Quick Write - Our 'old school' experience

On Tuesday we had a very special morning in Room 4 where the students experienced a little taste of what it would have been like to attend a school in the late 1800's or early 1900's. It was very strict and the work was quite different. Students were given 5 minutes to write their thoughts about how they found the experience. This is what they thought....

 

I came into the classroom to hang my bag up then Mum said

"Once you’ve hung your bag up then you have to go straight back outside. When the bell rings you have to go round the back of the class and line up, one boys line and one girls." When we came in we had to sit at our desks which were put in rows. We got given a slate for handwriting. For handwriting we had to copy off the blackboard. It was all in cursive which was really hard. - Alyssa

“Get outside now!" That's all I heard when I walked in the door. All I thought was 'Who was that? Why were our desks in rows like that?' When I walked in the door guess who it was? My usual teacher, Mrs May. I went outside to line up. Our uniform had to be tidy and our nails had to be clean. Then we got sent inside. Now I see what we are doing. As we sat down we talked. Well we would have got the cane  back then. One thing I hated was no compters and no lights. - Lucie

Wow. That’s fancy words, desks moved, lights off, Janet and John books for reading but the worst was handwriting. Our little f’s looked like a’s, big  g’s looked like a boat, big q’s looked like 2’s, but it gets worse… - Alesana

I wake up in the morning, just a normal day, well I thought it was.When I got to the school gates I realise that everyone that's here is outside. I saw Jessica and Alyssa in the playground. They said I had to quickly go inside and hang my bag up and come straight back out. When the bell rang we had to line up but with a girls line and a boys line. I felt like I had gone through a time machine.   - Samara

“Hang your bag up then go outside.”

“WOW there is an old granny teaching us today”. When the bell rang we all lined up outside and the boys pulled their socks up. Girls stand up straight and boys. When we go inside we did dictation and it is a lot of writing then p.e. It was boring old stretches. When it was morning tea and lunch we were not allowed to come inside so we had to stay outside for the whole lunch and it was so hot I almost died with thirst and I had a sore leg so I could not walk at all and if we did go inside we would get told off.   - Paris

"As I walk into our classroom I look around. This is way different than usual. Why are the desks separated? What did Mrs May say about school yesterday? Oh yes, I remember. She said that it was going to be different. I looked up at the board, there was fancy writing on the board and the lights were turned off. I don’t understand what is Dictation and Arithmetic. I don’t know what it is. Mrs May spoke to me sharply,

"Didn’t you see all of the children lining up?"

"No," I answered.

"Shoo back outside and line up outside. Line up with the other children." She paused for a second,

"Now!"

"This is going to be a long day."

"I heard that!" - Abby

Ding, ding, ding went the bell. ‘Time to go and line up’ I said to myself. As the teacher then  said,

“You can come inside.” I started to think of what the day was going to be like, really horrible or kind of nice? As I walked  to my desk  I scanned my eyes through the list of things that we were doing today. I mumbled to one of my friends

“It looks like it’s going to be a fun day NOT!” - Kate

I walk in the door and see Mrs May and wonder who it is but then I realise that it is the olden day thing for the whole morning and then the bell went. We line up by the door and

"Pull up your socks boys," said Mrs May.We get inside and find our seats and sit up straight. - Hamish

I was like “WHAT?” Why do we have to put our bags away then go straight outside? Then Max told me why. He said that it was olden day school today. Then I saw Mrs May and I laughed really hard, so hard that I couldn’t laugh at all. Then when the bell rang we had to line up and then we could go inside. Straight away we had to do handwriting and it was really hard. After that we did dictation and that was the easiest thing of all. I needed to use three pages though. - Ryan

As I walk in the classroom door I see Mrs May dressed up.

“Go hang your bags up then go outside,” Mrs May said so the class played outside. Then the bell rang and we lined up and the teacher let us inside. She told us to do fancy handwriting, start with a-z, but the tricky part was the writing. Then we did dictation, we wrote 1-2-3 pages and we had to write what Mrs May said, like she would say “150 years ago classes were massive.” For P.E you would just reach up to the sky then touch your toes. Then came reading. We read Janet and John. It was called ‘Here we go’, Then the hardest one was arithmetic, very hard questions. The rules were NO TALKING, NO leaving your seats and NO sniffing. SO BORING I wish this never happens again. - Emma

I walk into my classroom. OMG Mrs May is an old granny. Ring goes the bell. What do I do now? I line up at the door. I walk inside and did handwriting, dictation, PE, reading, arithmetic and technology challenge. - Max

On Tuesday we did handwriting. We had to do the alphabet. It took ages because we had to do it as neat as we could. I hate old school days. It just took too long. Mrs May said to do this and that. Man it was boring. Then we had to do dictation. We had to write what Mrs May said. Then we had to spell ‘because’, we had to spell it B.E.C.A.U.S.E and then we had P.E. We lined up outside and then we went to the tennis court. We did stretches (look below) and then we did reading. We had to read Janet and John. Man I am going to hate this day. I hated that… - Venessa

“Fold arms, backs up straight” bellowed Mrs May. “Here are your handwriting slates for today.” No, please don’t be… CURSIVE. In the end I didn’t get it finished because it was so hard. - Rubie

‘Ahah,’ I say to myself. ‘Mrs May looks different, the power’s out, desks are in rows.’ I would have hated it if I went to school 150 years ago doing all the hard stuff. One thing I didn’t like is that you were not allowed in the classroom after lunch or during morning tea. You have to line up outside. I do not want to experience the olden days again! - Josie

As we walk in the classroom I find my desk. Mrs may tells us the rules. I start to freak out. Handwriting was boring, dictation was silly and P.E was useless. In fact from morning to lunch was B.O.R.I.N.G! I was relieved when it was over. - Toby

On Tuesday we had an olden day school. We had to do hard handwriting and dictation. Mrs May looked funny because she had to wear a funny outfit. I felt like we were old people. I did not like our school. The learning bits were hard too. It was like she was not our teacher. The P.E was boring. I hated old school. - Lanie

As I walked into the classroom it was going to be an ordinary school day but the class was soooo different. The desks were in rows, the lights were and something was different about Mrs May...she was dressed as a nanny!!

“Hang your bags up and the get outside. When the bell rings line up at the door,” Mrs May shouted in a croaky voice. So I went outside with Alyssa and max and as people came into the class we warned them. Then the bell rang. We rushed into lines and then the cranky teacher came out and said,

“Right. Pull your collar out Alesana. Socks up Blake. Ok. You may go into the classroom.” I was sooo nervous when we got into the class. We had to do a nail check!! How weird!!! Lucie and i got told off because we had nail polish. OMG!! We had to go to Mrs Holgate to get remover! - Jessica

“Sit up straight, arms folded, no leaning.” Strict, strict and even more strict. We had to try the morning pretending that it was 150 years ago, not fun. For handwriting in olden days you had to do cursive. For P.E. it was boring old stretches. When we do maths we had to do times-tables and say them out loud three times. OMG I would not stand a chance in the olden days. - Connie

As I was walking into the class I was confused. Mrs May was dressed up. Our desks were different and the lights were all off. Mrs May said,

“Hang up your bag and get outside.” I think to myself ‘Today is going to be a special day.’ Then the bell rings. We had to line up and Mrs May said,

“Have you collar right and pull up your socks.” P.E was cool and easy to do.   - Jenaya

I walk into the classroom and see Mrs May. She looked really old. We had to do P.E and that was boring. All we did was do stretches. All the things that we did were handwriting, dictation, P.E, then we had morning tea. Such a relief. We had reading for 45 minutes, arithmetic and then it was lunch. What a great relief. We finished the day off with technology challenge and that was stressing. - Blake

I  walked into the classroom. Mrs May said,

“Hang up your bag and go outside.” Then when the bell rang we had to line up outside the door. P.E was so boring  because all we got to do was stretch our arms out and reach to our toes.  - Lucy