You can read the previous part in the Growing up in New Zealand 1920 - 1950 series
here, or read the articles from the original Growing Up in
New Zealand series.
Preschool education
Most children did not have pre-school education. A few attended private
kindergartens. They remember kindergarten mainly as a place to play, but
also having books and slates and having their first lessons in reading.
Peter remembers being taught about the sun's movement and how it caused
shadows. Jo remembers that her sister, five years older than she was,
taught her to read before she started school using a series called the
'peg' books.
During the Depression the Government decreed that children should not start
primary school until they were six as an economy measure, but in 1936 the
starting age was restored to five.
Walking or riding to school in the towns
In the towns most children walked to school, often in groups, without
accompanying adults. A number of children went to school barefoot. Some
went on trikes when they were young and rode bikes as they grew older.
Once they reached school often the infants had a separate playground and
from Standard one upward the playgrounds for girls and boys were segregated.
Judy remembers being collected from the house and riding in a bus to
kindergarten and then refusing to leave the bus to go to the kindergarten.
David remembers that when he went to Fairfield Kindergarten in Garden Road
in Christchurch, his sister took him on the back of her bicycle on her way
to Rangi Ruru School. Fortunately the roads were sealed so the journey was
smooth.
For Anna there was a walk of about a mile to the first primary school which
she and her sister attended in Auckland, and a journey across town by two
trams to the school they next attended. In Christchurch later they had to
take a trolley bus or diesel bus and then a tram. Later they cycled to
school.
I remember that when we lived in Roslyn, a hill suburb of Dunedin, my
friend and I usually walked downhill to school with a neighbour who was
walking to work, but we were not nervous about walking through the town
belt of trees on our own. To go home quickly for lunch we would ride the
Roslyn cable car. The cable car was also a lifeline in snowy weather as it
was the only transport which could get up and over the hill when ice or
snow was making the roads unsafe.
Jane lived in Wadestown and was allowed to walk three quarters of a mile to
kindergarten alone.
Boarders at girls' schools going from the hostel to school walked two
abreast in 'crocs' (crocodile formations).
Heating
Many schools were heated by hot water from the furnace passing through
pipes and radiators on the walls. This heating was not effective and
unless pupils were sitting in desks by the wall attending school in winter
was a cold experience. Pot belly stoves were used in some schools but
they were ineffective in rooms with a large class. Again these provided
heating only for those close to the stove. Frank remembers a fireplace
with a good fire in the Lyttleton school he attended, but this was unusual.
Lunches
Most pupils took their own lunches from home. During the Depression some
families had no money for cut lunches. There were no lunch rooms serving
hot drinks in most schools. Pupils were sent outside to get some exercise
and to air the classrooms in the lunch break unless it was raining, so the
lunch break could be a very cold time in winter, especially for children
whose families could not afford warm clothing.
School wear at primary school
Very few state schools demanded that pupils wear a uniform. Girls wore
dresses or a skirt and jersey. Boys wore shorts, even in the winter. In
places like Naseby this often meant painfully cold knees.
Examinations important
The atmosphere in the classroom was very different from today's. Classes
usually had forty or more pupils, mostly mixed, but often with girls
sitting on one side, boys on the other. Although most of the people
discussing this topic were not of the age to sit
Proficiency
we had examinations each term and took them seriously. We felt it was
really important that we pass our exams. Failure was a real anxiety for
the slower pupils because there was no social promotion from class to
class. Some were held back in one class for two or more years. Many did
not get above standard four.
Jane remembers the weekly tests on 'basics' on Fridays. "They had to be
done in a special test book. On Mondays the results would be posted.
Seating the classroom was based on these results, so that the pupils sat in
order from the most successful down to the least. Those who had more than
three mistakes in spelling or arithmetic were strapped on the hand. Our
teacher was a vestige of the old system."
From about standard five at the convent school Anna attended in Christchurch
the end-of-year exams were marked externally by teachers at another of the
Order's colleges in a different town.
The teaching methods were very different with more rote learning, not the
stimulus and exploratory techniques of today's classrooms. There was less
group work and individual teaching.
Anna recalls, "Sometimes for 'tables' in standard three we lined up in the
aisles between the desks. As a question was answered one moved to the end
of the row. If an incorrect answer was given one stayed at the front until
the turn came for another question. The process was run through a number
of times. The incentive to learn one's tables was great to avoid holding
up one's team."
Discipline
With little of the pupil participation that is seen in today's classrooms
pupils were meant to speak only when spoken to. Both boys and girls, were
strapped with a leather strap on the hand for a variety of reasons - both
for poor work and for what was deemed misbehaviour. Judith remembers being
strapped on her first morning at school because the girl next to her
claimed that she had been talking. Being smacked around the legs with a
ruler was a common punishment. If the pupils were restless the whole class
would have to sit with their hands on their heads or their arms folded -
which put an end to fidgeting.
When one girl aged five played truant and told her mother she had been
allowed to go home as a reward for good behaviour her mother told the
teacher and her punishment was to stand in the corner facing the wall until
the lunch break - which she declares cured her of playing truant and of
telling any but little white lies.
Left handed pupils
Frank recalls, "For three years I attended the local school. I remember
the teacher waiting with a metal ruler for me to take up the pencil in my
left hand. If I did she dealt with me very severely hitting me across the
knuckles. I had to spend two years in standard one, but luckily with a
different teacher in the second year. My father was so furious at the
treatment I was receiving that he sent me to my uncle and aunt in
Invercargill when I was eight years old. "
There is no doubt that such children suffered greatly from being forced
against their will to change from left-handed to right-handed writing.
Frank continued to write with his right hand which was fortunate.
When he was in Invercargill he had a very tough master who had a
four-tailed strap for discipline. Everyone was so scared that it was
rarely used.
After that he returned to the former school.
Writing materials
In the earlier years of this period pupils worked on slates. Tom remembers
using them. "The slates were smooth slabs of natural slate about 20 x 25cm
surrounded with a wooden frame. We wrote on them with a slate pencil, a
rod of slate about 6mm in diameter, originally about 15 cm long. The
slates came clean with a damp rag. From slates we graduated to pencils and
eventually to ink with dip pens."
School desks had a round hole for the ink well and ink monitors were
appointed for each class. They had to keep the ink wells filled - a messy
job for those who didn't have a very steady hand. From about standard 4
(present year 6) pupils worked in ink instead of pencil, and it was very
hard for some of us to keep our work free of blots and smudges. Blotting
paper was an absolute necessity! Girls with long plaits sometimes had the
ends dunked in the inkwells of the desks behind!
Writing was done with nibs fitted into a pen holder. Nibs came in various
sizes and broad nibs were used for special printing. There were no ball
point pens. Most people had to wait until they were at secondary school
before they were given a fountain pen. During the war such things were
scarce and one woman remembers using one given to her mother on her twenty
first birthday, putting it in her pocket and then leaning against the arm
of the seat in a bus and breaking it. She felt a terrible sense of guilt
and loss, especially when it was so hard to get a new one.
Work was done in exercise books, so it was not possible to have a fresh
start on a new page as it is when using folders with loose sheets. With
the paper shortage during the war there were stict rules for economising on
paper. Margins were to be written in and the books were to be filled
without gaps.
The leaving age had been thirteen until 1901 when it was changed to
fourteen. In 1944 it was increased to fifteen.
The School Journal
This publication which first appeared in 1907 featured prominently in the
programme in most classrooms. It contained excerpts from English
literature, and articles about history and geography, mainly relating to
the British Empire, nature study, civics and moral instruction. It was
well after 1950 before New Zealand themes and writers predominated.
Honouring the flag
Barbara T recalls the whole school standing outside school each morning
before lessons began while the headmaster would raise the New Zealand flag
on a flagstaff and they all sang 'God Defend New Zealand'.
School milk and apples
In 1937 free milk for primary school children was introduced throughout the
country. New Zealand was the first country in the world to introduce the
scheme which lasted for thirty years. The milk was distributed usually at
morning break. It was not pasteurised or homogenised and there was a layer
of cream on the top. All had vivid memories of the bottles with cardboard
tops and the perforation in the middle to be pushed open to allow for the
straw. There were no refrigerators and in some schools the crates of milk
were left sitting in the sun and the milk was less than pleasant to drink
and possibly a danger to health.
Ron recalled that at his school the boys who were milk monitors drank all
the milk in the leftover bottles and after a time there were no players
light enough to play in the rugby teams for boys under five stone (30kg).
Joe recalled that one of the perks for the prefects was drinking the cream
off the top of the surplus bottles of milk to provide the skim milk for
mixing with the tennis court marking materials.
During World War II an apple was provided daily for each pupil from orchard
surpluses, mainly Jonathan and Red Delicious.
Music
Singing played an increasingly important part in the primary schools and
many people have vivid memories of singing in music festivals where
individual choirs presented their own items and then joined for the massed
singing. Barbara T remembers the St Patrick's concert at which the choirs
from the Catholic schools sang together dressed in long white muslin frocks
with green shamrock crowns on their heads.
Watch for the next article on education in 1925-50.
