UK Schooling/Ponderings about Hogwarts Colours (Was Re: UK Schooling)

[Susan Atherton]

<<GulPlum AKA Richard, who has just realised that if he's done his 
calculations correctly, he'd already left *university* by the time Susan 
was even born... (erk! old!)>>

Actually I'm forty five, I just pretend to be eighteen to impress strange people on Harry Potter newsgroups. ;D

LOL re-reading that sentence, I meant "strangers", not "people who are strange"...although on hpfgu...

Me: Btw, I'd put five galleons on that Richard has taped the CR HP thing and 
>is about to stick it on his website ;) that's not a hint if you haven't, 
>but it sounds so you!

Him: You owe me five Galleons. :-) I suggest you (and any other interested 
parties who haven't already done so) take a look at the OT-Chatter list, 
where I and a few others talked about the spoof last night.

Me again: Damn! ~counting out my Galleons~ now I'll have to save up for another month for my Firebolt. And also - hehe, you caved to the pressure re the spoof. Wuss ;)


Re: holiday homework...
Me: I must beg to differ, Richard. Since I just got out of the school system, 
>I regret to inform you that sadly, today's teachers are manic on homework :(
>
>Actually, this could be due to me attending a grammar school when I was in 
>high school, but we certainly had a fair whack of homework during the half 
>terms and end of terms (terms=semesters; half term=one week break about 
>half way through; end of term=two or three week break at Christmas and 
>Easter), usually revising for tests or coursework and the like.

Him: Ahh... But you appear to have misunderstood the question. :-) At issue was 
homework over the *summer* holidays, which you appear to accept doesn't 
happen on the whole for the (real world) general pupil population. 

Me: No no, I did mean the summer holidays too! I don't think I explained myself very well - I tend to write in streams of consciousness and when it's late I can't be bothered to check them over. Again, perhaps it was because I was in a grammar school (which Richard defined so elegantly - but then, I was minus eleven in 1973, so you have to give me some leeway with the history stuff!) ie - and I don't like saying this, because it makes me sound v.stuck up - a "clever" school, but we did get a fair bit of homework in *all* the holidays during 7-9, GCSE years, and A Levels. It was only generally as much as at Xmas and Easter though, so we just got more time to spread it over (ie 6wks rather than 2wks). However, in my summer between yr1 and yr2 of A Levels, I had to do 90% of my Psychology coursework over the holiday, to be finished up at school due to the pre-Xmas deadline. So sometimes there is, sometimes there isn't. ~shrug~ Guess it depends on subject, teacher and school.


On JKR as a teacher:
Me: JKR is more or less following the British school system (which, as an 
>ex-teacher I imagine she knows a fair bit about) and they should really be 
>doing coursework.

Him: Small point of precision here. JKR's teaching experience was in teaching 
English abroad, and then as a second language after her return to the UK. 
She was in the middle of preparing for UK teaching qualifications when the 
HP bandwagon started so she never actually got around to teaching in 
British schools. 

Me again: I actually didn't know she taught abroad, I'd just heard she was an English teacher at some point and it stuck in the back of my head. My general point was she might still keep an eye on the teaching system with more of an interest than any old mum, but thank you for clearing that up!


Re: the law-as-degree, law-as-profession thing:
I'm really only aiming this bit at Richard himself - huh! Did not know that - I thought you needed a Law degree to get into Law school. Eee, you learn something new every day, don't you?! PS - to anyone NOT from Yorkshire or Lancashire - I apologise for the "eeee". I'm glad no-one can hear me, because I sound like Neville Longbottom in real life, only less polished than he does in the movies. (Seriously. If you've never heard anyone from Burnley, trust me, he's polished as all get out.)

Richard again:
<snip Susan's recollections of years 9-10 curriculum>
There's a simpler way of putting that. :-) The fact of the matter is that 
it is a legal requirement to follow the full school curriculum until Year 
11 regardless of the choices of GCSEs. 

Me: ROTFL Yes, that would have been easier to say. I gotta stop posting in the middle of the night. ~checks watch~ Too late.

On grammar schools vs. comprehensives:

Richard: I'm sure that Susan will give us more about her own experiences, of how 
that system worked for her in practice... :-)

Me: ~falling over self to give you more about my own experiences of how that system worked for me in practice~ heehee. Nahhh, I think I've skated dangerously close to the OT line (close? Let's be honest, to quote Joey Tribbiani, the line is a dot to me) with all my reminisciences already!

As for your other questions, Lynda, Richard has answered them far more eloquently and succintly than I could ever hope to. And Louisa Brown, thanks for adding the Scottish system to our little discussion - oh, the new perspectiveness of it all :D

Louisa also said:
And where does her daughter go
to school? Just in a "English/Welsh/Northern Irish schooling system or
Scottish system?" way, not in a "I want to stalk her child" way. In case you
were worried....<g>

Me: I thought that was funny. Heehee.

Now to hopefully bring this post a bit back on-topic, and vaguely still in the manner of school and also movies, I was re-watching PS today and I finally put my finger on what's always bothered me about the Sorting (beyond the hat speaking out loud and W apparently coming before P in the alphabet, of course). 

During the scenes on the train and in the corridor, and during the welcome feast, every first year is wearing plain black robes, plain grey sweaters, and black ties with the Hogwarts crest on them. Later that night, we see Harry sitting at his window with Hedwig, and we pan over to him, over neatly folded sweaters with the Gryffindor stripes on, Gryffindor ties, and Gryffindor scarves, on each chair (I think we see Dean's, Harry's and Ron's). When we next see the kids, they also have Gryffindor patches on their robes. Now, here's my wondering - do we think each child bought a tie etc for each house, and then kept the only one they needed? (Making five outfits in all, including the generic one) Do we think their generic things change, either by "magic" (ie one minute they're plain, turn away, and then next thing they're Gryffindor) or by specifically house elves, prefects, McGonagall etc going round and changing them? And most of all, do we not think it would have been a much cooler effect to spend a bit less money on making the Hat talk, and maybe spend a bit on making the ties and sweaters suddenly morph into the right colours when the name of the house is called?

Just me? Probably.


Susan
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