?), which I recently found again, battered and minus some coverings - it took me right back...and the sunday school stories.
The only thing I can remember about that school was boredom because I read all the books so quickly. Can't recall much about the next one, but the third one was a village CofE school. It had three rooms. I started off in the little ones' class, and I can still see the kindly face of our lovely teacher, Mrs Broad who we gathered round. Lots of posters on the walls. Then the next class up, we sat on bench desks and I tried not to get my plaits dipped into the inkwells by the pest behind. Not quills but dip pens. Another kindly teacher, Miss Hudman. She was a spinster who wore her grey hair in a tight bun, and we had to go up one at a time to stand at her desk and recite the times tables; I don't think I ever got past 5. The toilets were outside in a lean-to, oil drums with wooden seats: every time I smell Jeyes Fluid I'm back there, retching. School lunches were served in the village hall, a barn type of structure: memories of having to sit in front of a cold plate of semolina for the whole lunch break. Still can't stand it today! We also had the frozen/warmed milk thing.
Then off to another school, abroad, for service children: hot, dusty and old. The next one was a new build, right opposite where we lived. We had huge workbooks for language, which I enjoyed. And it had a baby grand piano - joy. I was given permission to go in and pick out a few tunes. My mother told me I would wait till I heard the morning assembly bell go before dashing over the road. So couldn't have enjoyed it that much! There were more schools to come but I'll stop there.

I don’t recall learning about anything scary or upsetting at school. Actually until I was nine, we didn't learn anything outside the three Rs, plus singing and prayers and the nature table. Except for the Coronation when we learnt all sorts of dances etc to perform at a special event.
My first school had three classes, one for infants, one for juniors and one for seniors. My sister was a year older, so she taught me what she had learnt before I went to school. The teacher understood, and I quickly moved up the groups in my class.
I can only remember getting told off once, for not drinking my school milk. My favourite time was the afternoon nap.

I moved schools after two and a half terms, away from my tiny village to a much bigger school. I was so disappointed as I missed out on Reception where there was a Wendy House. I never had the chance to play at school. I could already read, so I was allowed to read any book I chose. I was often asked to help others with their reading.
At junior school I jumped a year. In the middle year we had a male teacher and did history, geography and other interesting subjects. Then it was the 11+ year. We worked really hard, but after the exam we had all sorts of opportunities, with weekly house competitions, poetry, choirs, craft work, all with an excellent teacher.
At Grammar school my form did O levels a year early. As I was already a year young, I was only 14. We were all naive in those days and had no idea what half of the things meant that we read about in English and French literature.

I started school in September 1969 aged nearly five. There was a brand new two class entry primary school built in the late sixties but, because there were so many children born at that time, the reception classes were at the other end of the village in what was known as The Annexe. This was a mobile building with a lobby between the two classrooms. There was a small playground with another building that could easily have been a Nissan hut left over from the war. I loved it and, looking back, it was a very gentle way for a small child to start school. I found reading, spelling and sums, as they were called then, easy but writing more difficult. There was lots of singing and, dancing games and nature walks. These nature walks had up to forty children, two by two, and the teacher. Unimaginable nowadays. Before our school dinners we lined up in twos and the teacher would count us in: “two, four, six, eight, cherries on a cottage plate.” When we went in for dinner, like others here, we sang thank you for the world so sweet. Before we went home we sat on a carpet and the teacher would read us a story; often one of the Ladybird Best Loved Tales. The pictures would be shown to us and l always remember how several of the boys’ names seemed to be in the story without the teacher batting an eyelid - “once upon a time, Andrew R, there was a little gingerbread boy, David C…”. She was an excellent teacher; strict but very kind and very fair and we learned a lot. At the end of the year l remember sobbing my heart out because I was not going back again but loved the main school just as much when I went there.

Far too young. It's ridiculous. Children of that age barely understand death anyway. I am shocked by some things taught to youngsters now. When my GS was at primary school the boys and girls were separated and told about swear words - many of course relating to parts of the body. I was incredulous. Surely this is the sort of thing one unfortunately picks up from the street, not something to learn in school.

My father remembered the sinking of the Titanic. He was born in 1907, so was about five years old. The family was closely connected with shipping, so the awful news made an extra powerful impact. He remembered the heavy shocked silence and the sense of disaster in the house.

As a former Key Stage 1 (infants) teacher, I do think the sinking of the Titanic is a morbid subject for five year olds. It could lead to a lifelong fear of travelling on water. I wonder if plane crashes will be next on the curriculum and then rail disasters and finally road traffic accidents? Is it a government plot to keep everyone at home... ?

Mamardoit

The juniors used to do a show for parents at the end of the summer term. Sir always taught us new songs for the performance. I remember learning a sea shanty which started... Sally Brown she's a bright mulatto (sp?) Way! Hay! a roll and go.
She drinks rum and chews tabacco. Spend my money on Sally Brown.

Not the sort of thing 8 and 9 year olds would sing now.

Marmardoit - I had a good laugh at that. As you say, not the sort of thing kids wold be taught now!

I was taught: pounds, shillings and pence.

Feet and inches.

Pints and ounces etc.

I hate all metric measurements.

I remember we had to read a word held up by the teacher in order to go out at playtime. I was so chuffed once when I was first to read one out as I was so shy. I also remember our first teacher came from India and she showed us how to put on a sari and we had a teacher from New Zealand who taught us how to sing a Maori song. My school was in London so even of 60 years ago the population was diverse.

I remember carbolic soap in the infants' outside toilets. One day we were asked who could tie a bow, I could but froze when my turn came to demonstrate my skill. I remember being heartbroken at not being given a sticky paper pink bow because of my failure. Also, remember BBC radio programmes, Singing together and History, I was traumatised by a broadcast detailing beheadings in ancient China.

Stories told in primary school do need to be ones that do not cause the children to become upset or worried.
I was four years old when after school on day the head teacher Miss Edward’s (long since expired) took my sister and I back to her house which was next to the school.
She told us the story of Grace Darling, how heroic she was and how strong she was. At the time I thought nothing of it until many years later I realised she was trying to prepare my sister and I for terrible news. Stories told to you at a very young age do stay with you.
The sinking of The Titanic is a story more suitable to maybe junior aged children who can express their thoughts and feelings a bit more so than five year olds.

I taught primary aged children and was shocked by what some of them were allowed to watch on tv.
Eastenders was a case in point. A lovely young chap in my class was devasted when someone hurt Sharon. He cried every day and his mother said he couldn't sleep at night for weeks. However, she didn't stop him watching it !
I have met five year olds who have watched the Shining and also Silence of the Lambs. I have never managed to sit through either of them.
In answer to the question, I think that is far too young to learn about Titanic.

Should have added that it was a poem called 'Spot the dog' that was the first thing I learned

It goes without saying that school today is totally different to Easter1950 when I started aged 4. Two days of complete misery in a class of what I thought were idiots, before being given to a girl called Shirley to be 'looked after' in a class of 7/8 year olds. JOY. I've never looked back. I didn't really notice the age difference until I was about 14 and I realised that these were not my peer group at all. Still have problems with that.