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I heard part of Benjamin Britten's Ceremony of Carols on the radio the other day and it took me straight back to the festering season at the dreaded Manning.   Manning held a service of Less

Re maths teaching, earlier post; The only use for higher mathematics is to be able to teach somebody else higher mathematics.  (Bertrand Russell).

I don't know Jill well enough to be able to recognise her by any leg features.

4 minutes ago, MelissaJKelly said:

Completely different to the Manning I went to on Robins Wood Road!

Was that the school next to Aspley Wood special school Melissa ? Think I've mentioned this before, my sister in law was in Manning same time as you. B.

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8 hours ago, Cliff Ton said:

came across this photo recently, and it hasn't appeared previously on here. At a guess it's the main entrance to Manning.

Correct CT. It's the entrance to the Admin Block. Head's office to the left, medical/viva voce examination room first window on the right, remaining windows on right are those of the school office. First storey windows are those of the needle work room and senior library

 

Only the sixth form used this entrance. Below that, it was used only by latecomers who were locked out of the side entrances. The deputy head, Colthorpe, lurked behind the doors and would write down names of those who dared be tardy, along with the reason. The result was always detention.

 

Just looking at it makes me feel ill!

 

The rear entrance was far less salubrious.

 

What became the Manning in later years was the old Peveril School building on Robinswood Road.

 

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On 6/25/2019 at 10:35 AM, Beekay said:

Was that the school next to Aspley Wood special school Melissa ? Think I've mentioned this before, my sister in law was in Manning same time as you. B.

 

Don't think I remember you saying Beekay. But yes that's the school. I was there in 2004 and left in 2009 

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34 minutes ago, MelissaJKelly said:

 

Don't think I remember you saying Beekay. But yes that's the school. I was there in 2004 and left in 2009 

Apologies profusely Melissa, got the wrong person. It was Jill Sparrow. You are way too young. My sister in law was at school back in the late 60s. My wife and i were/are lifetime vice presidents of Aspley Wood school. Didn't the school next door used to be Pevril school before Manning, or have I got that wrong also.

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5 hours ago, Beekay said:

. Didn't the school next door used to be Pevril school before Manning, or have I got that wrong also.

Yes, it did, Beekay. I don't know when the changeover occurred. My older sister attended Peveril from 1961 to 1966. Both buildings now gone.

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The Manning site on Gregory Boulevard is now occupied by a gym/swimming pool on part of the admin block and upper quad footprint. Djanogly Academy was built over the tennis courts and hockey field. Pickleface would turn puce but she probably haunts the gym. If I'd been more successful with my javelin that day in 1972, she'd have started her spectral career much earlier!

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  • 5 months later...
On 8/27/2018 at 8:13 AM, JAquino said:

My mother attended from Canada around 1953-54.

Found her old photo album, trying to upload photo but says its too big.

If your mother was Diane Haxby from Saskatoon, I have quite vivid memories of her joining our class for a few months. She appeared to us ' frumps' as very glamorous. - tall, good looking with immaculate blonde hair and so confident. I think she was at least a year older than us and managed to make our grey shirts and tunics look stylish. My particular memory is of her standing up when a new teacher came to take class, placing her fingers tips firmly on the desk, pushing up her sleeves (that became the mannerism for all of us to copy) and introducing herself, spelling out her surname so there was no mistake. 

Hope life treated her well.  Chris

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Welcome to NS, Berrima.  From your description of the uniform, you were at Manning before my time. I have a number of friends who were there in the 50s and some of the staff would have been there over both our tenures...Miss Long, for instance.

 

I would be interested to hear  your memories of the place.

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  • 2 months later...

What year did you start at Manning Jill? Is the colleen Mrs Davy? Did you really hate it so much and did you feel that the education was below par? You certainly seem to have benefitted from the English lessons, you write very well.

It will be interesting to know when you were there.

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Welcome Pitstop.  I commenced my sentence at Manning in September 1969.

 

Yes, indeed, Mrs Davy. One of a kind. I wouldn't like to think there was another lurking anywhere.

 

It would be fair to say I hated The Manning. In fact, it would be something of an understatement! Yet, I'm not alone in those sentiments. I know of no one who liked the place. Perhaps you are the exception that proves the rule?

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Am I correct in assuming that Manning was created as a sort of Female version of High Pavement?  HP was of course a Co-Ed school at some point, around the 1930s I think.   I know we had some strong associations, and useter occasionally draft in Manning Girls to play female parts in school plays, but I don't know the full story.

I recall one afternoon leaving the changing rooms at the HP Bestwood site.  That was next to the Gym and the showers... and it had the unmistakeable smell of male sweat, rarely washed sports kit..etc.  I was only a first year, so I wasn't yet fully 'engaged' with the female of the species.. so when a rather attractive girl in Manning uniform confronted me, I was rather overwhelmed.. She was in the litle 'porch' between the outside, and the HP Gym. She fixed me with an unconquerable gaze and asked. 'Would you please close that door?'

'That door', was of course the door into the changing rooms/showers.  Whatever romantic or other associations she had with the school,.. she really didn't deserve to confront that smell... so I complied.

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Manning was indeed the female equivalent of High Pavement. For those unwary souls who passed their 11 plus in my day, the choice was Mundella, Bluecoat (church attendance was mandatory) or Manning (girls)/ High Pavement (boys). By 1969, FFGS was no longer an option. 

 

Manning opened around 1931 and was always a single sex school. At sixth form level, there were joint productions each year of Gilbert and Sullivan with High Pavement but, other than that, no young males were ever seen on our premises. Male teachers were very few. Girls were encouraged by many of the staff in a condescending and patronising attitude towards males, being informed that they were basically a waste of time whose only purpose was to distract us from making academic progress and tell us we were inferior. I do, to an extent, applaud that sentiment and still believe that single sex schools are a beneficial arrangement. Many, I know, will disagree.

 

I never visited High Pavement but if it boasted showers, it was more fortunate than Manning. All we had were footbaths!

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I was a 'young male' c1960, and well remember being in Manning as one of the inter-sixth form society, as an HP pupil.  Most uneventful, but I did end up married to an old girl, and still am, 52 years later. 

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Jill, there was certainly a debating society, but whether it was restricted to just 6th Form I don't recall.  The only societies I joined were the Science Society and the Jazz Record Club.  A friend and I had to seek special permission to attend the Jazz Club as we were only lowly Third Formers, but it was there that I first heard the true range of talent possessed by Ray Charles.. IMHO, the greatest 'all around' popular musician of the 20th C.  I was only familiar with a couple of his chart hits, and ignorant of his huge output in Jazz, R&B, Blues, Country, Gospel, Soul..... but I digress...

 

I've been doing a bit of research in my copy of 'High Pavement Remembered'.. and it seems that the school was  always 'co-ed'.. from 1788.. pretty much until the creation of Manning.

 

Your mention of what sounds like a pretty extreme 'early feminist' world view as inculcated by Manning, is rather at odds with the generally respectful view of all humanity which was engendered in HP., under the leadership of Harry 'Taff' Davies.. a truly great Headmaster and Educationalist, who went on to become Emeritus Professor of Education at the University of Nottm.  That said, as I recall.. the only females on site at HP were a couple of office staff and some canteen staff.  There was never a female teacher in my day.

 

Harry Davies was committed to the idea of the Grammar School, as a way of giving opportunity to 'mainly working class' boys, but he was keen to make their education as wide as possible and to include 'culture' in its widest sense.  A long way from the mechanistic 'hoop jumping' regime which is so spectacularly failing much of our current youth.

 

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A boy could leave HP with a top Oxbridge scholarship, but he was a failure in his Headmaster's eyes if he wasn't interested in music, art, architecture, the theatre, books, the sciences, politics, girls, family and neighbourhood and the rest of mankind.

 

On those terms and despite my relative lack of of success in the career, wealth and fame dept..I think  he succeeded with me.

A determined opponent could I suppose construct  a fake argument around homophobia because old Taff wished his boys to be interested in Girls, but given his times, I suggest we can forgive him.

 

You also expressed envy for the fact that HP (Bestwood) had changing rooms.  I can see that.  There's no doubt that by the standards of the times, HP Bestwood was exceptionally well equipped.  It was after all built around 1955,  ( fairly) hot on the heels of Atlee's 1944 Education Act.  When I was there, we were told the school was designed to accomodate 600 boys, but by 1960 had 800+ (Some things never change) That said I was never conscious of overcrowding, shortage of teaching space etc., apart from the odd lesson in the hall, or on the stage.

 

I was very excited by the place when I started.  Apart from plain old classrooms, some of which were largely adopted as bases by certain subject heads, we had the following:

Separate Junior and Senior school libraries

Separate and very well equipped woodwork and 'Metalwork' shops. Metalwork in particular had machine tools, (lathes, shapers, milling machines, saws etc.) plus a fully equipped forge, with every tool the blacksmith or Farrier could wish for, plus both arc and gas welding kit.

Separate Junior and Senior labs for the three main sciences, each with their 'assistants' room/store.  Each 'station' in the labs, had the basic kit needed for all kinds of experiments, with the rest being provided as and when by Lab Assistants.

A 'Science Lecture Theatre'.

A decent sized hall, with a well equipped stage including lights, curtains and whatever the rest of the stuff is called.

A good sized 'tarmac' yard.

Tennis Courts.

A proper bike shed.

A well equipped Gym, with all the usual 'apparatus', plus  all of the stuff for Rugby, Cricket, Hockey and Track and Field sports.

Large playing fields, on three levels and overlooking much of Nottm.

Extensive grounds connecting all of the above.

 

I went to an open evening, shortly before the place was demolished.  With an old classmate I walked the corridors and soaked up the memories.  We finished up out on the playing fields on a glorious Summer evening and were both deeply affected by the view and the atmosphere that we'd no longer be able to see in quite the same way.  I've commented elsewhere here, about the particlar soft light and atmosphere which seems unique to Nottm at the height of Summer.  I still haven't worked out whether it is  real...or some sort of emotional response to 'home'.

 

At least the builders of the housing which inevitably replaced the HP site, put the names of notable teachers from HP as street names, so some of my old teachers will exist in the general consciousness for a little longer. I hope they do the same on the old Padstow Secondary site, which is I believe up for  'development' and has even better views.

 

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We did have changing rooms: gym changing room, games changing room and a space at the rear of the hall where we changed for dance. The footbaths were opposite this space, at the rear of the hall. Cold water only. No soap!

 

Manning had no mod cons and no state of the art equipment, apart from a tv which more often than not didn't work. It was, basically, as it had been built in 1930/1 during my time there.

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  • 3 months later...

Reading recollections of maths teachers at ACHS and the difficulty in recruiting same, made me think Manning must have been scraping the underside of the maths teacher barrel when they appointed one of ours, whom I usually refer to as Barmy Colleen.

 

Mrs Davy was a disgrace to the teaching profession and should have been permitted nowhere near a school. Whether, in her younger days, she had been capable of educating her charges in the mysteries of mathematics I do not know but of one thing I am certain: by the time we encountered her in September 1970, any pedagogical prowess she may once have possessed had been replaced by sarcasm, vitriol, violent temper and, not infrequently, the unpredictable, bizarre behaviour of someone on the verge of being sectioned.

During our first year at Manning, we were taught mathematics by a Miss Scott: a fairly young, bespectacled, bookish lady whose skill in communicating her subject was faultless. A reasonable, calm, cheerful individual whom we all liked. Sadly, in the second year, she was no longer timetabled to teach us and we fell into the volatile clutches of Mrs Davy.

Apart from covering the board and our exercise books with indecipherable red inked scrawl that would not have disgraced a gin-soaked arachnid who had succeeded in clambering out of an inkwell, this woman was entirely capable of wasting a double maths period haranguing her pupils on subjects as diverse as potato famines, the heinous treatment of the Irish by the English and the certainty that every Protestant was destined to burn in Hell. Not exactly what she was supposed to be doing!

On days when she was in a less garrulous frame of mind, she employed the time by heaving chalk sticks, wooden-handled board dusters, exercise books, hardbacked copies of The Schools' Mathematics Project, together with anything else not securely nailed down, at the heads of those she was being paid to teach.

I have described a typical Davy maths lesson elsewhere on this forum and I know many are convinced I invented it but I assure you, every word was true.

One of our number, Kathryn Jayne Smith, hailed from Ragdale Road in Bulwell. She was a good friend of mine. Kathryn was, I now realise, dyslexic although no one on the teaching staff seemed to recognise her problem at the time. She involuntarily transposed her letters which made English written work very difficult for her but she was a brilliant mathematician.

Kathryn, like others who were gifted in maths, grew angry and frustrated not only at Davy's antics but also with her apparent shortcomings in the subject. Kathryn had long confided to me that the virtually unintelligible workings out and answers with which Davy covered the board were actually incorrect. We obtained a copy of the SMP answerbook which quickly proved Kathryn's suspicions to be well founded.

I shall never forget the day my friend stood up in class and uttered the immortal words, "Mrs Davy, that isn't the right answer!"

Our old wooden desks with their hinged slopes were not, I'm sure, designed to be used as shields but were it not for their defensive properties, most of us would probably have had our heads knocked off in the positive fusilade of missiles she launched that afternoon! She went, literally, ballistic. This type of behaviour wasn't uncommon, yet one would encounter her in the corridor 45 minutes later and receive a smile and a nod in passing, as though she had no recollection of having screamed abuse at you earlier. I marvelled at the fact that no one ever came to investigate what was going on when she started ranting, raving and throwing things around.

The fearsome head mistresses Miss Harding and Miss Lighten were before my time at The Manning but, from what I've heard, I have no doubt they would have dealt with Mrs Davy in the most appropriate manner, ie gathered her up by the scruff of the neck, frogmarched her down the front steps of the Admin Block, across the tennis courts, through the gate and deposited the baggage in the middle of Gregory Boulevard with an admonition not to darken the door again!

I know for a fact there were complaints lodged about Davy by parents who were very concerned on hearing their daughters' descriptions of what transpired during her lessons.

Sadly, she got away with it and continued to waste both the time and educational prospects of the girls in her charge for some years after I escaped. Whatever the pittance they paid her, (another of her favourite rants) she wasn't worth it!

Mrs Davy will now be deceased. I'm not given to speaking ill of the dead but the above is nothing I wouldn't say to her face were I to meet her in the street. With hindsight, perhaps she was bipolar. Who knows? Perchance, she had her own demons. Who hasn't? The difference is that when you are employed in a professional capacity, you don't take them to work with you and make everyone else's life an unmitigated misery.

Most of us quickly cottoned on to the realisation that we weren't going to learn much about maths with this woman and became naturally wary of her. Sad to say, we regarded her as a joke and her lessons were notable only for their entertainment value.

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I was never very good at maths. I became an accountant but apart from addition, subtraction, multiplication and division which I learnt at primary school I never came across any of the more advanced maths we were taught at grammar school. I've never seen a quadratic equation since I left school. A knowledge of Ohm's law and Newton's laws of motion usually solve most problems!

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I've long held the view that there really ought to be a distinction made between what might be called 'Practical Mathematics' and 'Unneccessary For Most People Mathematics'.

 

I freely profess to being appallingly bad at Mathematics and I'm convinced that somewhere along the way I missed something.  I was very near the top of the class in Primary, mostly because I was good at doing what used to be called 'Problems'. I was also OK at basic Arithmetic and Geometry.  But, when I got to High Pavement I quickly got out of my depth and oddly, being embarrassed about my poor Maths made me less inclined to ask for help.. whereas being very confident in the Sciences and in English, I always felt confident that any question, or request for clarification was reasonable and so wasn't embarrassed.. 

However, in retrospect it must have been obvious to all that I was struggling.. yet no additional help or 'remedial' stuff was ever offered.  Anyway.. I digress.

 

Working as a Scientific Technical Officer Grade 4 (Almost the lowest of the low..) at the NCB Cinderhill labs, I was never required to do anything but add subtract multiply divide and simple percentages.  I don't think anyone else was either. Yet, despite having plenty of science O levels, I was denied access to ONC Chemistry on Day Release/Night School due to having no O level Maths and eventually gave up on a scientific career as progress was based almost entirely on exam passes.

 

As a general observation.. I'd say that many.. if not all those who have attempted to teach me Maths over my lifetime, have suffered from the same problem as IT types.  They start by speaking to you in a foreign language about a subject you are already srruggling with. and then wonder why you don't follow their 'logic'.

 

Throughout my life, I've got away with my pretty poor skills, adding in Ohms Law, and the whatever name is given to Watts = Volts x Amps, plus a bit of simple geometry.   I had a minor wobble at Uni in the 80s when I was forced to do Statistics in Year 1and only just 'winged it'. .. but apart from some stuff I chose to use in a report ( Spearman's Rank Correllation or Spearman's 'Rho') plus some percentages.. 30 years in Career Guidance never troubled me on the Maths front.

 

 

 

 

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