School trips have changed since my day…..

David49

Way back in the 1960s there was no sex education at all, surprise, surprise most of us managed to navigate the dating and relationship challenges. 60 yrs later I see nothing that has changed for the better, in fact behavior and wellbeing has got considerably worse.
It was an ordinary state high school, there was never any sexual harassment of girls, now everything has to be sexualized from an early age - progress?.

Wow, no sexual harassment of girls in schools (and everywhere else) in the 60s! Seriously????!

Also with respect MOnica you are probably I think, in the top 5% of the population terms of intelligence and find it easy to soak things up like a sponge. Also to apply analytical thinking to what you have seen or read.

I hope I won’t offend you but saying that the phrase from Miss Marple “a mind like a meat cleaver” comes to mind. I’m sure your children are much the same.

You only have to look around you to see that a number of adults find that quite difficult and my working and personal experience with children leads me to believe that their developing minds often muddle quite unrelated information and experiences.

So, again with respect, I do think there can be too much information too soon in any learning experience, especially for young children whose experiences and powers of reasoning are still developing.

David -
there was never any sexual harassment of girls,

Are you sure?

Grandma70s.

I realise that although my children read whatever they fancied I did try to steer them away from what I considered "trash" childrens books and novels towards what I considered were better written ones. They still read Disney books and ones with odd messages - one grandchild had a book called "Rainbow Fish" which seems to imply we must all be the same.
Mercifully they didn't like Biggles!

*were claimed

Galaxy

I dont think I have any strong feelings about this either way, except perhaps that it somehow seems othering to me. All the books mentioned above will be in any bookshop in any town.
And of course the use of the word queer, which whilst reclaimed by some is seen by many others as hurtful.

It's the opposite of othering.
Those hurt by "queer" need to realise why it was so important that this, and other terms we claimed. Gay rights were hard won and that fight should be recognised, especially by today's youth.

Way back in the 1960s there was no sex education at all, surprise, surprise most of us managed to navigate the dating and relationship challenges. 60 yrs later I see nothing that has changed for the better, in fact behavior and wellbeing has got considerably worse.
It was an ordinary state high school, there was never any sexual harassment of girls, now everything has to be sexualized from an early age - progress?.

Lathyrus
I actually agree with your comments about young children being bombarded with too much information too soon and that, in some cases, there has been promoting rather than educating. Too much information too soon jst leads to confusion - in anything, even for adults.

With due respect, I could not disagree more. From a very young age I could never have too much information on anything. I was a sponge. My parents tried to keep somethings from me, but i always got round it.

Diversity wasn't an issue when I was young, butit was just after WW2 when many books were published on the horrors of the concentration camps. I read everyone that came my way, from a very young age. When we lived in Singapore, I was about 10, the local daily paper ran a long series of articles on the full horrors of the Japanese occupation of Malaya and the terrible things that were done to Prisoners of War on the Burma Railway. It was a game of cat and mouse with my parents, but I read everything.

More lightly I was reading adult hstoric novels from much the same way and one or two dealt with adultery and infidelity, and my mother tried to hide these, but I read them, and much of it went right over my head.

I never stopped my children reading or watchng anything, my son wanted to watch a schools programme showing a baby being born, when he was about 3. I sat with him ready to turn the tv off. He was just fascinated by it but I was always knew what they were reading and watching and would be with them when necessary. The only time either of them got upset was DS over a Noddy book, because a little monkey was put in prison for breaking rules he knew nothing about and that upset DS's sense of justice.

I think if I were still teaching a print out of this thread would provide an interesting starting point for a couple of lessons. As an English teacher use of the verb 'bombarded' would be worthy of discussion.

NotSpaghetti

Barleyfields
Probably not literature that their parents would prefer them to read at that age.

Well, I'm not a parent of a "soon to be teenager" these days but I'm sure there will be plenty of age appropriate literature to see there.

There will certainly be plenty of literature on the shelves of this bookshop.

Straight people are no more likely to write excellent books and not all excellent books will be about straight people.

The Color Purple, by Alice Walker
The Line of Beauty, by Alan Hollinghurst
Giovanni's Room, by James Baldwin
Middlesex, by Jeffrey Eugenides
Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit, by Jeanette Winterson
...these are all books I consider to be "literature"

There will lots more.
These are just the ones that immediately came to my mind.
I read Giovanni's Room as a young teen, also ^Death in Venice by Thomas Mann.

👏👏👏

Grandma70s

I wouldn’t dream of limiting the books that a twelve-year-old reads to those I might think are ‘suitable’. Let them explore. (I too read Giovanni’s Room as a young teenager.)

As for being ‘bombarded’ with too much information - I don’t think there is such a thing as too much information and knowledge. They are ‘bombarded’ with heterosexuality all the time, so I feel that a similar knowledge of homosexuality is just balance.

👏👏👏👏

FriedGreenTomatoes2

I’m not against this day trip per se but I’m with escaped here.
Too much, too soon. Seems we push these things on kids nowadays. Can’t childhood, a game of football or netball just be enough for a little while longer? Why this rush into learning about alternative types of sexual behaviours all of a sudden?
12 years old?
Must be me that’s out of step.

I get exactly what you’re saying, however it’s not about “sexual behaviour” it’s so much more about the make up families.

These 12 year olds will learn about “sexual behaviour” in the playground.

It’s so important to learn tolerance and acceptance.

There are many many children now with same sex parents, no one wants to see these families singled out, it’s “normal”

I dont think I have any strong feelings about this either way, except perhaps that it somehow seems othering to me. All the books mentioned above will be in any bookshop in any town.
And of course the use of the word queer, which whilst reclaimed by some is seen by many others as hurtful.

nanna8

So many good places to visit in the Uk, why this one ? Too political for me and I don’t think it would happen here. Certainly not through the Lutheran school my grandchildren attend.

Why not this one? They are London children, they have visited many interesting places. This is just one more.

I wouldn’t dream of limiting the books that a twelve-year-old reads to those I might think are ‘suitable’. Let them explore. (I too read Giovanni’s Room as a young teenager.)

As for being ‘bombarded’ with too much information - I don’t think there is such a thing as too much information and knowledge. They are ‘bombarded’ with heterosexuality all the time, so I feel that a similar knowledge of homosexuality is just balance.

Barleyfields
Probably not literature that their parents would prefer them to read at that age.

Well, I'm not a parent of a "soon to be teenager" these days but I'm sure there will be plenty of age appropriate literature to see there.

There will certainly be plenty of literature on the shelves of this bookshop.

Straight people are no more likely to write excellent books and not all excellent books will be about straight people.

The Color Purple, by Alice Walker
The Line of Beauty, by Alan Hollinghurst
Giovanni's Room, by James Baldwin
Middlesex, by Jeffrey Eugenides
Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit, by Jeanette Winterson
...these are all books I consider to be "literature"

There will lots more.
These are just the ones that immediately came to my mind.
I read Giovanni's Room as a young teen, also ^Death in Venice by Thomas Mann.

So many good places to visit in the Uk, why this one ? Too political for me and I don’t think it would happen here. Certainly not through the Lutheran school my grandchildren attend.

I visited Gay’s the Word as a (straight) librarian, many years ago now, to select books for the children’s and young adult sections of the library. The range of books showing eg same sex parents or young people discovering their identity as gay or lesbian, trans or bisexual, was very limited in the stocks of mainstream library suppliers at that time. The staff at the bookshop were welcoming, knowledgeable and immensely helpful.

I imagine the visit would have been fairly short and certainly age appropriate. The only worry I’d have is the antipathy to books and reading which a recent survey of children and young people highlighted. There are so many wonderful books!

I’d still like to know what the learning objectives are for such a visit.
And why being respectful of all people, regardless of any differences, is not taught in school.
As a matter of fact, I know that it is, because I used to be a teacher, so I’m still wondering what the learning objectives for this trip are.
I had to provide the learning objective for every lesson I taught, including for any school trips.

A lovely post again from you Lathyrus3. Thank you again. We meet perhaps halfway in our viewpoints? Some consensus anyway.

(The song was by UB40 btw - quite catchy - about being the one gay in ten. 1980’s. Loved their songs).

We went on a school trip to a power station and a margarine factory. We also went on a field trip to Yorkshire and it poured with rain the whole day so most of us sneaked back onto the coach and shared our pack lunches, I remember one boy had brought scotch eggs and I had never eaten one before, that was in fact the most exciting part of the trip.

My daughter went on a school trip to Israel and the Palestinian Authority.

I don’t know that song🤔🙂

I actually agree with your comments about young children being bombarded with too much information too soon and that, in some cases, there has been promoting rather than educating. Too much information too soon jst leads to confusion - in anything, even for adults.

I guess where we differ mostly is in what we regard as age appropriate. I think there is a fair amount questioning, confusion and I’m afraid bullying that goes on at this age so we’ll agree to differ on that.

As far as the bookshop visit comments I haven’t been so don’t know if there is a vetted children’s section, but I do know the museum sent anything like a freak show.In fact I think that’s just exactly the concept that it challenges.

This is becoming like a game of ‘I am The One in Ten’ 🎵 🎶

We had school visits to a cigarette factory, a banana importing place, a bread factory, a chocolate factory & several residential A level field trips. Latter resulted in pub visits each eve, smoking & drinking followed by messing around in the accommodation with the opp sex ! Back in late 60’s early 70’s. Schools wouldn’t get away with that now ! We did have fun even though risky at times.