When education became compulsory in 1870 it was part of a system where someone stood at the front of a room and imparted knowledge and those listening had to learn from it. In many ways very little has changed unless you find pockets of expertise and people who are prepared to take risks.
Children today are used to information overload. They are surrounded by high-tech screens and fast and furious content coming at them from all directions. Therefore, is it any wonder that some of them switch off if day after day they are sitting in a neutral classroom with nothing to stimulate them?
When I started teaching, I could entertain a class of children with props and music. I ensured that every child understood the properties of 2d shapes simply with a piece of elastic and all my fraction lessons were based on songs. Nowadays children want every lesson to be all-singing, all-dancing and it is exhausting.
Where possible I took the children out; it might be a local walk, a trip to local from, an outing to a museum or a residential. Anything that got them out of the classroom and looking at the world around them was a bonus. Some of my favourite trips were re-enactment days where the children got to experience what life was like in a different period of time. We would go to Duxford Air Museum dressed as a 1940 school, the children all labelled up as evacuees and from the minute we exited our time machine (the coach), we were into World War II. The children met Edie, a 1940s housewife and learned all about rationing and living through the blitz.
Visiting a Prehistoric Experience was something completely different for the children, and whilst it taught them all about Ancient Britain, it also focused on encouraging children to use their imagination and helped improve their well-being. Visits like this would give the children the opportunity to learn and grow and become well-rounded citizens of the future.
It was clear that some children responded to their learning in a more optimistic and positive way which impacted greatly on their learning. By taking children out of their comfort zone we saw them in a very different light. Some, who were very sure of themselves in class, became quite quiet and reticent and needed support and encouragement from those around them, whilst others who seemed more timid, came out of themselves and were almost daredevils.
One of the highlights of being a Year 6 teacher, was getting to take the children away on a 5 day residential. I liked to organise these trips myself and arrange a wide variety of experiences for the children across the week. My favourite venue was North Wales but we also visited Whitby, Isle of Wight, Bournemouth, Swanage and North Devon, anywhere where there were lots of places to arrange day trips. The main focus for these visits was for the children to learn some independence. Many of our children were rather spoon-fed, so to have to organise themselves, plan their clothes and get all their equipment ready for the day was a new challenge. We were adamant that this was not a holiday and so the children had to take notes on the places they visited and put together a diary of their week away. This was the culmination of their Year 6 work. We became well-known around Snowdonia as ‘the school with red hats’ – long before all schools wore hats for quick identification. And parents would always comment on how their children grew up in the week they were away.
Obviously I took health and safety very seriously, but I didn’t let it stop me doing anything, we just did risk assessments. Life is about taking risks and children need to experience this – in a controlled, safe environment. It should be a part of growing up.
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