THE HAPPIEST DAYS

Press, Volume CXV, Issue 33804, 29 March 1975, Page 22

THE HAPPIEST DAYS

A little learning is a dangerous thing, we are told. Well, this is certainly true where school pupils are concerned. Especially at examination time. If examinations at school are generally taken, though, to mean external examinations then class tests may be regarded as holding even higher risk than these — for if things go wrong for the subject in a test the hour of retribution may not merely be at hand but only minutes away, and in the hand (in the old days) might be a pliable length of light bamboo. In the same old days class tests were often sprung, on the boys at the high school which comes to mind, rhe theory being that individual results arrived al this way would be a more reliable indicator of consistent learning than results found after due warning of the master's intention. Those whose

study habits embraced a dramatic burst of learning very late in the year in order to be ready for the grand examination while everything was still fresh in their mind, were cruelly cornered by the intervention of tests. As the 30-odd members of the class filed through the door they would hear the master reciting instructions in a continuous and repetitive stream which went on till all were seated. To comprehend, they could enter this flow at any point, departing after completion: “. . .ready. Test. Books off desk. Paper, pen, and ruler only. Start when. . .” On the way to their desks the subjects would look over then shoulder at the blackboard extensively chalked with questions. Depending on their degree of readiness they would view this displayof academic arrogance with dismay. resignation, or smugness. Those who were smug

were at the fop of the class. The rest called them “swots” because it was known that they learned without ever opening their books at home. Tests and examinations at secondary school stand out more clearly than those at primary school, but someone may recall writing the following Standard 5 genuine and certified answer to a question on the threefields system of fanning in the Middle Ages. “Crop rotatation is that if one year you have got peas fallow carrots hay and orchard well the next year you might have crop that you had peas in the fallow crop and in rhe pea crop you might have the fallow crop and then you might have carrots in the hay crop and the hay crop in the car rots crrtp so it goes on and on like that. The swamp and t.h< orchard stavs where r is." And so does the pupi in his class.