Reflections on Lea Valley Park Trip

As well as enjoying the visit in itself, the Lea Valley visit was useful for previewing the "Trip Out" for the "Everyone's A Winner" module. After a night to recover, we reflected on the experience.

High level competencies such as initiative and the ability to understand and intervene in team projects are difficult and demanding activities that no one will engage in unless they very much care about the activity in which they are engaged – or unless they find these activities intrinsically satisfying. Such qualities will, therefore, most often only be developed and displayed while people are undertaking activities they care about.

(Wikipedia "Competencies.")

• We affirmed the value of "walking through" the trip in advance and understood the importance of preparing the students properly for the trip and helping them reflect purposefully on the experience.
• Students need to be prepared in terms of the skills required to carry out the task.
• In the spirit of personalisation we agreed on the need for an element of choice for the activities.
• A parents letter will need to be raised in adavce, letting them know about the cost, clothes etc.
• We know our children, so it is important for us to be willing to intervene in the unlikely event that they are not getting the best possible deal for themselves and the Academy.
• We agreed it was important for our children to experience reassurance, success, challenge as well as ensuring that all students are supported to access the activity.
• Children will need to experience success early on in the activities.
• It will be possible to debrief twice - on arrival as well as early the next day.
• As far as supervision is concerned, teacher positions (static) will need to be identified on the map. Staff teams will need to be on bikes, allocate resources, capture achievement and communicate with various other team members.