40 years ago on Monday, the weekend after Britain had declared, that we were at war to protect the Falklands, my class of 11 years olds came tumbling into our class room shouting....'we're at war, will we be bombed?'
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I must admit if the BBC hadn't shown maps of the Atlantic on the news, I wouldn't have known where the islands were. No internet in those days, but I did have my child's Arthur Mees Encyclopaedias and I had looked at the maps of the Atlantic the evening before to see how far the Falklands were away from Britain. Those Encyclopaedias were bought for me by my Aunty Glad who with my grand mother brought me up, thank you Aunty Glad. They were useful when I was 10 and even as an adult I consulted them!
So the first lesson of the day was geography and to explain how far the Islands were from us I used the children's own knowledge.. Most had been to Disney Land in the US and so we looked at how long it took to get there and then how much further to get to the Falklands.. Even further than Spain too I'd said.. We spent the rest of the week, looking up that far away place and how the people lived there. Drawing maps and maths about time and distance, and that the people there were not that different to us in Basildon Essex.
The children were happy to learn about it, altho' some of the boys wanted the gory details of bombing and ships on fire and soldiers killed, most were content to learn we weren't going to be bombed and they loved colouring the maps they drew!
We didn't talk about the 255 soldiers killed, but most watched the news with their parents so they knew what was happening. And I hope in my classroom they learnt the geography of the Falklands and where Disney Land was in the US, and what a green and pleasant land we lived in and freely.
Did the news that it is 40 years since it happened bring back memories for you?
Chrisxx
3 comments:
I hadn't realised but I do remember. It was a very worrying time, not only because of that but with every
xx
I vaguely remember people talking about it, there's certainly been lots of talk about the Falklands since. The Gulf war I definitely remember that and the shock that my family members could get called up. Also the VAT rise of to pay for it, that never went down again.
I remember I was revising for my finals at Uni, and stayed with my Aunt, who really kept my nose to the grindstone. As light relief, I wrote to a sergeant who had written to the local paper asking for penfriends. I got a reply from a Captain - there had been so many replies, that all the soldiers had chosen a letter to rep^ly to! Mine was chosen "because of my beautiful handwriting"!! I corresponded with my Captain for a year or so, but he stopped writing when I sent him my photo... Hmmm. I wonder what that says (about me, or him!)
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