In 1927, when I was due to go to secondary school, my father was promoting an experiment in teaching at the Thebarton Technical High School on the use of the Dalton Plan for secondary education (see Chapter 14). The essence of this plan was that there was only one lesson a week in each subject and work for the rest of the week was set out in assignments and individual study at the student’s own pace. I enjoyed this and, as well as doing woodwork, sheet-metalwork and architectural drawing, I did several additional ‘academic’ subjects. Thebarton Technical High School (later called Thebarton Technical School) was a boys' school situated on the far side of town from our house, and I had to take two trams daily each way. I enjoyed travelling through the city and I liked school. The mode of teaching, involving considerable individual initiative, was a very good introduction for the type of teaching offered at the university, and I had none of the problems of school–university adjustment that were common among my contemporaries.

I passed the Leaving Certificate at the end of fourth year, with more subjects that were usually taken and several credits. I then went to Adelaide High School (then a co-educational school in the Grote Street, in the centre of Adelaide), in the hope and expectation that I might win one of the 12 University bursaries offered each year at the Leaving Honours examination. My experience was mortifying. The course concentrated on six subjects: Physics, Chemistry, Mathematics I, Mathematics II, English and French. I failed in mathematics but, like many other students, went back next year to try again for a bursary. The Great Depression was under way, my father's salary had been cut, and a bursary would have been a boon. Next year I passed all subjects with some credits, but again failed to win a bursary. I did not enjoy Adelaide High as well as ‘Thebby Teck’. The competition at the Leaving Honours level was substantial, since the class comprised the bulk of the students in the State whose parents could not afford to send them to one of the two élite private schools (St Peters and Prince Alfred Colleges) but who sought to gain a University bursary. The teaching consisted of a continuous series of lessons and practical work. Mathematics loomed large, in physics and chemistry as well as in maths itself, and although the maths teacher, ‘Doggy’ Nietz, was a good teacher, I had little intrinsic mathematical ability.