This is second GRADE, not secondary school. When I went to elementary school (and dinosaurs walked the earth) it was SOP to ask a teacher, then go — if the classroom didn’t already have a bath adjoining it, which one school (which wasn’t particularly deluxe) had. Classes were 30 strong then. But to be sure, students were better behaved because severe misbehavior would get them paddled in the principal’s office, so bathroom was no big deal, a student would ask, go, then return, 99.999% of the time without incident.
In the old days, the teachers had the support of parents. If we got into trouble at school we were in worse trouble when we got home. These days the parents are a bigger problem than the kids. If a kid is disciplined at school, the parents are at school wanting to fight the teacher.
Not all teachers are stupid and belong to unions, and not all parents are good parents or homeschool teachers.
This year at a parents' meeting at our local HS two mothers got into a fight. The cops were called and they both went to jail and have been banned from school property.
I wonder how their kids behave at school!
When I went to elementary school in the 1950s, Sister took the entire class to the rest room. We went quietly in an orderly line, two by two. A certain number of us went in at a time, did what we were supposed to, and came out to get into the line that faced the way back to the classroom.
There was no nonsense tolerated, and we did what we were told. Not because we were threatened in any way but because we were raised to behave and to respect authority.
Oh, yeah, and there were usually about 30-40 kids in a classroom.