In March we did our first sessions with Crucial Crew – a safety scheme for year 6 children, to prepare them for the transition to secondary school. Scenarios include safety on roads, railways, open water, electricity and a lot more.
Children visit each scenario in groups of 6-8 for a quick but intense 10 minute interactive presentation. All the children were sent home with a safety ‘goodie-bag’ which included a Billy’s Wish branded projector torch pen and a safety promise card (a year 6 appropriate version of our anti-weapons pledge). Along with school visits and a workshop at Watford Football Academy, we spoke to over 1000 children from around 25 in a two week period in the middle of March!
Secondary School Visits
A lot of time is spent preparing for school visits: talking to teachers, making sure we deliver the right content for the schools’ needs. In the summer term, as well as schools who are delivering our lessons, we addressed over 500 secondary school children. This included two hour workshops with year 7 and year 8 pupils at Longdean, assemblies in Kings Langley School and Ashlyns School and meeting with year 8 pupils at Adeyfield school as part of their active citizenship project.
Our assembly at Ashlyns was prompted by Berkhamstead Youth Town Council who wanted to support the young people of their town in the wake of recent knife crime. The focus was on peer pressure and how to stay safe. We were well aware that this was a sensitive time for the school and were relieved when feedback from the teachers was that we had pitched the message at the right level for this group of children at this point in time.
The assembly at Kings Langley was, in contrast, incredibly hard hitting. We had a guest speaker: leading trauma surgeon, Martin Griffiths. His talk was a no holds barred session, no one present can have been left in any doubt about the devastating effects of carrying and using knives. Some of the pupils and staff were visibly affected, but the feedback on social media was very positive. Parents reported that their children had come home and they had been able to talk frankly about what they had heard and seen.
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