Young Person’s Pages!

Welcome to a brand new section of the Buzz by young people for young people. These pages were made possible by funding from the Local Network Fund ,part of Devon Community Foundation, and were put together this month by some young people in their lunch hour.

It has yet to be named, so if you can think of a suitable name for it, please tell us your suggestions. Similarly, please feel free to contribute to these pages with your own thoughts and ideas. This is your space, so if you’re a young person and have something to say, we’d love to hear from you!

Bideford College Ski Trip 2007

     On 6^th April, my friends and I, as well as many others met at Bideford College to go on a trip to the French Alps. We were going all the way on a coach; I get travel sick and was really nervous about the long journey.

     It turned out to be quite fun as we read, listened to music and played games on the way there. Going through the tunnel was a new experience and it wasn’t too bad. I was also nervous about spending so long away from home because I had done short residentials before but never eight days!

     When we got there the view was amazing! I saw snow for the first time and decided I loved it.

      Our hostel was on the side of a slope; we arrived two hours early and weren’t allowed in our rooms for a while. In the afternoon it took ages to get everyone’s boots and skis sorted. In the evening we went to a café and had waffles.

     I haven’t been skiing before; all the beginners had to go onto a flat area and were sorted into two groups. I was in the bottom one! We stuck to green and blue slopes for the first few days and did a different activity each night like ice-skating or shopping. I found the ski lifts a lot of fun and on our third or fourth day we did a red slope. We didn’t do any black slopes but I was glad because they looked too hard.

     The food there was weird and I didn’t like any of it. By the third day I was missing home and my Gran’s cooking! Luckily I had all my friends there so we could cheer each other up.

     On the last day I felt like I hadn’t been there a week and all too soon it was time to go. We got back at about quarter past four. It felt good to be home but I missed the Mountain View and the feeling you get when you’re zooming down a red slope. I had the time of my life and would love to go again someday.

Katie Scott

Home Education versus School?

There are several means of gaining an education.  One of the main ways is by attending school and being taught by teachers.  An alternative is to stay at home and be taught by close friends, relatives, family or a tutor.   I am hoping to put forward some of the fors and against for both types of these routes of education.

One of the good points about school is that you get to socialise and interact with others. You get to share ideas and play with friends at break times and lunch times and possibly in between lessons. This is good because it builds up friendships and a social life in and out of school. However, if you were being taught at home you would not have as much opportunity to socialise and interact with others because it would be just you and your mum /dad/ tutor. You would have no more children to talk to, it is just you.

A benefit about home schooling is that you feel more relaxed because you are in your own home and in your own clothes .You do not have to worry about the different lessons and what you need for the next day because it would be there in your house. (This could also be a bad point because you have to be very self-disciplined to settle down and work). At school you are not going to feel as relaxed as if you were at home because you have teachers there and at home you would have your mum and dad who you would be more familiar to. You would also be in a big classroom sitting up straight but at home you would be sitting on a comfortable chair or sofa.

At school you have an excellent range of equipment available to you such as Bunsen burners for Science and hockey sticks for P.E; a wide choice of Art equipment; musical instruments; library books and textbooks from which to study from. These pieces of equipment all contribute towards enhanced learning and education. At home you might have some equipment but not all the equipment that is available to you at school. Although some of the things we use at school might not be essential to our education it does help to have a range from which to choose from.

At school you also have a lot of pupils to be able to work with and take part in team and inter-form sports with. It helps a lot in P.E to have more than one person because you need other people to be able to have a team for hockey, football etc and be able to play properly. On the other hand it could be at a disadvantage to have lots of pupils because the teacher cannot concentrate on each individual at once and cannot give one on one teaching all the time. At home however, there is just you and the person who is teaching you .You get personalised one to one teaching and can be taught according to your individual learning needs. However it could also be a bad point to just have one person being taught because you will not get to experience team sport properly if you don’t have any other people to play with or against.

Another advantage with home schooling is that you do not need to pay for any transport costs to get to and from school, which can be a real saving as the costs of a bus pass to travel to school can be very high. However, to be taught at home would require money to pay for a tutor, or if being taught by a parent this parent would possibly have to give up their job. Whereas education at school is free to under 16’s.

A good point about school is that you have paid qualified teachers and teaching assistants, so you can be confident that you are going to be taught correctly. At home the person teaching you would have to obtain the approved syllabus and qualifications to be able to teach them. They would also have to allow sufficient time in their day to be able to teach.

In conclusion, and from the evidence and discussion above it would appear that there is no right or wrong way to be taught as long as each individual gets a good education. Most people are taught at a school but that does not always mean that going to school is better than being taught at home. Obviously other outside factors have to be taken into account, such as whether you have a place to be taught outside school and someone to teach you. Ultimately it is all about each and every person, their needs and what suits them so that they can get the best out of their learning.

Megan Townshend