Burnley Grammar School

Comment by: James on 10th December 2023 at 17:09
Alan on 10th December 2023 at 03:39


James most of your message is risible, but just just one quote of this frankly over the top message will suffice:


´Is there anything you would compel a child i.e. an under eighteen to do or would you prefer to just let chaos reign?´

Anybody over 16 IS NOT ´a child´?. As for the nonsense about sending children up chimneys, I treat it with the contempt it deserves. It is you who seem to have a Victorian attitude. I invite you to go out and meet a group of 16-18 year olds and call them children and see the response you will get. and it not creating chaos to allow them to express their own personalities and their own style.

I think the problem with you,and those that think like you is that you talk ABOUT young adults and never TO them. You are the problem, not them.

By the way, you do realise to join the Metropolitan police as a cadet you need to be 17, and an RAF entry can be made at 18. Are you seriously suggesting that a 17 year old is a child?

Chris G's part 'Some of us actually enjoyed being bare-chested' is very true. There's actually a guy living at a house in my lane with his parents who is about twenty years old who seems to spend all summer never bothering with placing a top over his torso. He's nothing out of the ordinary, just a normal looking lad but seems keen to do this, to the point of being too keen because we have been in situations where he goes about where it looks less than appropriate and when he's going about in his bare chest look he actually walks differently, almost a strut. Me and my wife have actually laughed at it before. He was at his family BBQ over the summer which we were invited to and spent the whole time mingling completely bare chested among the guests when everyone else had made a bit of an effort to dress smart casually.

Alan on 10th December 2023 at 03:39

Is there anything you would compel a child i.e. an under eighteen to do or would you prefer to just let chaos reign?

I was at school when the leaving age was raised from fifteen to sixteen, quite a few lads didn't like it but after a couple of years, all were used to the idea and the majority took advantage of gaining some qualifications.

As Mr Blair said in due course, Education, Education, Education. It doesn't do harm. Of course if you want to roll back time, perhaps instead, you would like to see the school leaving age reduced and we could send children up chimnies and in the world you seem to live in alongside Mogg and that would be fine as long as they had a choice but Mogg wouldn't give them a choice. Education is not wasted and an additional two years would grant opportunites to the majority and they don't need a choice about it because that's often a life on universal credit or in a poorly paid job.

This is 2023, not the 1950s or whatever decade your hatred of all things to do with education is founded in. Get over it.

Comment by: Frank on 9th December 2023 at 22:15
Even if they had not chosen to do so I see no problem with an actual teacher instructing them to do PE shirtless even in those circumstances as a compulsory element of the class.



Neither do I. What are we saying here, that we should be worried they might have been a bit cold or that we should be making them ashamed of their bodies, a bit of both or something else?

I do agree that they were unlikely to be doing anything they hadn't consented to willingly in this case but I was made to run the school cross country shirtless many times during my school years and I found it quite an enjoyable way to run and when we did have days when we did so with our sweatshirts on again I felt rather constricted, we didn't run like that over winter but I'm sure we did sometimes in the first part of November coming off the half term. This goes back to the early to mid 70's time.

The school gym for me at comprehensive school from the age of 11 until I was 15 was next to nothing - one single quite basic pair of white shorts. Nothing else ever got put on. Chest, legs and feet were bare. No discussion about it. That was the rule, we knew it and we adhered to it. The fact that you might be personally shy or self conscious about your own body counted for nothing and was irrelevant, and when we came back from the gym and had to remove those shorts, complete nudity was expected without argument or hesitation and we went to shower with each other and no fuss about it would be expected or infact tolerated. You knew where you stood whether you liked it or not. The teacher reigned as the supreme leader whose decisions were almost always non-negotiable, certainly when it came to what we were allowed to wear.

What was good about this was that it made it completely impossible for anybody to avoid gym PE on account of not coming with the right kit which was sometimes the case outside when we had much more to bring along. If you didn't come to school on PE gym day with your shorts then you were in your pants getting out there on the gym floor, not sitting the lesson out, but there was a lost property box of shorts ready for that possibility so rarely happened. So I think my PE gym teachers loved the very minimalist basic shorts only kit for this reason as much as any other and at least it meant not lugging too much around all day like sports shoes and other stuff. At first I was bringing towels to school which slowly got smaller to hand towel size and ended up a lot of the time I never even used to bring a towel for the showers but would simply slip a small dry square flannel to dry off with which always seemed good enough, so those gym days ended up remarkably easy. I used to sweat profusely under even minor exertion as a teenager so I definitely needed those gym showers at school.

Comment by: Gareth on 10th December 2023 at 09:27


You and Frank are the ones harking back to times past. I was making the point that in 2023, 16/18 years are not boys, they are young men.

You then mention that in your boyhood you had to do what you were told. Who is doing the harking back here? - me or you?

If you want to take me to ask at least do it fo something I have done, not something you erroneously think I had done.

Alan on 9th December 2023 at 07:36

When I was growing up, boys didn't have rights, you did as you were told whether that be by parents, teachers, neighbours or any other adult and that was whether you liked it or not and if you didn't a punishment usually resulted.

Things are very different in 2023.

Do you need to keep harking back and ranting about times past? It all seems a bit childish to me.

Frank makes a point that seems to have got lost among all the angst and recrimination generated here. Some of us actually enjoyed being bare-chested for PE and games. I know I certainly did, and I don't remember anyone grumbling about it during the all-too-brief years that I experienced it. In my school days, over half a century ago, the top part of my school uniform comprised vest, shirt, pullover, blazer. The pullover was generally optional, although expected in the colder months, and vests, while not actually mandated by school, we're definitely mandated by Mums for most, sometimes all, of the year. That's a lot of clothing for a young boy, and being able to escape into PE kit was a relief, especially so when that PE kit was just a pair of cotton shorts and a bare torso.
Compare that with today. Even at this time of the year, kids will think nothing of spending the school day with just a polo shirt between themselves and the North Pole, and of going home afterwards similarly (un)clad, and no one bats an eyelid.

Frank. It is 2023. Not 1953. In a more ´normal´ society, you would have lads and girls of 16 choosing either to go to work or stay at school. If they were anxious , as I was to get a job, some of the them will really resent the extra two years they are compelled to be in school. - was going to say waste at school. Do you really want to antagonize them further by instructing them to do things they don´t want to, and for which there is no need, to satisfy the whims of a teacher?. They are adults for God´ sake.

Comment by: Brian on 8th December 2023 at 15:27

Whereas boys in school doing the cross country back in the 60s, 70s, 80s and possibly the 90s might have been told by their teacher to run shirtless like that there is no way I can see that kind of old school way still being applied to a class in this day and age so they must have agreed to be running like that and been enjoying it you would think. It's an intriguing observation all the same.



Even if they had not chosen to do so I see no problem with an actual teacher instructing them to do PE shirtless even in those circumstances as a compulsory element of the class.

If you went to some of the top further education establishments in the USA in the sixties you had to be photographed naked full frontal, profile and behind on entry as a new fresher and some of those pictures have ended up online today. I don't believe there was any choice in doing that.

Alan 9th December 07:36

Perhaps he could have been an orthopaedic medical student or something, I really wish I could remember. He did explain what he would be doing and why before he started, but most of it went right over my head at the time. I’m sure I remember the word, ’student’ being used.

Alan, none of us were made to feel as though we had to go along with it. I think had any of us not wanted to, I have the impression that he wouldn’t have minded. I remember him as being friendly, unlike our usual gym teacher, and he did seem to be respectful to us all. I don’t think kids mind going along with most things, as long as they have an understanding of what’s going to take place, and they feel comfortable with it. We all found it quite interesting in the end I think.

Monsieur Chipps 6th December 15:49

I shall always miss France, as stated previously. I spent so much time there for more than 20 years that it became a big part of my life, and my work in the end. I was lucky that I was be able to incorporate my job as a documentary photographer into my travels around the country, which gave me opportunities to explore much more and to get closer to a lot of its culture. My initial impression of France was how visual everywhere was. Everywhere seemed so visually interesting and deliberately aesthetically pleasing. I particularly liked the frequent rows of pollarded trees, not only creating colonnades of shaded protection from hot sun, but also wonderful shapes and shadows during the winter; all so great for photography. All the best photographers were French, Henri Cartier-Bresson anyone? Before him similar subject matter was being painted by Renoir, Degas, Seurat with their visually aware impressionism. I remember when in the south of Brittany visiting Musée de Pont Aven where there was a great exhibition from a group of Irish artists who settled there at the end of the 18th cent. I still have a print from there on my wall.

Your mentioning of French course books sent me off into the loft searching for my old school books, some of which I’ve kept for all those years. Amongst them I found my very first French lesson book, where I’d written very neatly at the top of the first page with my fountain pen, Mercredi, le dix-huit Septembre. I didn’t write the year, but it would have been 1969. Looking through it seems my very first lesson was learning, les jours de la semaine, which I’d neatly and correctly written out, for which I got a nice red tick. Interestingly, further along in my book I see we had to translate our Form time table into French. Unusually, this class had boys from a variety of forms, all made to do French because of our English grading, so most would have been different, so no cheating here. I notice that I had a French lesson every day of the week except one, Jeudi, which started its morning with, double Anglais. Relevant for this forum, I see that Monday morning our second lesson period was, Gymnastique, followed by more Français, and then later that same afternoon, Double Sport (obviously Games) So it seems I must have had two showers in one day at the age of 13, having already had a bath the Sunday night before, I must have been the cleanest boy in the world by Monday night.

I couldn’t find evidence of the course book we would have gone on to use. I’m disappointed I couldn’t find a French project book I’d made on French cars. We’d each chosen our own subject for this, so as I’d always interested in cars, that’s what I’d chosen. I remember sitting in class writing letters in French to lots of French car companies of the time, Citroen, Pergeot, Renault, Simca, and others. I gave my home address for replies, and so subsequently became bombarded for weeks with large, thick envelopes, full of brochures from the many different car companies I’d written to, all jam packed displaying their new models. I remember having to write back in class to thank them all, which must have been unusual for these places to receive, but good practice I suppose. I enjoyed writing about the cars in French, and giving my opinions of their new designs etc. I also cut the brochures up and stuck them in my book, with attached labels where I’d written, ‘pull here’, which would then open up into double page spreads. I must find this book which I know I have somewhere.

Several have been mentioning bare skin running, and Craig has his WhatApp group seemingly going strong. Also there’s been wild swimming mentioned, with Mr Chipps diving in too. Has anyone been listening to doctor Michael Mosley’s Radio 4 series called, Cold Therapy? I didn't catch them all but see the 4th episode was all about taking exercise within cold temperatures, and episode 5 was actually about cold water swimming. All episodes are still available as podcasts to download to listen to if interested here: https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p0gt2krh/episodes/player

Mr Chips on 7th December 2023 at 17:01

I never thought I'd write again about M. Jazy.

When the outline of the story was read to us, I wasn't listening and was thinking of athletics training later that day so what I wrote was nothing like the story we were supposed to write. I was pretty good at French so when I got 18% for this rather than my usual 85%+ I had to explain why. Of course I just mumbled about not really having grasped the story so I was given a lunch time detention to repeat the exercise. The outline was read to me again and I wrote my essay.

On completion, I was told to return at the end of school by which time it would have been marked. When I returned, I was shown the two versions, the first scoring 18% and covered in red pen and the second with one red mark on it which scored 93%.

Again I was asked to explain and of course had nothing to say. The result was four strokes of the cane to help me stay away and paying attention in future. They were four absolute stingers and it worked!

What would you have done Mr Chips?

In answer to Greg2's question on 5th December, it is just possible your PE teacher's interest in measurements might have been a study in anthropology - this would tie in with Graham's suggestion of extra mural activities. That said, ALL studies should be conducted with volunteers not conscripts.

Nate on 7th December 2023 at 23:02
Has anyone ever tried to set up showers in a school where they were trying to hide?

Strange question.






You're right Mike. That's not what I was asking. Something went wrong there. I agree it doesn't make sense. I've now forgotten what it was I did actually mean to ask in actual English that did make sense to me at the time I was trying to be clever using a language I've never even studied. I think it was something like did anyone successfully manage to avoid showers in PE when they had to do them.

Comment by: Bill on 1st December 2023 at 00:00
About half the boys I saw cross country running out of Queensbury Academy in Dunstable on Monday afternoon this week were running along shirtless with entirely bare chests. They looked to be about 15 to me. There must have been at least 20 doing that. It looked very old school and like they might have even been divided up like that deliberately but it was impossible to tell.




This is very old school and rare nowadays Bill. What was it like outside that day? I've looked that school on google earth and it certainly looks like a school with very extensive sporting grounds and facilities so must take PE very seriously indeed by the look of the set up from above. They really are spoilt there and I noticed there are some nice nearby off road areas that looked good for running around away from the main roads and streets which I think was described in a later comment.

Whereas boys in school doing the cross country back in the 60s, 70s, 80s and possibly the 90s might have been told by their teacher to run shirtless like that there is no way I can see that kind of old school way still being applied to a class in this day and age so they must have agreed to be running like that and been enjoying it you would think. It's an intriguing observation all the same. Lots of boys do actually love stripping off like that in peer groups with each other, as much as many others really don't like doing it at all and even fear being asked to.

Do you live near there Bill and have you seen that before?

An while we are off-topic discussing languages, my first French teacher started us off on pronunciation by covering the blackboard with words transliterated into the Phonetic Alphabet as used in dictionaries. At age 10!

We nad the "New Latin Course", which with a little bit of penmanship became "The New Eating Course".
Sic transit Gloria . . .

I think all that's happened there is that he's tried to use google translate to ask a question in what looks like latin to me and the translation hasn't quite translated correctly. This AI thing isn't all that intelligent just yet. Possibly it should have been reverse translated back again to make sure it said what was wanted. But a nice try anyway.

Original Andy on 7th December 2023 at 08:30

I'm very interested in your post about working with a different PT, is the routine different to the things you did before and likely body parts and sets of everything? Do you include a cardio session in this or is it just all weights.

Let's say, I have 'room for improvement' and I would like to make it.

Thanks.

James on 7th December 2023 at 12:14

Good luck with finding a new gym, for me it has made a huge difference.


Mr Chips on 7th December 2023 at 17:01

Yes sir, that was it, the Cambridge Latin Course, I think it's still in use so it must have been well ahead of its time when I started with it. Oh, yes, I passed my O levels in French, Latin, German and a few more things besides.


Nate on 7th December 2023 at 23:02

Has anyone ever tried to set up showers in a school where they were trying to hide?

Strange question.

Whilst most boys back in the day were actually rather on the skinny side and certainly not overweight, put yourself in the position of being an overweight chubbier child being made to strip off and be weighed and measured amongst a group of others like that. That kind of situation is setting up potential problems for those who don't fit the regular mould.

Ecquis umquam in schola imbres erigere conatus est, qui se occultare conabantur?

Comments by: Graham Butterfield on 4th December 2023 at 21:30
Danny C on 4th December 2023 at 23:57


The same thing happened to me at middle school too and that was back in the seventies, I joined secondary school in 1978. Boys were sent along to the hall with I think it was a couple of PE teachers from the secondary we were going up to and we all had to take our trousers and tops off while both teachers went around measuring and weighing us while we were just standing around in our pants for about 20 minutes.

James on 7th December 2023 at 12:14 & Original Andy on 7th December 2023 at 08:30

Your memories of Longmans Audio Visual French are quite accurate. It covered all five years with books for both GCE and CSE as they were in the 1970s. It was so much easier to teach than what had gone before, the books were accompanied by some films and audio tapes bearing in mind this was before language labs existed.

Yes, James, I remember the story of M. Jazy and le camion chargé de clous. Those stories were a series of, I think nine pictures and there were choices about how to use them in the teacher's book. Suggested were to start a classroom conversation centred round the pictures, set it as a piece of written composition either in free form or after reading the story in the book or finally using it as dictée. I used all the suggestions at different times on the various stories and yes, M. Jazy had a 2CV.

How, James did you make such a mess of it may I ask? Did you pass your O level?

Original Andy, I think you remember the Cambridge Latin Course, it was new about 1970 and compared to when I learned Latin it was a pure pleasure though not all the older staff liked it, indeed I remember a couple who refused to use it because it didn't concentrate enough on rote grammar learning. The books were brightly coloured, I remember orange, blue, green, gold and purple for the five years to GCE. I trust you worked hard and passed your O levels in both French and Latin?

Original Andy on 7th December 2023 at 08:30

Thank you, that's great advice. I too have always used health clubs but don't use most of the facilities. I'm out of contract time so can just give notice and go. I'm on holiday next week so I will take a day to look at a few other places that are not chains and see where I get to.

Mr Chips on 6th December 2023 at 15:49

I remember Longmans Audio Visual French, the books were about A4 size I think and there was red on the cover along with a picture, I think in black and white? I certainly remember M. Jazy and also a story that was about him and un camion chargé de clous which I made such a mess of that I had to start it all over again. Would my memory also be right that M. Jazy drove un vieux deux CV? What fun cars they were.

James on 6th December 2023 at 13:16

How did I choose my PT?

I have had a number in my time and most were not satisfactory and as you say, filled the session with things I could do on my own. These were all based in 'health clubs' that I had membership of meaning ones with the same branding as an ocean crossing airline so it's more show than substance. After the pandemic gym closures I decided I wasn't going back to those places and so started looking around for something different.

What I found was somewhere far more 'rough and ready' than anywhere I'd ever been before, little polish, no bundles of white towels, no swimming pool, not part of a chain, but loads of weight training equipment and also no yearly lock in to membership so I decided to give it a go.

What I found there were guys who were a lot more serious about training, there are quite a few ex-military guys and the PTs were in a whole different league, they pushed hard from the first minute almost whether you had signed up with them or not. I just needed to decide which one I wanted to work with and agree a plan with him.

How I chose him in the end was not at all scientific, he was a guy I had talked with a few times and so I knew he knew his stuff. I was still waivering when one evening he came and took the next shower to me and what I saw was the body I wanted, well toned upper - defined shoulders, chest, arms and abs, well developed lower - well developed calfs, quads and glutes. I figured if he could achieve that for himself then he could get me there within limitations - he's 10cm taller than me so that's never going to change and he's blond while I'm not any more and never will be again.

Over a year on, I'm more than pleased with the results and I feel great. One of the things that has improved no end is that I no longer get back pain from spending so much of my day standing or sitting on what are usually very uncomfortable benches - think of sitting on a church bench for hours and that's what it's like.

So I guess the only real advice I can give after all that is if you like the body the PT has and that's what you want, he may be the right guy for you.


Mr Chips on 6th December 2023 at 15:49

Yes sir! I remember Longman's Audio Visual French and M. Jazy. It was, I think, way ahead of its time and made language learning fun. I also learned German and Latin and there was certainly no equivalent for German but we had some relatively light stuff for Latin which started out in Pompei and moved around the Roman Empire telling stories. I can't remember much about it other than the books were very bright colours.

Greg2 on 5th December 2023 at 19:52

It's a pity you had to leave your French home, life is so much more civilised here. For what it's worth, I've always believed that any country exports wine the locals don't want. When I first visited Australia, Australian wine was an revelation to me and nothing like anything I'd ever encountered in the UK. I remember an Aussie telling me they only exported the wine that wasn't good enough to wash the car with.

I guess unless you are paying absolutely premium prices, France is the same and of course there's very little duty on wine in France so it will always be much cheaper and better quality. I'm still amazed at what I can buy for less than €5.00.

When were you at school? I can't remember the first text book I used but about 1965 we had a new book called Nos Voisins Français. I still found it as dry as dust but it was a bit of a relief after the endless grammar that we had to teach up until then. From the early 1970s we had a new series of books, called Longman Audio Visual French and that was a huge improvement and concentrated much more on language use rather than rote learning. The lads started to learn better and faster and it was far more enjoyable to use than anything before it.

Does anyone remember un certain Monsieur Jazy if you used the book?

I only had to teach French literature including plays for A level, Andromaque et La Peste anyone?

I agree though that proficiency in one language can make the use of another easier. I also learned German as an adult but now I also have reasonable use of Greek, Italian and Spanish. The one that continuously defeats me is Portuguese but it has a lot of roots in Arabic rather than Latin.

You might be surprised how often schoolboy French comes good. As we are relatively close to the Roscoff ferry, I quite often have an old boy call on arrival there and they are often surprisingly proficient when they get here and while I'm happy to converse in English with them, they want to speak French to blow away the cobwebs and be ready for their trip - because as I'm sure you know, in the main, in France you speak French with no forgiveness for not doing.

I think my old boys must have been well taught ;-)

Original Andy on 5th December 2023 at 09:03

A question if I may please.

You talk of working with a PT in the gym, may I ask how you chose him and how successful you find it?

I've worked with a few over the years but never been really satisfied with them. They are keen to fill an hour with warm ups and cool downs which I can do on my own and then describe exercises and tell you what you need to improve them, if only they would demonstrate the exercise - because I'm a visual learner, I would get it right far more quickly. I've spent quite a bit of money but never been pleased with the results and often nothing much seems to change.

Any advice appreciated.