Figure 1.--This boy is walking to school in the morning. He attended a prep school which had strict rules avbout wearing the complete uniform on the way to and from school, in part to give a good impression of the school. |
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The way of getting to school in England varies somewhat by age and over time. Most English primary schools children walk to school. English primary schools are mostly neighborhood schools. The children walk from their house to the schools. We do not see large numbers of yellow school busses as in America. Metropolitan transport in many cities do have school runs. Most primary-age children ttending live wihin walking disance. Lolipop ladies commonly man major crossings. We are not sure just when that began. Children arriving early play in the school play yard. One modern approach for primary children is the Walking Bus. One teacher seeing a New Zealand Walking Bus writes, "An old idea. I used to run a walking bus from where I lived to the school in the UK between 1981 and 1989. Each day I walked to school and children would join me and quite soon I'd a little band of which I escorted.school. It had meeting points after a while as mums would let their children join the processions. The thing was I didn't know I was doing ground breaking things!" We also notice a walking bus in Serbia. Another English reader writes in 2009, "Our local primary school has a walking bus. The children's haversacks are carried in a supermarket trolly." Secondary schools have larger catchment areas which means many children live beyond walking disdtances. Many children used to ride bikes to school, but in the post-World War II era this began to decline as more parents purchased family cars and traffic increased. Quite a number of children use public transit (bus, subways, and trains), especially children going to private schools and/or secondaty schools. Many parents now drive their children to school. A British reader writes, "I remember from my school days that the wearing of the complete school uniform to and from school was standard in many British schools, both private and state. This is still the case in a few. At some schools the rule was more Draconian. No part of the school uniform could be worn out of hours unless the *complete* uniform was worn. It was all or nothing! If you wore your school blazer to Church you had to wear everything else."
Getting to school has changed over time. For primary children asttending stsate school there have not been a major change. They walk to work. There did have to be changes as traffic chnges, especcially as significan numbers of automobile began appearing on city streets. This gave rise to the lolipop lafies. There The major change is that after World War II (1939-45), England substantially expanded the secondatry system. This meant schools with large catchment areas. Meaning that many children for the first time were living beyond walking distance of their schools. Sone children rode bikes, but expnding street traffic made thast a less safe choice. Many metropolitan districts organized school runs with metropolitan busses fir school hours. Children also use subays and computer trains. Another change was that with the post war prosperity, especally with the Thatcher years, more English parents thsn ever before could afford cars. And we see more children thn ever before being driven to school. We do not see nearly as many large yellow chool busses as America, but many privare scools had small busses. Unlike stsate schools, most students ttending private dschools did not live in walking distance, both primary and secikndarychildren. We see bikr and the use of metripilitsnt transit. After Eitkd War friving cjhilften to chool bcme increasinglky common. Msny private schools were boarding schools meaning that there was not daily travel back anbd forth. By the end of the 20th centutryn, many private schools were expanding their day-student component many increasing issues with coming and going to school for the children.
The way of getting to school in England varies somewhat by age. Most English primary schools children walk to school. English primary schools are mostly neighborhood schools. The children walk from their house to the schools. Most primary children live wihin walking distance of the schools. Secondary schools have larger catchment areas which means many children live beyond walking disdtances. Many children used to ride bikes to school, but in the post-World War II era this began to decline as more parents purchased family cars and traffic increased. Quite a number of children use public transit (bus, subways, and trains), especially children going to private schools and/or secondaty schools. Many parents now drive their children to school. A British reader writes, "I remember from my school days that the wearing of the complete school uniform to and from school was standard in many British schools, both private and state. This is still the case in a few. At some schools the rule was more Draconian. No part of the school uniform could be worn out of hours unless the *complete* uniform was worn. It was all or nothing! If you wore your school blazer to Church you had to wear everything else."
A factor in going to school was traffic. Most English children walked to school, especially primary-age children. This traffic was a issue for these younger children. There were accidents before cars appeared on streets, but they were relatively rare, because horses and horse-drawn carriages did not go all that fast. The power of the horses and the condition of the streets limited speed. The autmobile changed that, both because of the speed of the cars and improvement of city steets. This began to create real hazzards for children, especially after World War I when we see more cars on the street. Britain was the European country with the highest level of car ownership. Car ownership was more limited than in America, but the highest in Europe. Which meant that parents had to become concerned about their younger children walking to school or riding their bikes. Even in Britain traffic was not heavy in the major cities because cars were still not widely owned. Working-class families could not aford cars and even many middle-class families did not have them. This did not behin to change wntil after World War II when car ownership began to increase on the Continent (only Western Europe) and Britain. It is at this time that Britain began to give more attention to traffic safety.
As in other countries, there are many ways of getting to school. The primary method of coming to school for primary children is walking. Most city children attend neighborhood primaries. The schools tend to be smaller than A,merican elementary schools. Quite a number of crossing guards help the children. They are called Lolipop Ladies in England. These Lolipop ladies commonly man the major crossings. We are not sure just when that began. We do not see large numbers of yellow school busses as in America. Children arriving early play in the school play yard. One modern approach for primary children is the Walking Bus. One teacher seeing a New Zealand Walking Bus writes, "An old idea. I used to run a walking bus from where I lived to the school in the UK between 1981 and 1989. Each day I walked to school and children would join me and quite soon I'd a little band of which I escorted.school. It had meeting points after a while as mums would let their children join the processions. The thing was I didn't know I was doing ground breaking things!" We also notice a walking bus in Serbia. Another English reader writes in 2009, "Our local primary school has a walking bus. The children's haversacks are carried in a supermarket trolly." Many children use metropolitant transit to come to school. Metropolitan transports in many cities do have school runs. Ths is commonly the case for secondary school students. While yellow school bussess are much less common than in America, we do see quite a number of smhaller busses. Many private schools have small bysses.
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