Teach-Secondary-14.1

A tale of two cities Daniel Harvey shares his experiences of two school trips – one successful, one less so – to illustrate the importance of good planning and careful execution… ABOUT THE AUTHOR Daniel Harvey is a GCSE and A Level science teacher and lead on behaviour, pastoral and school culture at an inner city academy GOODTRIP THE Y7S VISIT LONDON To help our Y7s better understand ‘British Values’ and what the Houses of Parliament are, we planned four trips across the academic year, so that every student had the chance to visit the capital, see inside the Palace ofWestminster, walk past Downing Street, take a river cruise down the Thames and see London from the London Eye. I’d forged links with our local MP at the time, Dame Caroline Spelman, and her office was able to secure us free tickets for a guided tour of the Houses of Parliament. By acting as early as possible, we were able to select from four different dates to help plan our visits, and give every Y7 a chance to see insideWestminster. Good collaboration with our coach driver, plus some local knowledge enabled us to be dropped off near Downing Street, see where the PM lives and then walk on toWestminster for the tour. The tour lasted around 90 minutes, and remains the best historical guided tour I’ve ever been on. The tour guides all possessed a wealth of knowledge, yet still managed to tell a unique version of our Parliament’s history, meaning no two tours were ever quite the same. A river cruise addition to our London Eye experience allowed us to provide a full day of history, sightseeing and fun before the coach finally met us by the London Eye for our journey home. Arriving atWestminster for 11amhad entailed making an early start, but we’d had a great time. We’d made the most of all the opportunities the location offered, and combined these with our own local knowledge to ensure that the students got to enjoy a full day of history, sights, culture and fun. BADTRIP WASTED OPPORTUNITIES IN REYKJAVIK The worst outcome for a trip where the itinerary has been completed safely and successfully is that everyone sees it as an underwhelming and ultimately boring experience. Iceland is a great location for geography-themed trips, and for instilling a love of the natural world’s awesome power. However, a lack of attention paid to itinerary planning, a poor choice of accommodation, a general absence of local knowledge and lack of challenge to the tour company planner meant that our four days staying in Reykjavik ended up being tediously slow. Imagine hostel staff asking where you’re going that day, explaining you’re going whale watching, and being told, with a surprised look, “ Normally, that takes place in six months’ time... ” Then picture lengthy coach rides out to the frozen waterfalls and black sand beaches, where we meet other schools staying somewhere muchmore local, and thus in a far better position to visit more of these natural wonders than we were. Imagine your headteacher being on the trip with you . With her son. Imagine the head then telling you she’s just bumped into someone from the school next door, who happens to have flown there fromBirminghamAirport – which surprised her, since she’d been assured by the trip leader (YES, YOU) that there were no flights fromReykjavik to Birmingham (just 10 mins from the school), which was why everyone had met at 3am that morning to catch a morning flight fromHeathrow... This was such a missed opportunity, looking back, but it actually helped me. I now regularly support others in ensuring that itineraries for trips abroad are informed by excellent local knowledge, and awareness of the best times to visit and the best places to stay. Itinerary gaps of several hours will place strain on any trip location if there’s little to do – so ensure that there’s plenty to keep students busy each day and fully engaged. 15 teachwire.net/secondary S C H O O L V I S I T S