Back in Time for School

The 1960s (1x4)

Air date: Jan 24, 2019

In this episode, our time-travelling class arrives in 1960. With a brand new decade, comes a new school for our pupils - the secondary modern. Leaving behind the rigidity and formality of the postwar grammar, they are now training for a vocational future. As they experience more hands-on lessons than ever before, our modern students and teachers will find out whether the 60s were really so swinging, after all. Their first lesson sees the boys and girls separated once again for subjects deemed suitable for each. For the girls this means an introduction to typewriting, and for the boys, bricklaying. As the girls comes to terms with the challenges of carriage-returns and speed typing, to the fast pace of the William Tell overture, the boys attempt to tinkle and tease their way around a trowel, and building a simple wall presents a unique challenge for these modern pupils. In the secondary modern, though, there was no escaping the basics, as our class discover in maths. One of the few lessons in which boys and girls were mixed, there is widespread confusion as they try to master the complex art of the slide rule - no calculators here! Attempting to get to grips with this cutting-edge technology, they take some time out to prank the teacher and commit the age old trick of defacing the overhead projector. In 1963, there is rebellion brewing as the girls are told they will be cooking a meal in their very own purpose-built flat. Sampling the menu is their male teacher, acting as a stand-in husband. The recipes include an intoxicating mix of celery boats piped full of paprika and cream cheese, devilled eggs and kippers in butter. And if that is not enough to put them off their lunch, school dinner in the 1960s serves them a hearty 1,500-calorie meal of mince roly-poly, cabbage and mash, spotted dick and of course, the obligatory lumpy school custard. While the girls have been slaving in front of a hot stove, the boys have been learning a skill deemed crucial for mal