Chapter Nine

The Old Swinford Schools’ Curriculum [1860 – 1977]

Until the late nineteenth century children were almost exclusively taught Religious Instruction, Reading, Writing and Arithmetic. Later, more room was found in the curriculum for a greater range of subjects but the emphasis on the basic skills of Literacy and Numeracy has remained. Early schoolmasters and mistresses often used their ingenuity in introducing variety into the school day to avoid what must have been constant boredom for the children. In addition, for very many years a further subject, Needlework, dominated the lives of the children in the Girls’ Department.

Much of the writing was done on slates. Apart from desks and benches the classrooms were fairly plain with only a few maps and pictures of the reigning King or Queen to decorate the walls. Art has been taught from the earliest days but this originally only took the form of drawing, with lessons sometimes being given by the Stourbridge School of Art. In September 1865 the boys were engaged in drawing ‘A jug, a horse’s head sugar basin and coffee pot’. Singing was another important subject. This was often turned to as a stopgap when the master or mistress was temporarily absent or the light was too poor in the late winter afternoons to allow reading or needlework.

The difficulties posed by the English language exercised children’s minds in the 1860’s as they do today. On 12^th May 1864 Mr. Peak gave a lesson on the difference between ‘their’ and ‘there’. Mathematics or Numeracy has similarly endured as a source of grief to many. Mr. Peak’s entry in the Log of September 1864 has a modern ring to it ‘began to pay more attention to Mental Arithmetic’. At the very start the girls were less successful than boys in Arithmetic. A telling remark of Margaret Peak from January 1864 shows the low importance which was attached to teaching this to girls ‘I was obliged to let some of the girls have arithmetic this afternoon instead of sewing as they brought none’.

Even in the 1860’s there are references to the teaching of elementary Geography and History. Children were also often given ‘Object Lessons’ [the origin of the phrase still in use today]. These were an attempt to broaden the curriculum and sometimes to teach elementary Science. If possible the object would be brought into the classrooms e.g. a lump of coal. Otherwise a picture might be provided. The variety of objects chosen shows no coherent pattern. The Boys’ Department included coal, sheep, the porcupine, the hedgehog, the seal and the dog. Occasionally people who gave lectures or shows to the children for a small fee visited the school. One example was a Coventry silk weaver in November 1866 who gave ‘a descriptive lecture on the manufacture of Silk and Ribbons illustrated with specimens of raw and spun silks, also a very ingenious model of Ribbon Loom which gave the children a good idea of weaving’.

By the late nineteenth century the curriculum widened. Cookery was introduced for the girls and horticulture for the boys. In 1925 the Boy’s allotment gardens were lost on the sale of the land. A small school garden was established in the school grounds in September 1964 that was laid out and tended by the older children. Mr. Griffin, the Head at the time said ‘The prime object is to encourage the children’s interest in both Natural History and Horticulture’. As well as flowers there was a pond and a cold frame. No doubt Mr. Sutton, the Boys’ Head who had established the allotment gardens in 1898, would have heartily approved.

As the twentieth century progressed many other elements were being introduced into the curriculum including trips out of school of an educational nature.