"Middle middle one!"
Beat The Teacher was a children's gameshow made by the BBC and broadcast from 1984-88 (on the CBBC strand after it began in 1985), created by BBC Children's producer Clive Doig. It was presented by That's Life!'s Howard Stableford, then later by former Manfred Mann frontman Paul Jones (who went on to star in CBBC's Uncle Jack) and finally by Top of the Pops presenter Bruno Brookes.
The show pitted secondary age children against teachers in answering a series of general knowledge questions, logic puzzles, and observation tests, with successful answers giving them the opportunity to move rotating cubes on a board, in a large-size stand-up version of TicTacToe, or as it's more popularly known in the UK, Noughts and Crosses. The pattern of each cube went blank-nought-blank-cross, enabling tactical play for the sharp-minded.Completing a row enabled them to score points. Each player also had one opportunity to play a joker, reversing the squares on the board, and a sand timer was then activated to prevent the other player from using their joker within the same timeframe. There were various prizes on offer, including the likes of cameras and telescopes, equipment for the competing schools, and in the first series, even a trip to Alton Towers. There were also booby prizes, such as a Beat The Teacher failure mug (designed to embarrass losing teachers in the staffroom) and later, a pen or baseball cap.
The series aired four nights a week, with successful contestants able to return for subsequent editions, and there were also various 'champions' and even celebrity editions. In pitting children against adults, it was a precursor to Get Your Own Back and Are You Smarter than a 5th Grader?.
Beat The Teacher provides examples of:
- Adorably Precocious Child: Many of the contestants.
- Bratty Half-Pint: One or two of the contestants. Possibly. Even more in the audience.
- Consolation Prize: A mug, pen, or baseball cap for the loser.
- Cool Teacher: Some of the opposing contestants.
- Darker and Edgier: From 1987, the original titles and Mike Batt theme tune were replaced with a more aggressive theme by Martin Cook, accompanying a title sequence showing a scary teacher in mortar board and gown being chased by vengeful children across a paint-bespattered dark background, thoroughly unnerving any younger siblings who might be watching.
- Deer in the Headlights: A non-fiction example - various contestants and even audience members displayed the trope, once the camera was on them.
- Enthusiastic Newbie Teacher: Some of the opposing contestants.
- Later Instalment Weirdness: The later series added 'Supporter Questions', with the audience given a chance to answer multiple-choice questions on the contestants' behalf, and also video observation questions in the style of The Krypton Factor's Observation round. See also Darker and Edgier above.
- Replaced the Theme Tune: Mike Batt's original theme was replaced in 1987 with one by Martin Cook, accompanying a new opening title sequence.
- Revolving Door Casting: Three presenters in just four years.
- Stern Teacher: Some of the opposing contestants, to the extent you wondered how they got there.
- Stock Lateral Thinking Puzzle: There were often trick questions that required lateral thinking, such as "What were Nelson's last words at Waterloo?" Answer: He didn't die at Waterloo, he died ten years earlier at Trafalgar.
- Stock Puzzle: Lots, including examples of the Magic Square Puzzle, Riddle Me This, and the Train Problem.
- Stock Sound Effects. Also some Wacky Sound Effect, including—to announce the end of the contest - the same duck quack that would be used for Edd the Duck on CBBC a few years later.
- Studio Audience: Seated behind the contestants, with half the audience supporting each contestant, dressed in different-coloured sweatshirts marked with noughts or crosses. Mostly kids, but some adults too.
- Thing-O-Meter: A BBC Micro version measured responses to the 'Supporter Questions' in later editions.
