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Daily Timetable

Posted: Tue Jan 26, 2016 8:59 pm
by East Gun Copse
I've been trying to recall the timetable we had at CH in the 1950s. We seemed to fit a lot in and I can't recall how it was all scheduled. I recall being up promptly and at Th A it was cold baths except on Sundays. A parade for breakfast then back to the house or did we go straight to chapel? Presumably back to the house to get books and then I suppose two periods and back to house for PT at the back in winter and on the grass in the summer. Back for, was it another 2 periods and then at 12.15 back to the house for a break before lunch. After lunch we had games in the winter with another 2 periods in the afternoon afterwards. The sequence was reversed in summer. Then back to the house with tea to follow and then Prep at what time? Can anyone from that period who has less dementia that me, remember the actual times and how we fitted it all in. Of course it was all controlled by bells ringing.

Re: Daily Timetable

Posted: Wed Jan 27, 2016 9:02 am
by michael scuffil
I was next door in ThB, but that made one difference (see below)

6.55 get up (cold baths? I always thought that was a myth...)
7.25 breakfast
8.00 return to house for bedmaking (also surgery)
8.25 chapel (parade abolished 1956)
8.45 return to house to collect books (but not ThA or Pe -- who took their book to dining hall on way to chapel)
8.55 2 periods school
10.15 PT break
10.55 2 periods school
12.15 '12.15'
12.50 dinner parade
13.45 return to house
from 14.30 'activities'
16.30 2 hours school
17.45 return to house
17.55 tea parade
18.30 return to house (also surgery)
19.15 1st prep
19.50 duty followed by bedtime for LF/LE
20.15 2nd prep followed by bedtime UF/GE
20.50 3rd prep followed by bedtime deps/grecians
10.30 monitors' bedtime

Wednesdays and Saturdays were different as half-holidays (Mondays too in summer). No PT on half-holidays. Saturday longer chapel (practice); Wednesdays 5 lessons with shorter break.

This was the regime from (pre)1955 to 1963.

Re: Daily Timetable

Posted: Wed Jan 27, 2016 1:37 pm
by J.R.
Looks about right to me, Michael, though the mists of time have dimmed some recollections.

Re: Daily Timetable

Posted: Wed Jan 27, 2016 2:12 pm
by eucsgmrc
I'm very impressed that Michael can remember things with such precision. I couldn't have written that timetable down, but, now that I see it, every detail fits my recollections. Except possibly the evenings, which perhaps varied from house to house. I don't remember any third segment of prep in Col A.

Re: Daily Timetable

Posted: Wed Jan 27, 2016 5:15 pm
by michael scuffil
In the summer, Monday was a half-holiday, but its afternoon lessons were distributed between Monday and Friday mornings, so these were both 5-lesson mornings, like Wednesdays. PT was then only on Tuesday and Thursday.

Sunday

07.45 Get up (unless you'd already gone to Communion)
08.15 breakfast
08.45 return to house (in ThB, juniors had coat-cleaning)
09.15 Div Prep (or new-boy sessions with housemasters to talk about sex, religion and related matters)
10.00 - 10.45 chapel
13.00 dinner
14.00 - 16.00 HOOB
16.30 letter-writing (formal sit-down session)
18.00 tea
19.00 - 19.45 chapel
20.15 junior bedtime
21.00 senior bedtime
22.30 monitors' bedtime

From about 1960, there were senior and junior chapels, but not usually on the same Sunday. Junior chapel was usually in the morning, and senior chapel in the evening, with the other chapel being whole-school. Those not attending chapel had to do something quiet.

Re: Daily Timetable

Posted: Wed Jan 27, 2016 6:16 pm
by J.R.
michael scuffil wrote:In the summer, Monday was a half-holiday, but its afternoon lessons were distributed between Monday and Friday mornings, so these were both 5-lesson mornings, like Wednesdays. PT was then only on Tuesday and Thursday.

Sunday

07.45 Get up (unless you'd already gone to Communion)
08.15 breakfast
08.45 return to house (in ThB, juniors had coat-cleaning)
09.15 Div Prep (or new-boy sessions with housemasters to talk about sex, religion and related matters)
10.00 - 10.45 chapel
13.00 dinner
14.00 - 16.00 HOOB
16.30 letter-writing (formal sit-down session)
18.00 tea
19.00 - 19.45 chapel
20.15 junior bedtime
21.00 senior bedtime
22.30 monitors' bedtime

From about 1960, there were senior and junior chapels, but not usually on the same Sunday. Junior chapel was usually in the morning, and senior chapel in the evening, with the other chapel being whole-school. Those not attending chapel had to do something quiet.[
Not sure about that Michael.

I left Summer 1963 and I'm pretty sure Chapel was for one and all. Maybe C.M.E.S. changed it after that time.

Re: Daily Timetable

Posted: Thu Jan 28, 2016 11:21 am
by michael scuffil
Your memory fails you, John. I left in 1963 too, and senior and junior chapels had been going for at least the whole time I'd been a senior.

Re: Daily Timetable

Posted: Thu Jan 28, 2016 2:43 pm
by LongGone
Ah, the PT break. I often wonder what the classrooms smelled like after all those sweaty, unwashed, boys came back afterwards. At the time I was unaware of any odour, but then I was part of the problem.

Re: Daily Timetable

Posted: Thu Jan 28, 2016 3:50 pm
by DavidRawlins
The same pattern was followed from 1946, except 3rd prep.
Col A had shoe cleaning (and inspection) before first prep.

Re: Daily Timetable

Posted: Thu Jan 28, 2016 4:41 pm
by Kit Bartlett
If it was raining there was a signal given , probably by Sergeant Fielder the Headmaster's orderly, on the Big school of three chimes times three to indicate No P.T. I remember the joyous acclaim given in the classrooms to this.
If there was to be no shoe cleaning inspection the cry was given of "shoes in holes", another popular decision.
Messages used to be passed down the Dining Hall tables giving instructions such as "House in Day Room immediately afterwards ", usually abbreviated
to Hidia or summoning a named boy to do something. On one occasion in Coleridge A a boy named Hillier misinterpreted this to mean that he was required to report somewhere.

Re: Daily Timetable

Posted: Thu Jan 28, 2016 4:47 pm
by sejintenej
To follow up on David Rawlin's submission, in Col A we had evening prayers overseen (usually) by Kit immediately before 1st Prep. Bedtime for monitors was somewhat fluid, 10.30 not being really enforced - exhaustion and early mornings ruled. Having written that I was usually studying for several hours after monitors' "bedtime" and well before 6.55am.
Another note; Tuesday afternoons were also HOOB, "hobbies" being enforced.

Re: Daily Timetable

Posted: Thu Jan 28, 2016 6:49 pm
by michael scuffil
I suppose rained-off PT was usually expected, but I imagine it wasn't popular with teachers who had 10 minutes chopped off their break (especially if they weren't prepared). It did very occasionally happen that it started raining just after 10.15 -- that, of course, was great. In the Great Freeze in the Lent Term of 1963, there was no PT. But I can't recall whether there was any extra school or not. Certainly no more than 10 minutes.

Morning breaks with PT were a terrible rush. Of all the unhygienic horrors at CH, mid-morning PT was the worst. In ThB, monitors changed in the lav-end they were responsible for, and this at least provided an opportunity for a bit of an all-over wash.

Sometime in my last year someone came up with the idea of moving PT to pre-breakfast, but the Doctor wouldn't hear of it.

Then along came Neil Simms, and PT as we knew it was consigned to the dustbin of history.

Re: Daily Timetable

Posted: Fri Jan 29, 2016 1:50 am
by menace2
Always had shower after pt

Re: Daily Timetable

Posted: Fri Jan 29, 2016 11:33 am
by East Gun Copse
I'm impressed by Michael's detailed memory, puts mine to shame. Cold Baths were not myths in Thornton A while 'Fred' Hazelhurst ran it. Monitors would inspect towels to check they were damp. The 'old soldiers' would splash a bit of water on the towel but most ran the gauntlet of the bath. One bath filled and everyone queued up at the end to plunge in and get out before the next one came in. I never remember leaving books in the dining hall before chapel but I left in 1953 and that could be a subsequent change. One walked miles daily just between house, dining hall chapel and school apart from the other physical activities but I am reaping the dividend now as I get older and keep relatively fit in body if not in memory. I had forgotten about 'Duty' in the day room.

Re: Daily Timetable

Posted: Fri Jan 29, 2016 3:12 pm
by sejintenej
Kit Bartlett wrote: usually abbreviated
to Hidia or summoning a named boy to do something. On one occasion in Coleridge A a boy named Hillier misinterpreted this to mean that he was required to report somewhere.
ROTFL. Yes, I remember him