Fragments -- Peter Leyland
My Best and Worst School Trips For various reasons I couldn’t write my blog ahead of time this month so I turned once again to past articles that I’ve submitted to magazines which were never used. I was inspired to dig this one out by my recent visit to Vietnam, particularly the War Remnants Museum. The photograph is of a statue of two girls with a skipping rope at the museum’s entrance. I thought it was particularly appropriate to my subject which is the supervision of school children during the 70s and 80s. A colleague was taken ill at the last minute and I was asked to help out on a week-long trip to Leon Sur Mer in Normandy. I didn’t know any French so wondered what use I was going to be. As the trip got under way it seemed to consist largely of coach visits to war cemeteries, invasion beaches and museums. Although I found them interesting, I wasn’t sure about their appeal for my Year 7 pupils. Eventually, on the third day a gr...