A SMALL PIECE OF BRICK
The old Baginton fields special school was knocked down around thirty years ago. I visit the site occasionally like the return to Mandalay. Once I cycled through the old entrance, the sound of crunching gravel under the wheels as I turned in instantly took me back inside an old Bedford van. I was eight when I first went to this school. Just for a second I could see the old buildings. All that remains now is small bits of brick and concrete covered by grass. Nature is reclaiming its own. I once picked up a small piece of brick as a memento. This CD is an attempt to reassess the experience of special school both for me and others that went there and to look to join current debates on special schools. You’ll here the voices of former pupils Steve, Pam, Rose, John, Eric, Gill, Alison, Jullian, Phil, John and Alan also the voices of former teachers Hazel, Joyce and Dick.
Looking for a large scale map of the site on a visit to our local archive, I found they not only had the original 1951 plans but several large stacks of documents related to the school too. I even found some documents that related to me personally. There’s an introduction to the school written in 1953 in Education.
The friends of the palsied man in the Gospels were not to be deterred by any obstacles in their insistence that he should receive the best attention available and the result for him was complete healing. That same compelling concern has in recent years brought together the parents and friends of children suffering from the effects of cerebral palsy and has concentrated the light of publicity upon the problem of these unfortunate victims of a mysterious affliction, the causes of which are still the subject of conjecture and research with, so far, no very conclusive results. In Coventry, the ceaseless advocacy of their cause by the local branch of the Midland Spastic Association, together with the sympathetic concern of the Local Education Authority, have secured the establishment of a special school for physically handicapped children which includes a department specifically concerned with the special educational treatment of children suffering from the incapacitating effects of cerebral palsy. The school was opened for the reception of these children in October, 1951, and for the reception of children suffering from other physical handicaps in January, 1952. The total number on the roll is at the present time 97, 35 of whom are children suffering from varying degrees of cerebral palsy. This initial provision was in the nature of an experiment, for the reaction of these children to an entirely new environment away from the shelter and care of their own homes, and their response the company of other children, to an organised school life and a regular curriculum, coupled with daily physiotherapy and other remedial treatment, was an unknown quantity. The short experience of a year, and that a year of initial difficulties, constant development and fresh admissions, has proved the worth of such a project providing for all the needs of all the children in the authority’s area suffering from cerebral palsy.
I should say that the school came to accommodate all types of physical handicap and also some partially sighted
(Eric remembers layout of school)
(Rose remembers school layout)
Rose says it was a good school
Hazel describes her first impressions of the school (Hazel talks about buildings)
Getting there (Eric pick up in coaches)
The first day