Burnley Grammar School

Thankyou for explaining the mix up Drew.

As an oldie myself at school in the 1960s we girls had school mistresses who were the equal of many men I think. But where showering is concerned, I did this in those days with the usual feelings anyone would imagine at certain stages, don't we all, but do not have a problem with the current generation being asked the same as us if they are, such as a grandson somewhat unexpectedly confronted with a school, Willingdon, asking him to get himself showered with PE. I think in this day and age there are a huge amount of safeguards now in place, more than ever, and although a shower is a shower and it is what it is, where you are being asked to remove all your clothing briefly, I feel school is now safer than it ever has been. I think if you do feel embarrassed by such things then its just another obstacle to try and overcome in life. I do not agree with people who live in terror of a potential abusive adult around every corner, you just cannot live live like that.

Marion,
Apologies - I meant to put your name as the first word of my post, as it was in response to your post, but inadvertently typed it in the name section in error!!

I want to make it quite clear that I am not a gymnast in any way whatsoever. But I was able to hold myself upside down on top of the horse without being held by a teacher when I was at school and nobody else in class could do it apart from me. My arms were not especially big and strong and I was very slim build. My gym class looked just like the boys above, no shirts were worn. Could anyone else do the horse handstand without any aid?

Our family home in in the mid 50s was very cramped and although there was a notional bathroom it did not have a bath and there was definitely no shower at hand. Just a large square white sink and toilet with a long chain to a high up cistern to pull. The walls were not even decorated other than white paint on the plaster and that was it. A child or small adult could just about sit crossed legged in the sink and call it a bath of sorts. I was able to do this until I was about 12 years old but then became too big later on. We had one of those silver iron tubs you could sit in but rarely used it.

Going to grammar school in 1955 felt like I was being introduced to luxury. A shower. A nice big shower with lots of space. That felt so special. I didn't obviously have it to myself but with 20 or 30 other boys but that didn't matter, it still felt special when I was able to do this. Other boys came from posher homes with bigger bathrooms with a bath.

I was able to use the school shower at least twice a week, sometimes three, we had two or three PE lessons each week, it varied over time. So I have a highly positive view of showers in school PE from those days long ago.

To be clear, I would just like to state that I am not the same Marion who placed the comment here at 11.11am today, whether this is a coincidence or somebody wishing to mimic me which seems possible. Thankyou.

40 or 50 years ago most teachers probably thought they were untouchable, that's probably the only explanation for some of the actions they took.

Going back to first experiences and my first memory of the school showers, or at least one of the earliest if not the very first was how aggressive a couple of our PE teachers often were about the whole issue and making sure we did it how they wanted, and of course the watching over us. That stays with me to this day and I left school in 1976.

It's a long time since I was at school, but yes I suppose it was a little embarrassing the first time we had to shower together after PE.
But as George says, we soon got used to it.

Actually showering at all was a bit of a novelty back then. Like most houses at the time, ours only had a bath rather than a shower. The only other time we came across a shower was at the local swimming pool, but there you rinsed yourself off while still wearing your swimming trunks (or costume for the girls and women)..

Kevin: I know the excuse about öne rotten apple in every barrel" but THREE in the SAME barrel.?. To quote a notorious groomer of the past , Oscar Wilde, ´one might be regarded as a misfortune, both looks like carelessness'but THREE for Gods sake?. At the very least the current head should resign in shame - and the gravamen is, the older lads are kept at school and treated as children, the bigger the danger. When you know what went on 40 or 50 years ago, you can only hope with police checks and the British ´lessons will be learned" mantra, paedophile teachers would be a thing of the past. It is a terrible shock to know things are as bad.

Not sure it's helpful to keep putting up those kind of newspaper articles Alan. I think we all know there are rotten apples in this sector of education.

What those people who behave like this in schools seem to forget is that all those very young pupils who they treat as powerless and having to do as they are told will not remain like that forever and will grow into adults, leave school and retain the memories of what was happening to them and in many cases then speak out if they've been asked to do something they shouldn't. How can a teacher get away with forcing naked swimming on pupils and locking them in the pool area to do so and think he is ever getting away with that in the long term. I would have gone right home and told my parents that same night.

Marion.

Most boys would be a bit conscious or embarrassed first time showering. I remember my first time being confronted by many of my friends and trying hard not to look at their willies but kind of wanting to as well. But you get over it quite fast and next time was already quite different once that first time was out the way.

When I look back on my school days I think introducing kids to communal nudity is probably quite a healthy thing to do.

https://www.romfordrecorder.co.uk/news/23785141.third-name-given-royal-liberty-school-romford-abuse-case/

Secondary schools and their equivalents for that age group are obliged in law to maintain in full working order washing and showering facilities to be used. Whether they choose to then use them is not set down in law.

(ex-governor at two schools, primary & secondary 1985 to 2006)

Embarrassed, weird but okay.

That was an interesting reaction, the final word doesn't sit easily with the first two.

He sounds mature enough to understand what he's being asked to do and needs to do.

On balance I think I'm more against schools nowadays that simply refuse to let them shower even if they wanted to.

I wrote on here last Monday about my grandson who started at Willingdon School at the start of this month and how he and his family were unaware of that school's PE rules including being told on Friday ten days ago that he had to bring a towel last Monday for PE.

I see some people have asked a question and would like to know some more. I can let you know that the PE class he was in was made to shower properly after PE last Monday. He described it to me as embarrassing, a bit weird but okay. I'm sure he will get used to it quite quickly. I think it was a typical reaction to doing that for the first time.

Becky
with regards to what the girls wore in the final years at primary school as far as I know it was just vest tops.

Mike, how lovely to find that. No, I'm sure I've never seen that back in the day. I wasn't on the school rugby team, it wasn't my thing, much preferring all round athletics and I was on a team for that for a while. A little clip of the school gym there at Alderlea, yes, that's just how I remember it most times from '57 to '62, that's how we did it. Always climbing up something aiming for the high roof, with rope or gymside frames, there was always emphasis on upper body strength with arms and shoulders.

Ivan,
I think mum was at secondary school when she had to wear the regulation navy blue knickers. I don't know what she wore for PE at primary school.

Were your PE arrangements the same right through primary school?
The reason I ask is because some of my classmates had started to wear bras rather than vests before we left primary school.

I hadn't heard of Paul Henry for decades so I looked him up to see if he was still alive and kicking and what he might look like nowadays and then stumbled upon him as a subject on This Is Your Life in the mid 80's. I must say he doesn't look the particularly athletic type but he was also a keen rugby player at school and there is mention of his school sport at your school Dominic, I wonder if your have ever seen this. They do indeed show the boys in the gym shirtless too and picture of the rugby team, perhaps you are in it Dominic?. Quite a good find if I do say so myself.

https://youtu.be/7DCvZ8SzRLI?feature=shared&t=328

Becky,
I remember when I was at primary school 1957 to 1961 that girls wore the regulation navy blue knickers, because for P.E. they had to take of their dresses or skirts (presumably for safety and practical reasons) and do P.E. in vest top and knickers. Us boys just removed our shirts and because in those days boys wore grey shorts for school. all year round, we then did P.E. in vest top and shorts. Presumably it was not though necessary for boys to remove their shorts.

I was at Alderlea Boys School in Birmingham in the late 1950's and in my class at the time was the actor Paul Henry, best known for his role as Benny in Crossroads many years ago. Many boys had a good record of sporting prowess at this school at that time and I remember Paul as very athletic and capable in the school gym at the time where we never failed to be driven hard. That might surprise people who just see his character on TV and Paul looked a bit overweight by then. We also used to excel at athletics too and running both short track and field and cross country was always pushed hard too. The school gym was completely barechested at all times which was considered the way to give young boys added body confidence with themselves and around others.

In response to Ivan,
When I was at High School, our PE kit specified white socks. The boys wore blue football socks, which the school sold with the school initials included in them, although plain blue football socks were OK too.

Of course our uniform didn't specify the colour or style of our underwear, although my mum told me they had to wear regulation navy-blue knickers, both for PE and under their ordinary classroom uniform

Mark, in response to your comment "They will be dictating that to the exact colour of boys socks and the precise length of girls skirts won't they."
Some schools do. When my son was at high school, it was stipulated black socks. for P E we had to purchase particular socks from the school which had 2 hoops of colour at the top signifying the "house" he was in. Furthermore there was a regulation skirt for girls both normal uniform and P E.
Will it come to a point where schools dictate colour and style of underwear to be worn?

Bernard I don't think they've done anything unreasonable as far as I myself am concerned. I was aghast at the suggestion that if I did have an objection, which I did not, that it would likely be overruled in favour of the PE teacher quite possibly.

Howard - I'm a bit puzzled at why you are so aghast! The kit list is what the pupils are expected to turn up with but does not, of course, mean that they will all wear all of it for every lesson. It is not advisory - it is what they should bring with them - they could not be split into shirts and skins if they don't have the shirts in the first place. Schools need to have some freedom to do things as they see fit without individual parents wanting to veto odd bits here and there. Nothing you said suggests to me that they have done anything wrong or unreasonable.

I think everyone who comments on here already could tell you that PE teachers have always decided for themselves what you wear in their lessons haven't they, that's my experience anyway. I remember that we would frequently start lessons dressed differently to how we ended them, often this meant we started out with maybe a top of some sort and then ended without, having been told to take them off during the course of PE, so starting any given lesson with your shirt on didn't guarantee you'd be keeping it on. This happened an awful lot in my school PE lessons irrespective of who was teaching us, it just seemed to be a thing.

So I suppose the "advisory" word just covers their backs doesn't it, if that isn't an unintended pun.

Lots of PE teachers love stripping their male classes to the waist at some point even if it's not strictly needed or part of official kit, and most of them would probably hate the right to do that taken away from them!

So saying that the school PE kit is being so called advisory makes me wonder if they consider the main school uniform advisory as well. Something tells me not very likely. They will be dictating that to the exact colour of boys socks and the precise length of girls skirts won't they.

To Howard.
If you are dissatisfied with any aspect of how the school is managed or you child is treated, you are free to contact the Chair of the board of Governors who can raise your concerns with the school. If you know of other parents who are not satisfied then encourage them to raise the issues also with the Governing body.

My message to Marion as a 54 year old father whose son started his academy school just one year ago when he was eleven and a half is don't worry too much but I do have some good advice for any actual parents. We had the school website lay out everything clearly and most of our questions were answered on it long beforehand.

All the sports our son was going to be expected to take part in were listed quite methodically, alongside a comprehensive detailed list of all the items of PE kit to bring for indoors, outdoors and swimming. Our son showers. He's fine with it, so are we. I grew up in the 80's and it came as second nature to me and I don't want him growing up with pointless and silly hang ups that are unhelpful to his further developement. The era I grew up in at school seems to have screwed with a few peoples heads.

But what I want to advise here is how the school details we got given, and also what was on the website surrounding PE wasn't as set in stone as it first appeared. We both went to the open evening last December when I got a chance to chat with his PE teacher who told me that the PE kit on the school item list was only advisory. Our son had been coming home saying he was increasingly doing PE in the school gymnasium segregated into the so called skins and shirts by the PE teacher we spoke to despite no mention of the potential for such.

I wrote an email to his head teacher after speaking to his PE teacher at the December open night saying he might like to put the word 'advisory' onto the website listings which he agreed to look into and a few weeks later I saw it had been amended to include this word, but not before the head teacher actually told me that it was entirely up to his individual PE teacher on the day how he wished his class to dress and I even found out that if I was one of those parents that objected to anything like that then I didn't really have any power to veto, not even a shower at school unless there was a very good medical reason and no power to even ask that the school follows their own PE listings if a teacher wants to alter it and for instance make some or all boys spent PE without tops.

I was aghast to say the least. A very good job I'm not one of those who objects but the principle of the matter does annoy me that school is able to undermine my parental authority as they see fit.

I agree with both Andy and Nick here regards what Marion has said.

It would be of value to get some further feedback if possible from you regards how the lad got on. But don't make it seem like a big deal because it really isn't. Imagining (presumably communal) showers at school was a very different thing to actually ending up doing them for real. We were all in the same boat after all and had the same bits and pieces. I really didn't care very much about teachers watching me much either which seems to have been the big bugbear of a few, including my own elder sister who loathed all PE.

The school could have communicated better I think. It would have been quite important especially if the lad was not expecting it. I'm sure he survived it just fine.

You are creating a problem where there isn't one Marion and you explain that you have no issue. It sounded like you did really.