BY MICHAEL BRESLIN

So, teachers are being advised by the Department of Education not to ask pupils to put their hands up when the class is asked a question. The reasoning behind a research paper appears to be that a shy or introvert child's hand won't feature in the forest of hands (some kids put up both hands) and lose out.

Recalling my own schooldays, my teacher would line us all around the room and the idea was whoever answered the question moved up one. Me and Patsy McGarvey, who were regarded as bright, enjoyed going to the back of the queue and see how far we could move up by the time the teacher had finished.

But, yes, the familiar, 'Hands up, who can tell me . . . . .?' format was more in vogue and, such was the fervour of the kids in the front seats to answer, that they adopted a supplicant pose, one would imagine, similar the woman who touched the hem of Our Lord's garment. Except, she did make contact. The teacher, or the pop idol always managed to keep their distance from contact.

So, did children in my time lose out, or any time?

It is most unlikely. In fact, later, at college in Derry, when the 'Hands up' routine no longer was practised, streetwise dayboys from deprived areas of the city who hadn't their homework done, got away in the smoke during random questioning. They were academically bright but lazy, their 'homework' time devoted to girls, . constantly

Now, if the 'Hands up' regime had been in force, and the teacher - as any good teacher would do - politely ignored the 'Mister, please Mister/Miss, Miss, please Miss' pleas, both the shy and our streetwise kids would have stuck out like sore thumbs.

As one highly-regarded retired Principal put it: "You would be aware of the good child who always answers and, because you were aware of that, you would make a point of picking children who rarely if ever put their hands up".

For good measure, he explained he would not do that in a fashion or with the intention of catching out the quiet ones; rather,he would do it to encourage them and bring them on: "In the course of a day, certainly a week,when it came to 'questions and answers', you would endeavour that everybody answered or was approached in some shape or form".

OK, you might get a teacher who was content to toss out the odd question or two from their chair and, on a good day, go around the class for people to read. But, they were rare, in every way. One of my old teachers who fell into that category had his room beside the Presdent's office so that he could be kept an eye on. Mornings, he would come into class bleary-eyed and smoked out and the last thing the poor man wanted was a forest of screeching kids prepared to give him an answer.

Usually, the smart alecs had their seats at the rear of the class but, his was the exception. They knew the craic would be good, right up close to him, save for the odd time he lost the rag and the strap came out.

'You'll go far', he would thunder,'in the wrong direction'.

I never liked him, simply because he was so inconsistent, for no other reason. Oh yes, strapping. The Education Secretary, Alan Johnston who announced the probable ban on the 'Hands up' routine, firmly rejected any notion of a return to corporal punishment. He claimed he had been 'adversely' affected by caning. He was then asked if he would condone 'a clip around the ear'. No, he didn't think that was right at all.

He was quoted as saying: 'I went through the kind of childhood where teachers were allowed to do barbaric things in terms of, you know, caning. I knew a teacher at primary school who used to cane you across the wrist rather than the hand".

He was then asked if he was affected by that experience: "Adversely, yes I am sure. Because it was an adult, someone in a position of authority being violent towards me".

Perhaps he has a point, but one would wonder if the teacher's aim wasn't all that it could have been. Perhaps they needed glasses or drying out.

But, yes, caning in primary school and strapping in college were bugbears and, even now 40 years on, I just can't rationalise the image of a priest in full soutane regalia, with the shoulder flaps and the hair flying all over the place, strapping some poor sod, with mouth contorted in pain and fear.

It wasn't edifying, particularly when, in the case of one man, he would insist you would be in his classroom the next morning.

He's dead now that man. He was a terrific Irish teacher, but it came with a temper. In his calmer moments, he would tell us how the family home was haunted and how, now and again, he would meet a figure going up the stairs with a revolving head.

But, 'Hands up, who can tell me . . . . .?', I am all for. It does isolate those who need encouragement. Why it took a high-powered government think tank to come up with what is, in effect, a silly proposal is par for the course.