I Got The Cane In School 6 Of The Best

Most canings were administered in the headteachers' studies where we were either caned singly or with our fellow offenders.

Occassionally a large group would be caned. This was usually when teachers had made a concerted effort to catch smokers or there was a crackdown of lateness, uniform violations or some other petty rule.

In those cases, all those due to receive a caning would be assembled in the gym or the school hall. A few teachers would administer the canings. The number of teachers varied with the number of us to be caned.

We were all, boys and girls, caned in front of each other and our ages ranged from 11 to 18.

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Potter · 70-79, M

In my senior school girls were always punished in private. It would mean either the slipper or the cane on the hand that they didn’t write with. For the boys it was slightly different, most teachers including some female teachers had a slipper in their desk, which they didn’t hesitate to use on us boys in front of a mixed class. It was embarrassing enough to have to come to the front and touch your toes in front of a mixed class, but worse still if it was a female teacher administering the slipper. Caning, however was done in private, either being told to wait behind after class, or being sent to a senior teacher or head. Usual routine was a lecture then being told to untuck your shirt at the back prior to touching your toes or bending over a desk.

Sharon · F

@Potter Schools have always been hotbeds of sexism, many still are.

SeekingConnection · 61-69, M

@Sharon Mine most certainly was. It seemed archaic even in the 1970s! I've always been thankful that I wasn't sent to a single-sex school, the idea of which I found profoundly absurd then and now, but one of those could hardly have been a more sexist institution than my mixed-sex state comprehensive. In many cases, boys and girls weren't even allowed to take the same subjects. Metalwork for boys, cookery for girls. And the belt was reserved for boys only, of course. I think your school's policy on use of the cane was positively enlightened compared to mine!

Sharon · F

@SeekingConnection Some schools took sexism to petty extremes. Possibly the most petty was addressing girls by first name and boys by plain surname. It just showed how small minded some teachers could be.

SeekingConnection · 61-69, M

@Sharon It's as if the kids were being prepared for marriage and the girls were all going to take the boys' family names. Utterly absurd.

Your experiences of traditional discipline aside, I get the feeling you didn't enjoy school much. I certainly didn't.

Sharon · F

@SeekingConnection Actually I did enjoy school, but we were treated fairly. I understand your experience was the opposite.

SeekingConnection · 61-69, M

@Sharon Yeah, for me high school was five years of absolute chaos with discipline administered entirely randomly and at the whim of individual teachers. No rules or oversight whatsoever. However, I did enjoy it a bit more in fourth and fifth year when most of the thugs and shit-for-brains had left and we actually started to learn stuff. I enjoyed geography and chemistry in particular.

Sharon · F

@SeekingConnection I preferred the sciences and maths.

SeekingConnection · 61-69, M

@Sharon I really struggled with maths, but I got something like 90% for my arithmetic O-level, despite having filled in the entire paper in pencil before reading the instructions and discovering it had to be written in ink, and having to spend the last half-hour of the exam rubbing the whole thing out and rewriting it. I may not be mathematically-minded, but at least I can say I'm numerate!

Sharon · F

@SeekingConnection I was crap at English at school, I was much gooder (sic) at maths. My English has improved a lot since leaving school.

SeekingConnection · 61-69, M

@Sharon I found that my writing-skills and knowledge of spelling and grammar improved a great deal after I got on-line and began blogging regularly. I was on LiveJournal for many years. It was an excellent site, with very straightforward and secure privacy settings. It still exists, but hardly anyone uses it now.