General Chat

Rollo,
I was trained during the days of school certificate .when it came to 1950 we were told there was a change but it was more or less the same except they just gave you a pass or fail...instead of the grade of pass.
The O level was the same as school certificate and the A level was Higher school cert.
So When I started the High school and put in an A grade where we were taught Latin as well as French,it was to train for University and Latin was necessary then for University,I am talking long before this was relaxed.

I remember the year .it was a very significant year for me In every way.

In ‘The Story of Civilisation’ (by Will Durant 1885-1981), there is an interesting discussion on the origin of ‘words’ for, as the author intimated, ‘with words, man became man’.

‘Without those strange noises called common nouns, thought was limited to individual objects or sensorial experiences’.

To which the rejoinder is "I wasn't enquiring about your health"!

or another answer is "you're alright thanks" :-S

I get annoyed when I ask someone if they would like e.g. a drink.
The answer always seems to be "I'm good".
I have been known to reply "I wanted to know if you want a drink, I was not enquiring about your morals".

Well there you go then - no uni. could have been asking for A level anything in the 1940s.
Did you go to Manchester? The Victoria and UMIST were two of the very few places offering a high quality degree for working people.

I am sure that yr school encouraged studying Latin but UK universities did not demand anything beyond O level Latin unless reading classics/Greats. Even the medics didn't ask for Latin beyond O level. I was offered a place at UMIST in the 1960s and Latin was def. not required.I didn't take up the offer though.

There has been a resurgence of Latin in schools despite next to no encouragement from the DOfE. Now the DOfE is trying to kill off the subject by raising the bar too high.

Holts Hill School ?
fwiw two of my rellies were vice chancellors of northern universities post ww2.

Rollo I took my O levels in 1951 the first year and still have my certificates to prove it.
That was the year I went to Paris,just before my O levels.

IN November of the same year,I had a cancerous tumour removed from my parotid gland at the age of 16 and had radium needles....and still here to tell you.i do know my dates.

The last School certificate was in 1950.

There was no such thing as an "A" level or "O" level before 1951!

bob - careful!

'Free Fat' is not the same as 'Fat Free'. ;-)

How about...the only person to volunteer? Unique is another of my pet hates when it is used with "quite" "fairly" etc. It is either unique, or it ain't. I also dislike the use of "for free". Either "free", or "for nothing". But them I am rather old.

I don't really know how to put this without upsetting somebody but I have just read a piece of grammar that is used almost universally now but which still jars with me.

The only person who volunteers rather than that surely.

I'm sorry, it is just my personal bugbear and I am not trying to be superior, it digs me every time I see or hear it said and I am very well dug I can tell you.

I am sorry Rollo ...in my school in the 1940s it was a requirement....We were graded into classes In the 2nd year of High School.You went into Latin if you were university material.Then German and then Spanish then Commercial.

Maybe that was just for Manchester University, I don't know but my school was near there and I was there for the first year of O level...before that it was school certificate.
That's what we were told...pupils could upgrade if they showed later promise,but they had to take the Latin Exams....French was compulsory for everyone.

My parents weren't rich.My mother took in sewing to pay for my trip to Paris with school(where we had to wear our school uniform) in 1951 which was one of the first trips after the war.it cost her £26 for the week.!

"It def. "

"It was very important in my day...and to get into university you had to have an A level in Latin..""

It has never been a university requirement to hold an "A" level in Latin unless the student is applying to read Classics / Greats.

Way back in the day before the new universities were founded starting in the 1960s the choice lay between Oxbridge and a bunch of very traditional institutions ranging from Durham to Kings College and UMIST.

For a long time Oxbridge did not care whether the applicant had any A levels or not each college relying on its own idiosyncratic selection methods. Even when student grants were linked to A levels Oxbridge only asked for a minimum of two A levels any grade! A colleague of mine at school got in with two grade D and graduated with a first in Greats. One of my ancestors was at Cambridge in the C17 and he graduated before he was 20 no A levels .

Leaving aside Oxbridge the majority of unis from the 60s demanded a foreign language GSCE.

What is for sure is that lack of a fluent second language def. holds back job opportunities for those who can only offer English. This is a major factor in recruiting foreigners. Currently the hot tickets are Mandarin Chinese, Farsi and Spanish.

I recently ran the primary school grammar SAT tests against a dozen guys n girls wanting gopher contracts. Despite all being graduates only two passed both girls. (!)

It def. does not help that most of the population cannot tell the difference between vocational training and education. That especially applies to journalists and politicians..

Standards began to drop in the late 60's, when the idea that content was more important than spelling etc. was copied from America at about the time that the Americans decided it wasn't such a good idea after all!!

At the same time it was decided that children should learn at their own pace and not be forced to do things they didn't like - such as reading! :-( :-(

I had a friend whose daughter was at the local primary school, where the headmaster was very modern. Every day Mum would ask daughter what she had been doing at school and every day daughter answered "reading".

Knowing that the class had 30 pupils Mum asked whether all the children read every day. "Oh, no," said daughter, " when teacher asks who wants to come and read to her, I'm the only one that says Yes."

Another friend had a 9-year old son at the same school. He was supposed to be taking the 11-plus the following year and he couldn't read at all. Mum confronted the headmaster about this and was told not to worry - he'll learn when he's ready. :-0 :-0

I agree with you Andysmum.... A lot depends as well on their home life.
Parents used to take an interest in what they had done at school.Some probably still do.I certainly think standards have dropped over the last few years
I can't speak for everyone,but most children sat at the table to eat meals and chat about their day,showed you their homework etc.
I don't watch soap operas,but if I've flicked through channels and if life is like that children will get away with things we weren't allowed to.

I think it depends on the school, Brenda. Both my granddaughters had spelling tests and dictation once a week from the age of 5. I remember one of them learning to, too and two one week and putting them in simple sentences to show that they knew the meanings.

Their cousins, same town, different school, only started spelling and punctuation at about 9 or 10. It helps of course if the teacher is literate!!

Do they still have dictation in school?
It was very important in my day...and to get into university you had to have an A level in Latin...
Rollo ...I was referring to the ones on here who ,even though not as old as me,were taught in an age when we had some discipline.

"Words are the dress of thoughts, which should no more be presented in rags, tatters, and dirt, than your person should". (Earl of Chesterfield).

:-D

lol there are more things to worry about that's for sure, kindness is more important than grammar imho, and give me an honest person who drop's his aitches over a dishonest one who sounds his vowels correctly any day ;-)

The only 11plus question I remember ( it's a long time ago!) is naming the young of various animals, I can still do that :-)