Woodside

Infants and Junior school memories are starting to get a bit fuzzy.  Time is flying by year by year but I have really fond memories of Woodside that I’d like to hang on to, so I thought I’d jot some stuff down.

This is a rather random mishmash of memories but I’ve tried to think about all the different senses combined with funny moments that I can remember.  Sometimes a particular smell, taste or sound might trigger a memory or have particular connotations.  Maybe some of you reading this will join me in my trip down memory lane, please add things I've forgotten in the comments section underneath!

Taste

Mr Jenkins walking around asking who wants extras, so eager was I in putting up my hand that I always seemed to end up with the skin on top of the custard!

I remember the plastic trays we had with separate compartments for dinner and pud.

It was all about smiley face potatoes and gypsy tart, yum!!

I remember a Dinner lady helped me to peel an orange and squirted it in my eye, I’d call that unsuccessful.

Cartons of creamy milk at break times in the infants.

Sponge cake with pink icing and hundreds & thousands on top – the ONLY thing I ate during the week at Arethusa.

I’m not sure if this should go under taste-but the time where I jokingly gestured throwing my bottle of drink in someone’s face (thinking the lid was secure), they ended up wearing ribena, I think I may have got in trouble for that one…

Smell

That school dinner smell as you waited eagerly in a line under the archways waiting to approach the lower school hall, with its long tables and little round stools attached. 

The smell of rubber plimsolls that you used to wear during PE which in infants was essentially jumping around in your vest and pants.

This is a bit unpleasant to put under smell but for some strange reason we visited a sewage farm on one of our school trips…I’ll let you use your imagination.

Although a much nicer smelling trip was the one to the Bodyshop factory!

Sound

Mrs Stanford’s squeaky shoes as we padded down the corridor behind her in single file giggling. 

The sound of Mr Rogers deep voice reading stories to us in assemblies.

The lilting notes of Mrs McMillan’s piano playing

The sound of Steel Pans takes me back to school instantly.  Walking past Woodside now sometimes you can hear that familiar sound waft out into the street as kids practice after school.  Occasionally in the summer I can hear it faintly from my garden if they are playing outside.

The noise of break times, everyone running, skipping, pushing, shoving, laughing. Shouting.  The whistle piercing into sudden silence, everyone standing as still as a statue.  Hearing yourself breathe awaiting instruction to go back to class.

The squeak of those plimsolls on the school hall floor during PE.

Roller Disco’s in the hall, attempting to dance and skate at the same time, I seem to remember a few injuries occurring at those!

Country dancing where I was always the man!! Although it did mean I got to wear jeans so I didn’t really mind…some things don’t change much.

I remember one day in my last year at Woodside one of our classroom windows got smashed with a ball during playtime, but it hadn’t quite broken.  We had to move the tables away from the window and sit away from it incase it shattered, but we could hear the glass cracking all through the lessons.

Mr Jenkins booming welsh accent, the man who somehow had the power to remember every single students name, including their parents and siblings, and still does if you happen to pass him in the street 20 years later, amazing!!

Sight

The orange sparkly floor in the lower school hall

Mr Jenkins cutting his tie in half during assembly – there was a moral to that story but I can’t remember what it was!

Mrs Daily was ambidextrous and could write back to front, upside down and any which way you can imagine, that was quite a sight!

One of the projects which sticks in my mind from juniors was the Snow Leopards.  We went to Chessington Zoo where at the time they had snow tigers, they were beautiful!  It was an exciting project where you had to plan an expedition and I remember doing a drawing of a leopard.

Touch

Rugby tackles! I remember our class had a Rugby coach come and give us Rugby lessons in PE and bizarrely I really enjoyed it! We even went offsite and played against another school.  I have visions of Matt Terry being tackled by Joshua who at the time was tiny and pretty much hanging onto Matts leg while he walked.

Playing Stuck in the mud and Kiss chase in the playground, also the game of how many people can sit on a bench on top of each other…

Receiving a crumpled envelope in your hand, all the way from Gambia in Africa, with letters from children at school there, our pen pals.  I still have one of these letters somewhere that I kept.

Sitting cross legged on the hard wooden floor of the hall, and then moving up to the benches when you got a bit older.

Mrs ‘Biscuit’ the scary dinner lady who squeezed every inch of breath out of your tiny body until you thought your bones might crunch – that was if you were well behaved…