Hi all, you find me sat in teacher’s room here at the beautiful chateau where, by virtue of me holding my laptop, I have just avoided a water ballooning from some eager St Mary’s children as a ‘prize’ for winning scrapheap challenge – more to come on this later.
The day started with us making good time to Folkestone followed by a very quick passage through the tunnel, all children were excited to get going and the quick journey meant all were in fine fettle for Nausicaa. Our coach driver Sergio kindly put a Mr Bean film on for the children, I’d have thought Mr Bean might be a bit old hat for the class of 2017 but all seemed transfixed and giggled at the slapstick that was served up to them.
I’m pleased to say that our policy of no electronics is going well, the children have been playing hangman, playing cards and even….writing! One child must have been quite bored however, as I glanced over her shoulder to see she had drawn the most detailed biro drawing of an ice cream I have ever seen – two hours clearly put to good use 😉
We arrived at Nausicca in really good time and had a solid 1.5 hour visit which meant the children could really take the time to take in all the amazing exhibits. Three of our groups managed to see the sea lions being fed which was a real treat. The feeding was swiftly followed by ten children doing an impression of a sea lion , I can only imagine the other French tourists must have thought we were a bit odd – or maybe just British.
When we got to the Chateau I wandered over to check on the girls only to find Mr Williams purposefully wheeling a suitcase through the corridor with a child closely followed behind. He reliably informed me that there had been a suitcase mix up and he was on he look our for a similar navy blue case that belonged to the child he was with.
We got to the girl’s room and just as Holmes and Watson were deducing who’s bag had been mixed up, Mr Williams decided to check to the front pouch……in it we found a letter addressed to the parents of the girl who had cried foul in the first place, cue looks of incredulity from the two class teachers as we informed the girl that it must be hers all along. This one was a first for me, I’ve never even had a child not recognise their own case never mind be adamant someone had taken theirs – but on school journey, nothing surprises me.
So as I write the children have just finished scrapheap challenge and despite chants of MR POWELL! MR POWELL! my technology in hand saved my skin from a water ballooning.
However……….there was one man who was willing to step forward, cue Mr Williams (hoodie hood pulled tight around his head a la E.T) who stepped forward in front of 58 eager pupils to get his comeuppance, he took it really well and the children will have a fun memory to take with them into day 2. I will tweet a picture of said incident with this blog post.
A note about the food, we had mini pizzas, turkey escalopes, chocolate eclairs and of course….bags of baguette – one table seemed to create their own Eiffel Tower of bread which they dismantled with hungry intent.
Tomorrow is Dieppe and an organic goat’s cheese farm which we have never been to before so it should be good fun.
As ever, all children are happy and full of energy for the week ahead.
Mr Powell