The Primary Schools: The sausage is a cunning bird With feathers long and wavy; It swims about the frying pan And makes its nest in gravy

Newcastle's Primary School children, some 24 000 of them, attend 96 different primary schools, giving an average of 250 pupils per school. In common with the primary sector in most other local authority areas, the Newcastle intake enjoys the benefit of a relatively liberal primary education. Indeed, the employment of new ideas and methods of instruction has liberated them from much of the dog‐work that has bedevilled education in the city for so long. However, this is not always the case — for only since a short time ago (1967) has the totally reorganized secondary sector made its weight felt in Newcastle's primary schools. This, in turn, has occasioned a predictable re‐appraisal in those schools that were fed from predominant middle‐class areas.