CONTINUING the matter of the use of the tawse in schools (Letters, April 4 & 5), I would offer the following from my own experience.
When I started primary school many years ago aged four and a half, the P1 teacher was a gentle and caring young lady. But as that year was coming to an end, we were warned by those who had gone before us of the P2 teacher, infamous for her ill nature and coarse manner of speaking to the kids. We soon found her bark was not as bad as her bite because of her making sure you remembered the three-times table or whatever by beating your head in time with a 12-inch boxwood ruler. When she became really impatient, which was very frequent, she hit so hard the ruler broke. Each day she must have gone home with plenty of kindling for her fire.
The headmaster was equally ill-tempered and dished out his form of punishment when he felt it necessary by using the tawse, or belt as it was more commonly known.
However these people were angels compared to some of their colleagues I later encountered in the senior school and two memorable examples were first, the second year maths teacher who regularly belted the whole class to make an example of one person's failing. His leather belt was so thick it could stand perpendicularly, a feature he took pleasure in demonstrating before putting to use.
For an individual's punishment his speciality was the two-hander over a desk. The belt struck the upper hand and wrist and the back of the lower hand struck the desktop. The alternation of hands for "six of the best" ensured the recipient's inability to write for at least an hour after and the weals lasted for the rest of the day. These punishments were given out when mistakes were made and not for any bad behaviour.
Second was the deputy headmaster, for whom the tawse was not his choice. Instead, a five-foot long wooden blackboard pointer and an 18inch brown metal rod, which he called his "bar of chocolate", were the tools of his teaching methods. The pointer was used on the ribs or stomach (girl or boy) and the bar of chocolate across the skull to encourage the victim to give the correct answer.
I must clarify that this was a normal and well respected state school and not a borstal or other place juvenile correction and that bad behaviour was largely non-existent.
The belt was in common use in most if not all schools, in those days but I wonder if there were similar forms of the above types of punishment given out in other schools.
Gordon Stewart,
309 Mearns Road, Newton Mearns.
IN 1943 I was a 13/14-year-old pupil at City Secondary School in Glasgow and taught by a teacher known to all as Granny Smith (who was probably nowhere near that age group) who ruled with the belt. One day while studiously writing at my desk and chewing a sweet of some kind (a rarity in wartime) I was struck on the side of the head by a rolled-up belt, with Granny Smith shouting: “Cowan you are like the first three letters of your name, a ruminating animal.” I often wonder what a fury that would cause if it happened today, but it taught me a lesson, and every time I see cows chewing the cud I know what they are.
Donald Cowan,
Lochinver,
Lamlash,
Isle of Arran.
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