Spring is in the air, 1957

It is March in Bedford and amidst dashing out to pick some primroses Alice seems busier than ever.

The students have a series of exams at the end of the Spring Term and Alice has a heavy timetable as lessons continue with revision built-in. She still has to travel to Cambridge for the 'dissection' classes (Anatomy and Physiology was a key part of the curriculum) despite an impending English exam the following day, but she doesn't seem bothered by that at all. She talks about her hopes for subject choices in her final year and is enthusiastic to take a variety of options...except for Ballroom dance.
The games fixtures also continue and this week has proved very successful with wins in hockey and lacrosse and a draw in netball; Alice thought the Anstey students were really 'nice people' and enjoyed playing to win in glorious sunshine!

 Alice also had fun attending the Dramatic Society's production of 'Jonah and the Whale', although her asides (scribbled on the programme), suggest she and her friends were not a little distracted by the thespian students and that the humour in their observations clearly helped them to let off a little tension and steam.

Wry comments noted while watching the play

Second year timetable: Spring 1957

Teaching Practice and Christmas 1956

Alice is very busy with her teaching practice at the moment but hoping to get home for just one night to watch the original film of Oliver Twist which was first released in 1948 and produced by David Lean with Alec Guinness portraying Fagin.

Alice is working at a local village school in Harrold which she clearly loves, although not so happy about teaching P.E. in the snow. The social history is portrayed wonderfully with her astonishment that 8 children in one class still had to use a well to get their water.

It is apparent that Alice and her supervisor do not always get on, which must have made the teaching practice difficult at times.  She also mentions a new teacher who also doesn’t seem to fit in at the school who Alice feels sorry for.

Alice is looking forward to the Christmas Carol Service and there is a programme showing the Procession of Carols which would have been sung during the service.  She is then going on for coffee with her colleagues and music tutor, Mr  Thackray (who incidentally was appointed as the College’s first male lecturer in 1954) which she is looking forward to. The Christmas plays and pantomime are being rehearsed and seem to be coming on well with plenty of useful evidence for her teaching practice file.

Some aspects of student life don’t change; Alice has to ask her Dad for some money to pay her expenses and to buy some items she needs.

 

 

Drawing water from the well in the garden