The Ragged School Museum

Yesterday I went to the Ragged School Museum in Mile End. It was fun. The Ragged School is a school that was built by Dr. Barnardo who came to London to study and become a doctor but was shocked by the living conditions in the East End of London.  Barnardo was born in Ireland 1845. He had his aim, to improve the conditions in London and to give the poor opportunities to have good jobs.

The living conditions in the East End were horrible. People lived in buildings called tenements where there would be up to 60 people sharing one outdoor toilet and tap. There was no NHS or free state school so it would be hard to stay healthy or to find a way out of poverty. Barnardo started the ragged schools for the children to be educated, and homes for them to live. Barnardo’s schools were open to everyone, girls and boys, black and white. This was very forward thinking at the time and very radical.

The East End of London was the very poor part of London that was very over crowded. It was hard children from poor families who could not write to improve their opportunities because they wouldn’t be able to get a job except from a badly paid hard working manual job.

The Ragged School was originally a warehouse and opened as a school in 1867. It is next to the Regent’s Canal. The aim was to educate the children so they could get a better job than a washerwoman or working down at the docks. They became call the Ragged Schools because the children's clothes were ragged.

Upstairs in the ragged school I got dressed up and had a real ragged school day with an actor acting as our teacher Miss Perkins who was very strict and had a cane, a back brace (the back brace would do the job of making sure you don’t slouch), finger stocks (they would make you stop fiddling), dunce hat (you would wear that if you got something wrong, it meant you were stupid) and she even made a left handed girl write with her right hand.

You can learn more about the Ragged School here.