MOBILE phones and hair gel were unheard of when Tom Smith was at school; the cane, on the other hand, was all too familiar to the backsides of the rule-breakers. Now Tom is reliving those days, only this time from the other side of the desk, and without the cane.

"We're trying to be as realistic as possible without over-stepping the mark," he says. "I've actually been shouting at the kids and I've been to town on a few, but we can't cane them or anything like that. So we have to use other deterrents, such as detentions and lines and isolation and things like that. We are disciplining the kids pretty well."

Tom, 54, is one of the teachers in the returning series of That'll Teach 'Em, Channel Four's attempt to see how the children of today would cope with the teaching methods of the past.

The first series took a class of academically gifted 16-year-olds back to the 1950s; the second series, which starts tonight, puts children through the secondary modern system of the 1960s, the schools aimed at turning the 11-plus failures into plumbers, builders and secretaries.

Tom, who teaches design technology at Shotton Hall School in Peterlee, gave up his summer holiday to take part in the televised experiment, but says he hasn't regretted it.

"I've missed the chance to go off somewhere, but this is a once-in-a-lifetime experience. Once I got into it, the filming was very, very tiring but very, very enjoyable. And it's an experience I'll never forget," he says.

Tom's own experience as a secondary modern pupil at Hesleden and Blackhall, then a steelworking apprentice before switching to teaching, made him an ideal candidate for the 1964 school, Hope Green, which is actually filmed in Buckinghamshire. He applied after seeing an advert asking for teachers who knew about old-style woodwork lessons.

He was worried about having TV cameras capturing everything he did, and feared there would be more larking about than learning.

"I thought it would have caused trouble, but I'm oblivious to the TV crew. They're not there, they're invisible. Before I took my first lesson I was a bit apprehensive, I thought it was going to be like an Ofsted inspection with people taking notes, but it's been excellent, very professional and it didn't bother me at all," he says.

The father-of-three acknowledges his teaching manner and techniques in the TV school are different to the ones he uses back at Shotton Hall, but denies it is being manipulated to create good TV.

"It was an unknown quantity. We were coming into this school and we're teaching children who we'd never met before, and it was like going into a brand new school again and finding out strengths, weaknesses and pin-pointing the ones who might cause a bit of havoc.

"This is very authentic, there are no two ways about that. We have a head teacher and they are actually doing CSE (Certificate of Secondary Education) courses."

Tom reckons today's youngsters lack the basic manipulation skills of those of the 1960s.

"Back in the 1960s we were given a lot more time; in technology today they go on a merry-go-round where they do a little bit of this and that, so really they don't get time to study woodwork.

"Years ago, students had the opportunity to do woodwork, metalwork and technical drawing; nowadays it's technology, resistant materials, graphics or some other subject like textiles, home economics or food technology.

"The National Curriculum has its advantages and disadvantages. I think there's a certain element of students in our schools now who have the ability to manipulate materials and are really good with their hands, but they haven't got any planning or thinking ability.

"I'm not being nasty in any way, but they would prefer go ahead and make things, but in technology they have to problem solve, they have to research and design before they go ahead and make things, and that's the difference. Before, the teacher directed them down the line and they went ahead and made it."

Tom left school at 15 and worked as an apprentice engineer and pattern-maker at South Durham Steel and Iron Company, then for British Steel. Redundancy in 1980 saw him go to Newcastle Polytechnic to train to be a teacher.

"I went around the long way, and it was when my children were young so it was also the hard way," he says.

But his experience has taught him the value of getting qualifications at school, which was just as important at the secondary moderns of the 1960s as it is today.

"There is a big, wide, nasty world out there beyond the school environment, and you need as many strings to your bow as you can possibly get. That's why you should concentrate on qualifications and skills before you leave school, because I've seen what can happen."

l That'll Teach 'Em starts on Channel Four tonight at 9pm