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Tag Archive 'School'

Inappropriate behaviour?

Posted in Music, School, Teachers on Aug 24th, 2010

I was amused to read on the BBC website that there is concern in Wales over the fact that women teachers outnumber men by a ratio of three to one. I’m actually astonished, in these paranoid times that any man who values reputation and liberty would even contemplate a career in teaching. To illustrate my [...]

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Sometimes I brought it on myself…

Posted in Memories, Mental Archaeology, School on Aug 21st, 2010

There were times at Grammar school when I really did seem to go out of my way to court unpopularity; usually with a flagrant display of elitism. In lower Sixth Form those of us studying French Literature for A Level were invited to the University of Sussex at Brighton for a day of study along [...]

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There were other good things…

Posted in Books, Reading, Science Fiction on Aug 19th, 2010

One of the most significant events of my first week at Grammar school was discovering the library. It may be hard for some people to appreciate how difficult it was for a child with a very advanced reading age to obtain challenging reading material in 1960s rural West Sussex. My primary school had a very [...]

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There were some good times…

Posted in Achievement, Public Speaking, School on Aug 15th, 2010

You may have got the vague impression that I didn’t like my school very much and you would be right. Whether I’d have been any less bullied and unhappy at any of the other Grammar Schools that offered me a place is moot. Wherever I went I’d still have ginger hair, a “funny” Scottish surname [...]

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Odd facts about Malcolm, nearly at number 21…

Posted in Anger, Mental Archaeology, School on Aug 3rd, 2010

My best friend and I had already organised a post exam 3 week cycling trip in the West Country, with a 2 or 3 day stop at my Nan’s included, so I didn’t have time to fret over the slow progress with the grant application. That holiday was quite an adventure itself so I’m not [...]

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Odd facts about Malcolm, numbers 20 & 21 – part 3…

Posted in Exams, Illness, School on Aug 2nd, 2010

The first setback came just before O Levels actually started. I didn’t get the scholarship not, they assured me, through any lack of ability, simply because those scholarships were very limited and heavily oversubscribed. I was reassured that if the grant was forthcoming then there was a place waiting for me at Dartington so I [...]

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Odd facts about Malcolm, numbers 20 & 21 – part 2…

Posted in Mental Archaeology, Music, School on Jul 29th, 2010

I’d made my decision so on Thursday I turned up for my viola lesson and gave my teacher the good news, she was delighted. How does a nearly 16 year break something like that to his parents? The only thing to do was talk to the one Master that I completely trusted. The man who’d [...]

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Odd facts about Malcolm, numbers 20 & 21 on the list…

Posted in Mental Archaeology, Music, School on Jul 28th, 2010

OK, back to the list and a pretty horrendous sequence of events, even by my extreme standards. This was something that started out being very good and degenerated into something very bad. It’s going to take more than one post to tell this story because the details are important. In February 1969 I sat my [...]

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The only reason I never got caned…

Posted in Discipline, Memories, Mental Archaeology, School on Jul 26th, 2010

The fact that I was never caned at Grammar School is a debt I owe to one man, Norman Lucas the Headmaster at Midhurst. By being my Headmaster that man saved me from setting some sort of record for beatings. “Luke” as he was affectionately, and I mean that sincerely, known was determined that corporal [...]

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Odd facts about Malcolm, number 15 on the list…

Posted in Detention, Memories, Mental Archaeology, School on Jul 25th, 2010

I doubt that anyone will be surprised to learn that I was generally considered the most argumentative child that most of my Masters could remember teaching. Just after I started Third Form, aged 13 I got into a stand-up row with the RE Master. I’d got on my high horse about something and he made [...]

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