Wimps and Tyrants

My infant school teacher, Miss Osborne, was nice enough. Plump and pretty, although a little bit wimpish. One playtime, as we were all lined up ready to go into class, she was stung on the neck by a wasp and screamed so loudly that all us little children burst into tears. It didn’t help that after the initial ear piercing scream Miss Osborne ran around the playground flapping her arms in the air and crying hysterically. We were all shocked and scared and, worryingly, I don’t recall ever seeing her again after this incident. Maybe she was ashamed of causing us all trauma and was too embarrassed to face us again or maybe she died of anaphylactic shock.
Female primary school teachers in those days were either wimps or tyrants. Lots of them seemed to burst into tears for no real reason. Miss Ramsbottom, another infant teacher cried more than any of the children in her class and another tearful teacher (this time in the juniors) actually ran out of the class crying and we all had to write her a letter of apology. 'Sorry Miss for making you cry. We won't do it again'.

There were more wimps than tyrants but in my final year at Junior school we had the tyrant of all tyrants…Miss R.

Miss R was in her late sixties (or maybe even her seventies) and she was a spinster with whiskers. She would sit at her desk with her legs apart giving everyone a view of the contraptions she used as underwear and the elastic bands holding up her stockings. It looked like she had some experiment going on between her legs with pulleys and straps. The elastic bands must have caused her a great deal of discomfort which may explain her pinched expression. Miss R wore tweed skirts and lace up brown brogues. In fact she was a caricature of a scary, grumpy old teacher. She would pinch and shake us and use the ruler for any minor infraction. Miss R was a stickler for neat hand writing, saying our prayers and selling us charity stamps, that when stuck onto a card the card, when filled, would buy us a little African child that we could then name. The child (you had a choice of boy or girl) naturally remained in Africa but he/she had the good fortune to be sponsored by a 10 year old in the UK who forsake their sweets for the sake of a stamp. I only ever managed to complete one card (not because sweets were more important to me, but because my mum was on a tight budget, so tight that pennies really did need to take care of themselves) and named my little African baby ‘Adrienne’ which was my favourite name at the time.


There were a couple of male teachers who didn’t fall into either camp. On the whole the male teachers were interesting, fun and able to control, with ease, a class of thirty children. Mr C and Mr L, both big Irish men with a sense of humour and an excellent control of their tear ducts were my favourites. Primary School would be a much better place if it wasn’t dominated by women.


http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2009/jul/12/primary-schools-male-teachers