My mother, Jean Shirley, who has died aged 91, became a teacher in her 30s after she had spent her 20s bringing up her young family. Most of her subsequent career was dedicated to Ashgate primary school in Derby.
She was born Jane Davidson in Dumbarton, near Glasgow, to Margaret, a housewife, and John Davidson, a butcher, but there were so many Janes in her class at Dumbarton Academy that she was renamed Jean, a name she kept. Although she was academically gifted, her family circumstances meant she had to leave school early, and for a number of years she worked as a secretary in a solicitor’s office.
