Interview with Ceril Little, 13 May 2010

Abstract

Ceril went to primary school in Nottinghamshire where she was taught history by means of stories about figures like Robin Hood. She remembered a visit to Newstead Abbey in the last year of junior school where the emphasis was on tales of Lord Byron rather than the dissolution of monasteries. She passed the eleven plus and went to Sutton-in-Ashfield Girls’ Grammar School where the history teaching was chronological and taught by the teacher talking – no aids except textbooks. This teacher was inspiring and Ceril has met up with her several times over the last twenty years at school reunions. Trips with an element of history included ones to Southwell, Stratford-upon-Avon, and in the fifth year a long weekend in York. The school was small and everyone had to do history for O level. Ceril took history at A level as well , studying the sixteenth century – European as well as British. There were only four who took history A Level. Ceril considered doing history at university but eventually chose French which she taught. Later she became a primary school teacher. She felt the history she taught was fairly ‘bitty’ – a mixture of television programmes including How We Used To Live, trips, and reading storie