By the 1980s, attitudes were changing rapidly.
Corporal punishment disappeared from British state schools in 1987, although the legal position differed for some independent schools for a further period.
The old classroom slipper consequently began disappearing too.
Desk drawers that had once contained a battered plimsoll acquired more mundane contents.
Lost-property shoes returned to being simply lost-property shoes.
And a school tradition that had seemed permanent quietly passed into history.
The traditional school depended to a considerable extent upon trust. A headmaster or housemaster was expected to exercise judgement....
The days slipped by quickly at Highdon School. Within a fortnight, the new first-year boys had settled into Ash...
The question of corporal punishment in British schools remains a subject of considerable debate. While it is difficult to...
Truancy was regarded considerably more seriously than ordinary classroom misbehaviour. The reason is obvious. The pupil had deliberately removed...
Although corporal punishment was once common throughout Britain, there was never a single set of rules followed by every...
Looking back over the many recollections gathered together, one thing becomes immediately clear. There was never a single answer...
Accounts from former pupils across Britain reveal the extent to which corporal punishment formed part of everyday school life...
The surviving punishment register from Catford Central School for Boys, London, England, provides a rare opportunity to examine the...
