Following on from our glimpse into Victorian school life, school today seems so different to the experience of Victorian pupils. Computers, interactive white boards and televisions would certainly seem as foreign to those children as slates and dipping pens would to today’s students. However, a recent trawl through the delightful school log book collection for extracts to show teachers also found some things in common.  All the teachers agreed that whether it was bad weather, uniform, behaviour in class or the challenges of teaching maths and English, parts of school life from 140 years ago seemed very familiar.

 
Swallowcliffe Schoolchildren

A recent survey that was critical of maths teaching was uppermost in Swindon teacher’s minds when we came across the following extracts from Cricklade National School showing that it was a subject Victorian pupils struggled with:

 
Feb 16^th 1866 “Find that many in the 2^nd class failed in subtraction – several of whom seem utterly at a loss to comprehend the working of it”.

March 1^st “Kept greater part of 1^st class in this morning for insolence in the arithmetic lesson”

For one pupil the subject proved too much altogether: March 12^th “Maria Stone who lives with her grandmother doesn’t feel inclined to come, having such a distaste to arithmetic.”

Mathematics wasn’t the only subject to test Victorian pupils. The poor literacy skills of students are a common theme in the head’s log books. The head at Yatton Keynell wrote: 7 October 1867 “Admitted four children – Elizabeth, Fanny and Henry Hillier and George Whiting to school. The 1^st of these though 12 years old is unable to read words of 2 letters and the rest although each over 5 do not know their letters”. From Margaret Stancomb infant school the same story emerges: Feb 6^th 1895 “Admitted a boy Charles Andrews, he will be six years old on March 25/95 he cannot even say the alphabet or point out a letter or figure, nor can he write at all”.

Margaret Stancomb Infant School, Trowbridge

The new head of infants at Lacock school wrote this entry on her first day: Monday Oct 5^th 1874 “This morning I took charge of the Infant Department, I find the children very rude and disorderly, and above 30 who do not know their letters. Was taken very ill the same evening and was not able to attend my duties during the week”. We don’t know if the new head’s illness was caused by the shock of such a rude and disorderly school, but she continued to suffer illness throughout her time in charge. The next head wrote a very similar report on her first day in charge 5 years later in 1879 “On Monday morning Feb 3^rd after 29 years service in Lacock mixed school, I took charge of the infant Department” Friday 7^th “More like a noisy playground than a school”.

Little Cheverell Schoolchildren

Pupil’s dress has long been an area of contention and at Yatton Keynell school in 1867 it was no different. Sept 26 1867 “Several parents kept their children away because they were forbidden to wear beads round their necks. Two came in the afternoon with beads, when they were taken off.” The log book doesn’t say anything more on the subject, so we can only speculate whether this was against the school dress code or an early example of health and safety.

With children walking some distance to schools disruption caused by the weather is a common theme in the log books. This winter has seen more snow than we have been accustomed to in recent years, but it hardly compares with that which faced pupils of Lacock school in 1881: Jan 24^th “Owing to the severity of the weather and the deep snow – this school was closed for 3 days”. Jan 28^th “Attendance very low – the roads quite impassable, upwards of six feet of snow to be cut through, in many places”.  Then in February came the rain! Feb 11^th “attendance very low, owing to the high flood”. In the summer the weather still caused problems as due to the heat the children were described as “indolent”.