Burnley Grammar School

Comment by: Jack on 27th April 2024 at 16:40


"Comment by: Stuart on 27th April 2024 at 07:34
A boys grammar school near me still do cross country in the summer stripped to the waist (vests in winter). All the boys are bare chested, so it must be compulsory for ever class/run.



"........Excellent to hear this..........."

.........A normal activity being seen as exceptional now. From 1959-61 my grammar school put the boys out on the cross country in our bare chests all year round without a personal say on if we wished to cover or not. We obeyed the masters instructions to the letter and were only twelve, thirteen or fourteen years old........ It might seem quite abnormal now to be made to run like that outside in less than favourable conditions but they were trying to turn boys like me into men who had some stamina about us. It worked for the most part. Never heard a negative peep out of anyone about it.......


Why is it "excellent" to hear this?. You are now a man in your ?70s, why should what boys wear in 2024 concern you so much,, Jack?.

If I may say so, grammar school boys, always thought they were "better" than state schoolboys, and of course nobody complained, because as you have already told us "We obeyed the masters instructions to the letter ". That is why so many joined the Civil Service. They love obeying orders, even into middle age and beyond.

"Just obeying orders" is still the watchword in countries which do not welcome or value democracy. Better to think for yourself. I am very glad I wasn't grammar school yes-man fodder.

As regards "turning boys into men" - firefighters and policemen don't find it necessary to conduct their work without shirts on. Are they "boys" or "men"?

Well said Jack. A few more pro-bare chest physical education comments are welcome to hear, and compulsion is always the best way to deliver such outcomes. You shouldn't be scared of your own body!

Wearing a vest is almost the same as being shirtless. I'm not sure I can work your logic out there on that one Dave.

My comprehensive school gym kit was vests which were not worn much of the time. I think there is a clear difference. I've never heard of a single boy and no men have come on here bemoaning the fact that they were made to wear vests for gym class at school.

"Comment by: Mark on 27th April 2024 at 15:24
Dave you said - 'Being in a vest is almost shirtless. It is almost the same.'

Disagree with you here. Massive dfference. I like wearing a decent looking smart casual vest over summer because I'm slim to average size and going about like that on the best days is comfortable for me, but there is no way I would do the same things I do wearing a vest, such as going around shops etc if I was completely shirtless and I wouldn't wish to do so, I would feel different and maybe judged more. I save that for the garden mostly."

I meant wearing a vest or being shirtless is almost the same for PE and intensive exercise. Going to a store or to other places in every day life is a very different thing. What is the purpose of vests for PE? Well they are far better than T-shirt for exrercices and much better choice by a PE teacher but what is the function for any shirt for very intensive exersice for PE?

Comment by: Stuart on 27th April 2024 at 07:34
A boys grammar school near me still do cross country in the summer stripped to the waist (vests in winter). All the boys are bare chested, so it must be compulsory for ever class/run.



Excellent to hear this.

A normal activity being seen as exceptional now. From 1959-61 my grammar school put the boys out on the cross country in our bare chests all year round without a personal say on if we wished to cover or not. We obeyed the masters instructions to the letter and were only twelve, thirteen or fourteen years old. We were saved from the coldest days and only did the milder ones but it was still damned fresh as we ran sometimes. Boys bodies in those days did not contain much excess fat content, we were all quite thin really with marathon runner type shapes before filling out. It might seem quite abnormal now to be made to run like that outside in less than favourable conditions but they were trying to turn boys like me into men who had some stamina about us. It worked for the most part. Never heard a negative peep out of anyone about it. Inside the school gymnasium it was the regular standard to always go bare chests too at all times while I was at grammar school.

Dave you said - 'Being in a vest is almost shirtless. It is almost the same.'

Disagree with you here. Massive dfference. I like wearing a decent looking smart casual vest over summer because I'm slim to average size and going about like that on the best days is comfortable for me, but there is no way I would do the same things I do wearing a vest, such as going around shops etc if I was completely shirtless and I wouldn't wish to do so, I would feel different and maybe judged more. I save that for the garden mostly.

Wes - 23/04 2247

I went to school in the late 60's/early 70's - and when we changed for PE/cross country we always had to line up in kit waiting for permission to enter the gym or start the run. Again in full view of the rest of the school.

Our PE kit was only white shorts (no shirts, bare feet), and our cross country kit was white shorts, plimsolls (no shirts/vests - even in winter).

I don't think anyone actually hated this all, anyway it was "normal" for the whole school and we had no choice.

Ross - 25/04 1747

A boys grammar school near me still do cross country in the summer stripped to the waist (vests in winter). All the boys are bare chested, so it must be compulsory for ever class/run

Comment by: Gavin on 26th April 2024 at 22:46

"Stella.

Gosh if my gym teacher had made me perform for anyone doing some PE I'd have been very reticent about it no matter what I was wearing but if he whipped our normal PE kit off our backs and told us to get out there for all the old folks and prance around stripped to the waist I think I'd have feigned sickness and run to the loo and locked the door. Actually I don't think I would have needed to feign sickness, my tummy would be on a churn for real......."

You later accuse yourself of sounding "wet", Gavin, but you are not - I think you are expressing what MOST ordinary lads would have felt. Nor do I think Stella sounds like an over-protective mother. Apart from teachers who teach practical subjects - I.T and the like, so many PE teachers want to take us back to the 40s - the 1840s - when their word was law and everybody just without question obeyed their whims and fancies. Teachers, if they so wish, can live in the world as it was - not as it is. The world of Michael Redgrave in The Browning Version of 70 or more years ago.


Comment by: James on 25th April 2024 at 19:44


"Charles, Thanks for your interest. I absolutely agree with your point about vests, far better off bare chested.......



One question, Jim: WHY??


You go on to say: "......"My dad also had me fight in "private" fights, probably illegal, but for cash which was very short when my elder sisters and I were growing up. These fights were arranged at different sites, farms or somewhere quiet and out of the way of the authorities. I've no recollection of how the bouts were agreed, dad would announce on a Sunday morning I'd be fighting whoever in a month......"

There is no doubt that was - and remains - illegal, and frankly borders on child abuse. Sorry to be so blunt, but you could have suffered brain injuries, or even death. My family were not exactly rolling in it, but I would never have been cajoled or forced into doing something risky, or against my will.

I entirely agree with Giles and others on here who think that it was entirely inappropriate for PE teachers to force boxing on to young kids (or rugby come to that, but that is a discussion for another day) - two sports which carry the highest risk of really serious, permanent injury.

I am not going at you here, but I get really fed up keep reading bare chested fanatics thinking that we should all feel the same way. I am forever repeating, and will again, that if you want to take part so (un)attired that is fine and you should be free to do so, but for those boys and men who find it uncomfortable, then their wishes should be taken into account, and respected. It is sad youngish teachers like Nathan on here still demand it, especially as he claims to put the mental welfare of his pupils so highly. He doesn't, he pays lip service to the concept. A bit of PR for the teaching profession. The truth is a great many schools (the majority of state schools?) these days do not enforce bare chested PE on boys. That he chooses to do so is deplorable, especially as he now knows that a minority of his lads are not happy with it.

It has been commented that wearing a vest is better than being shirtless for PE. What is the real difference? Being in a vest is almost shirtless. It is almost the same.

Stella.

Gosh if my gym teacher had made me perform for anyone doing some PE I'd have been very reticent about it no matter what I was wearing but if he whipped our normal PE kit off our backs and told us to get out there for all the old folks and prance around stripped to the waist I think I'd have feigned sickness and run to the loo and locked the door. Actually I don't think I would have needed to feign sickness, my tummy would be on a churn for real. I couldn't care less if other boys wanted to do that shirtless though, good on them, but it wouldn't have been for me at all and one thing teacher taking his 'private' gym lesson like that but I kind of agree with you on the vests there, not really the thing to make boys perform shirtless for parents if they are not into that.

That probably makes me sound a bit wet I know, but that's my honest personal opinion speaking for myself. I was at school in the eighties and nineties.

Comment by: Ray on 26th April 2024 at 20:33

On that girls and hell comment from Chris A - 'So my parents wrote a letter asking if I could wear a tee shirt or a vest for PE and my trainers and when I handed it to my PE teacher he just laughed at me and screwed it up and told me not to waste his time. We showered naked too but I knew that was impossible to get out of so didn't even try to get out of that. We shared with girls once a week and that was hell.'




I don't think Chris actually meant he was made to share the showers with girls, just the PE lesson. I think everyone has a different pain/hell threshold don't they. It could have been something significant or it could have been next to nothing but if it plays on the mind then that's enough I suppose.

Don't most boys in their teens get a bit coy if shirtless in front of a girl or girls, unless on a beach maybe. I think the actual place you are doing so counts for a lot too.

Chris A, you said "We shared with girls once a week and that was hell."

Why? Did the girls do anything that made it hell?

Quoting Stella on 24th April.

"Was I just being a silly over protective mother here do you think?"


I think so Stella. It sounded quite like you were the embarrassed one there to me a bit, you got caught unawares by your son and his class coming into the hall in their shirtless state when you didn't expect that, yet you did also seem to say your son was not obviously concerned by this. Also you mentioned their faces but that could also just be concentrating hard more than anything else. I had fear about doing all this kind of thing at school but it went almost immediatley I actually did shirtless (in PE) and naked stuff (showers) in the changing room, although I never had to do any PE stuff in front of a bunch of our parents like that.

Just a note on the boxing that's been mentioned. No such thing ever took place at my school and I must concur with others and say that I consider that a specialist activity suited to a very small minority and not something that should be forced upon unwilling participants. Often boxing is used to channel the energies of those boys who fall off the rails a bit to direct themselves away from trouble into something a bit more constructive. Mostly regular lads, even the sporting ones have no interest in it. School should not be a place to encourage boys to hit each other, even with boxing gloves on, and I see no learning to defend yourself argument about it either.

I don't think boxing was ever a feature of PE in normal state comprehensive schools was it, or would have been allowed to take place?

I was always up for most things but boxing, nope would not have liked a teacher telling me to start punching my mates about in the school gym. Some of the rougher lads saved that for the school lunch hour or just outside the school gates!

The writer and actor John Cleese taught at a preparatory school for two years at the end of the 1950s. He recalled that the headmaster under whom he worked ended boxing, to the relief of all, because he was moved by boys objecting to punching their friends.

I am dead set against boxing taking place in schools PE ever since I was at a grammar school in the late 1960's where I did boxing on perhaps three occasions very much not wishing to start taking lumps out of others or getting punched myself. The first time we did it we all paired up across the gym and were encouraged to start jabbing with each other. It was quite tame on that occasion but the next couple of times got a lot more serious and some real knocking about took place and I don't seem to remember there being any head guards protecting us. Because of this they stopped doing it while I was there in my final year in 1970 when someone was sent into a seizure and fitted on the floor during PE when boxing was taking place in the gym.

If you really want to box then make use of a private gym to do so, don't attempt to make all boys do this.

Charles, Thanks for your interest. I absolutely agree with your point about vests, far better off bare cheated.
I started to learn when I was 8 (mum wanted me to cope with bullies) but didn't fight until I was 9. I wasn't anything special but gave things a go. Boxing was part of PE and it mandatory for everyone who didn't wear glasses until you turned 10 then you could do rugby instead. At school we had inter house competitions reffed only by PE teachers. One of the female PE teachers was a fully qualified first aider and she knew her stuff. Bouts were drawn by names from a hat by those taking part and we were very much barechested in the ring
These were held in the gym and your full year group, boys and girls, watching. We also competed against local schools which had it's moments.
My dad also had me fight in "private" fights, probably illegal, but for cash which was very short when my elder sisters and I were growing up. These fights were arranged at different sites, farms or somewhere quiet and out of the way of the authorities. I've no recollection of how the bouts were agreed, dad would announce on a Sunday morning I'd be fighting whoever in a month.
The afternoon or evening would usually feature 4 bouts and most of the time you were against someone your own age or fairly close to it where possible. For lads aged 9-12 it was 3 70 second rounds, From 13 it increased to 2 mins per round but the length of the fight could be 4-6 rounds depending on what had been agreed beforehand but it was all unregulated. I also recall grudge matches with lads actually fighting for a girls attention/affection Whether or not it ever worked out or was a fleeting romance I haven't a clue. Hope this gives an idea.

In the few weeks since I followed up on Bill's observations of seeing a group of shirtless runners near a school in Dunstable a few months ago I have been doing some wider research as a journalist for an article I may write in the near future into the increase in this running style lately, aka the 'bareskin running craze'.

As part of this research I might as well stick a comment on here because I'm interested to know just how prevalent this really was in the past within schools or whether it was nothing more than isolated instances of the practice, such as taking the school cross country out like this, and whether these were voluntary arrangements or not where they took place.

I'm also quite interested to know if anyone has any other current examples such as Bill identified and I was able to follow up and confirm back in February, and thanks again to you Bill for your repsonse to me on that.

I'm also trying to determine if the whole shirtless male scenario might be under threat and if we are retreating to a situation where it will no longer become as acceptable as it once was, or whether this is not really the case at all, and finally why such a thing appears to be so contentious nowadays, especially if it takes place within a school for a PE lesson.

I'd be keen to hear from those of all views but am espcially interested in those on the extremes, those who found being shirtless a problem and those who found it a non issue completely.


I also have a planned and pending article on health and education which I might merge in with this about the demise of school showers and would welcome thoughts about this too if anyone would like to share anything from any point in time they went to school.


I am 37, from Luton and was very bare chest averse at school myself.

Comment by: Neil on 25th April 2024 at 11:27


"Why do you always have to take a pop at what was obviously Nathan even though you never mentioned him by name? He couldn't sound more reasonable to me if he tried. I think even you would probably enjoy his PE lessons if you found yourself in one, whether you were wearing a shirt or not........."

What makes you think that, Neil !?

Every teacher I ever knew, however superficially "nice" they seemed, was invariably a control freak. I certainly wouldn't have enjoyed his shirtless lessons.

I suspect, anyway, that his vote was a pointless gesture. I wonder if he would really have scrapped the shirtless nonsense if the poll had gone the other way?. I doubt it, but only he can tell you that.

James.

I always wanted to box as a youngster although my mum was always dead against it. I was hugely looking forward to moving to secondary school where I knew from the older boy next door, that it was part of the curriculum (this was the early 60’s) and there would be no question of my taking part – only boys wearing spectacles were exempt if I remember correctly – only to find that it had been abolished the year before I started. I was furious! And have wondered ever since what exactly it would have been like to take part and how I would have coped, far from being a really fit or sporty lad.

Where did you box – at school? I assume it wasn’t at an amateur boxing club as I believe they all had to be affiliated to the ABA, which required (completely unnecessarily in my opinion) vests to be worn.

I’d love to know all the details about how opponents were decided, the length and number of rounds, who and how bouts were refereed, etc, etc – all you can recall in as much detail as possible, please!

James,
In my final year at secondary, last lesson of the week was timetabled as Music/Boxing. I always opted for the easy option of sitting in the hall with a book listening to Classical music, and never once showed my face at Boxing, but as vests were always mandatory for PE, it was inevitably the same for Boxing.

When I boxed as a youngster the majority of boys went into the ring stripped to the waist and no one was surprised.

Why do you always have to take a pop at what was obviously Nathan even though you never mentioned him by name? He couldn't sound more reasonable to me if he tried. I think even you would probably enjoy his PE lessons if you found yourself in one, whether you were wearing a shirt or not. He got an overwhelmingly positive response to his query on shirtless PE with three quarters thinking it was fine, that's a big chunk in any binary vote. Can you ever imagine one of our own PE teachers in our day even thinking about asking such a question never mind actually doing it. Actually, if you had been in his class there would you have been prpeared to accept the outcome to any choice before the vote was taken and then accepted it fully after the result came back even if you were on that minority?

Comment by: Stella on 24th April 2024 at 22:44


"A parent's viewpoint on PE and the kids doing it without shirts......

......We went along to see our thirteen year old son take part in a gym display in his school sports hall in 1992.
Now I always remember my initial reaction while we were sat there as the pupils at his school filed in, the girls arrived in a lot of leotards or short sleeved tops and shorts but it was all the boys that I noticed. None of them were wearing the PE vest I expected to see on them. Not one, including my own son. Only white shorts and a bare chest. I don't know why I was so surprised but I was and I made comment to my husband about it. He didn't say too much about it. As I watched them doing their display, which was impressive from many of them and very physical at times, I noticed a number of them looking like they would prefer not to be there and a bit glum with strained faces.

When he came home and we spoke over dinner that night and talked about what we'd seen, we congratulated our son on being so good but I did ask him if that was the way he usually did school PE and he told us no, that a lot of the time they wore vests in PE and only sometimes didn't and that their teacher had simply decided they would look best presented to the parents for the school second years gym display all the same in bare chests and it had been compelled on them all and done that way on purpose........"

O share your view, Stella.
The thing is, if these obsessed PE teachers had ever seen any PT (as they call them) displays put on by the Army, RAF or even the Royal Marines, they will see they all, to a man, wear a singlet. The days of military bare chested displays ended decades ago. But hey, some schoolteachers still think it is 1945.


Why do they do it?. Several reasons. Mainly it is power - they insist on it because they can. We have a current PE teacher on this board. In one of his early posts he contradicted a man who had written that shirtless PE was "a thing of the past". "Not in my school it isn't" he announced, almost triumphantly, I thought, and told us he would conduct a shirtless class the next morning. Later we had a frankly piss-poor excuse that it was conducted in this manner so the muscleculture of the lads could be checked. Why? - how often does it change?

Then you have the "discipline" fetishists who thinks that it makes the boys realise that they are subordinate to "sir" - perhaps, most probably, a sign of the inferiority complex of the teacher concerned. I doubt that is a success - out of school, over the years, we have had Spivs, Smash & Grabbers, Teddy Boys, Skinheads, Bovver boys, football hooligans and today's various graffiti and drill rap gangs - and worse, who are perhaps rebelling from this post war "discipline" still being inflicted - a reaction to the methods of the 20th century still being applied in the first quarter of the 21st century. So much for old fashioned school discipline. Girls are treated much more gently at school, and, on the whole, there are far fewer social problems with the female sex.

Finally (and it happened in my school, sadly) you have the homosexual teacher who is just a little too interested in boys bodies. Mine was so interested he took great pains to ensure that, as we got older, he would minutely "supervise" the showers religiously. He got so close he got splashed sometimes. Sadly, with the probable advent of a new "progressive" government we will have even more of this latter sort.

A parent's viewpoint on PE and the kids doing it without shirts.

We went along to see our thirteen year old son take part in a gym display in his school sports hall in 1992. I think at the time it was meant to have taken place outside but because of poor weather was taken indoors at the last minute. The building was huge and there was plenty of room so it seemed to make little obvious difference to us at the time. All around the edges seating had been set out for rather a lot of parents like us.

My son never used to say a lot about school and I used to have to drag information out of him about what he was getting up to and learning.

I remember looking forward to this event because at home he liked climbing the tree in our garden and we had a rope hanging from a high branch which he often climbed up to sit in the tree. We had a large long garden. We still do and the tree is still there. He ate his greens and seemed quite a strong active child for his age I thought.

Now I always remember my initial reaction while we were sat there as the pupils at his school filed in, the girls arrived in a lot of leotards or short sleeved tops and shorts but it was all the boys that I noticed. None of them were wearing the PE vest I expected to see on them. Not one, including my own son. Only white shorts and a bare chest. I don't know why I was so surprised but I was and I made comment to my husband about it. He didn't say too much about it. As I watched them doing their display, which was impressive from many of them and very physical at times, I noticed a number of them looking like they would prefer not to be there and a bit glum with strained faces.

When he came home and we spoke over dinner that night and talked about what we'd seen, we congratulated our son on being so good but I did ask him if that was the way he usually did school PE and he told us no, that a lot of the time they wore vests in PE and only sometimes didn't and that their teacher had simply decided they would look best presented to the parents for the school second years gym display all the same in bare chests and it had been compelled on them all and done that way on purpose. I remember a mum sat next to me saying she'd not expected her son to be confident enough to take part like that. I wasn't sure quite how she meant it but I became instinctively less comfortable about what I watched from some of them whose body language gave them away I thought. Not our son though. They looked good and did very well but I think on balance it was nicer if they'd put the vest on for us.

Was I just being a silly over protective mother here do you think?

Comment by: Wes on 23rd April 2024 at 22:47




"On days when I didn't have PE and passed the gym going to other classes I never ever saw any girls lined up to go in the gym, their teachers didn't seem to make them do that but it was common to see a waiting class of boys standing along the wall just in navy shorts, no top, in line waiting to go into the school gym loitering in the public corridor where all teaching staff, admin staff and other pupils would be passing by frequently.......



........I think secondary schools attempted to knock the modesty out of even the shyest boys didn't they. If there was any way most of us could finish up PE without doing the showers then we would make sure of it but this was the exception rather than the rule and there was always at least one, if not two eagle eyed PE teachers looking over the whole class like guards in a watchtower to make sure everyone stripped off and got in. I think communal showers are awkward as hell at school even for confdent boys. Who can seriously say they relished such things?"

I think it was even more than knocking modesty out of us, Wes - it was a deliberate (and sadly successful) attempt to humiliate. The people who yearn for the bad old days, are ;probably the same people who long for National Service to come back, are probably the same people who would run like a stag if they were called up themselves.

Which brings me to:

Comment by: Sean on 23rd April 2024 at 20:23


"But Nathan made it very clear weeks ago when he did that survey that all those boys accepted the decision that came out of his survey, so while there may have been a handful per PE group who were not keen on that result he got they did accept it, and that's how it should be, otherwise why bother with doing it at all."

Indeed - why bother doing it at all, when it seems clear that Nathan approves of shirtless PE as he makes his own pupils undertake it?. He knows there are some lads who don't like it, but he imagines a few warm reassuring words will "cure" them. That is why I said yesterday that he should have been a politician. He listens with the utmost courtesy, but nothing changes and he allows an old system to continue, and ignores what is in front of him. If school has any value at all it should be about today and tomorrow - not yesterday. We need teachers who accept that the world of 2024, and the people in it, is a lot different to the world of 1959, when the header photo was taken. That was the world of conscription and conformity, but it is not now, is it?. Damn it, some people seem to think that working from home is their right now - that would have been unthinkable even 10 years ago..

The fact that he is a comparatively young teacher makes it even more disappointing that he still has the mindset of a teacher of forty years ago, however much he suggests he understands child psychology.

When I was at school, and I'm 48 now, the gym PE was shorts and no t-shirt and no socks. We used to have to all line up like this in the school public corridor before PE where all comers could just walk past us while we waited to get into the gym.

One measly pair of dark navy short and nothing else was worn. Many of us used to dislike going shirtless for PE, worried about what we looked like at that age. I was paranoid about the size of my chest measurement and biceps for example and when I was 15 I'd convinced myself I still had the body of the average twelve year old for some reason.

On days when I didn't have PE and passed the gym going to other classes I never ever saw any girls lined up to go in the gym, their teachers didn't seem to make them do that but it was common to see a waiting class of boys standing along the wall just in navy shorts, no top, in line waiting to go into the school gym loitering in the public corridor where all teaching staff, admin staff and other pupils would be passing by frequently.

It was even worse when we went swimming. The school had a modest sized outdoor pool. We had to hang about in reception in our swimming trunks to be taken out to the pool. It just all felt so awkward and come to think of it now looking back there was no real need for all this hanging about at all like we did.

I think secondary schools attempted to knock the modesty out of even the shyest boys didn't they. If there was any way most of us could finish up PE without doing the showers then we would make sure of it but this was the exception rather than the rule and there was always at least one, if not two eagle eyed PE teachers looking over the whole class like guards in a watchtower to make sure everyone stripped off and got in. I think communal showers are awkward as hell at school even for confdent boys. Who can seriously say they relished such things?

But Nathan made it very clear weeks ago when he did that survey that all those boys accepted the decision that came out of his survey, so while there may have been a handful per PE group who were not keen on that result he got they did accept it, and that's how it should be, otherwise why bother with doing it at all.

Comment by: Nathan Hind on 21st April 2024 at 22:19




"Chris A. I've never had such a letter, but if I was to receive one then I would receive it sympathetically, have a chat with that pupil, maybe also the parents who sent the letter, and be prepared to accept such a request. I would never be dismissive in that manner. From my point of view the potential issue could become a fellow pupils one, youngsters don't tend to like it when one person in a class is seen to get special treatment. I refer you to the Mark Twyford comment left here on 18th February this year and the power of peer pressure in school...."

Nathan, this hardly applies in your own school though, does it?. According to your poll, there were 5/6 boys in each class who felt less comfortable shirtless, so there wouldn't just be an odd one out. Why not allow those lads to feel more comfortable by wearing shirts?. The others who prefer to work without would not have any grounds to feel hard done by.

It seems common sense, to me, but due to your endorsement of Thomas' remarks ("......I note what you also said Thomas and think you are along the right lines there....."), I put it you that you are, in fact, biased towards shirtless PE which is one of the reasons you make your lads take part in it from time to time, and probably the reason the vote was so heavily in favour. Some lads are notorious people pleasers You should have been a politician.


Comment by: Neil on 22nd April 2024 at 17:49


"....Alan, do you write on any other forums on this subject?..."

No, Neil, I don't, but even a cursory reading of this board will tell you there are many others who think like I do.

Comment by: A Yorkshiredad on 8th April 2024 at 10:21
On the point of school showers, I do not know of any primary school that requires them. Pre-pubescent boys simply do not sweat that much, I have never seen a boy "soaked in sweat" in one of my PE classes. To require showers in primary schools would simply be odd.




Hi, A Yorkshiredad. I presume you are/were a teacher of some sort.

When I was at middle school from the age of nine upwards we had to make use of the communal shower plus provided soap that my school had back at the time there after just about every PE lesson going and it was compulsory to do it fully naked in a small and quite narrow but long oblong shaped white and dark blue tiled area with lines of showerheads high up down both sides so that if you stood in the middle you could get a burst from two at once. We all went in at once and it was a bit of a squeeze for something like 16 to 18 boys. This was in 1973 - 76. Like you say at that age, I rarely remember being at all sweaty after PE in my middle school, or particularly dirty at any time, but we still had to go in the showers after PE and wash and soap down properly until the teacher was satisfied. I can still remember how incredibly nervous many of us felt about it the first time. "Seeing" other boys like that proved nerve wracking initially but also interesting in some way.

As a subtext to this memory, for some reason there were a couple of occasions when the school matron, a rather round and overweight middle aged woman, would supervise us doing this. I have no idea why this must have been, perhaps there was some discreet observance health reason for it but after such a long time I have no idea. The normal man who used to take middle school PE with us always supervised us and made sure we behaved and in particular for some reason I recall him making sure we dried ourselves properly before dressing.

So by the time I attended secondary school such things had already become second nature, lessening the impact that others must have felt who didn't do the showers thing at middle school. I thought this was the norm at that age back then and only latterly realised that only a fraction of middle schools ever asked the class to do showers after PE, and mine was one.

And like many write on here of their secondary school and grammar experiences of PE, at my middle school the boys did PE in our bare chests and feet, beside girls in the main hall. Girls obviously took a shower separately but we could always hear them in ther own changing room and I suppose they could hear us too.

But when I went to secondary school in the late 70's I did less bare chested PE than I did at middle school, just the skins against shirts basketball springs to mind and maybe some indoor football and the occasional fitness tests like timed press ups and the like were done like that. Showers never stopped being compulsory though. The imagery plays in my mind quite clearly from those days and so do some of the sounds.