My son and I are fans of the CBC show Back in Time for Winter. The show follows a modern day family as they recreate life in Canada through several different decades (1940s to 1990s).

In that spirit, I thought it would be fun to look back at the school supplies a typical Canadian student might have seen when back to school shopping in the 1970s. ​

In the early 1970s, older students would have been shopping for a slide ruler. Later in the decade, electronic calculators such as the TI-30 would become affordable. Do you have memories of shopping for school supplies in the 1970s? What was a cherished or wished for item that you had? 

During the 1970s and 1980s there seemed to be agreement between the big three Canadian pencil manufacturers about the proper color for a student pencil. These companies all had a jumbo (10mm or 13/32" diameter) pencil for the youngest students that were painted red: The Berol Alphabet No. 1, the Venus Primer Print 1 and the Dixon Primary Printer #1. The next sized jumbo pencil (8mm or 11/32" diameter) for slightly older students were all painted blue. These were the Berol Alphabet No. 2, the Venus Primer Print 2 and the Dixon Primary Printer #2. (I don't have the Berol yet to display here).