The British School In The Netherlands

The children attended school for the morning in Victorian style. They attended a traditional assembly separated by gender into groups of boys and girls. Snack time included no plastic or modern materials with coverings of brown paper for their bread and jam and glass bottles for drinks. In class, the boys and girls learned their times tables by heart and studied the poetry of Lord Tennyson.

During the day they had Victorian style music lessons and drill sessions in the playground. The School Inspector, Dr Coles, also asked each teacher how many buckets of coal they had used and was astounded to find that classes of 40 children were unusual. On his schedule were checks to ensure that the children understood pounds, shillings and pence and that the female teacher's hemlines covered their ankles!

Victorian Day forms an important part of the Year 6 topic this term and the children get a good idea of what school was like one hundred years or more ago.

Luckily the applications of the cane and dunces cap weren't as realistic as other aspects of the day!