Learning for Life

He’s lost a lot of weight and is speaking a bit faster but, those superficial changes apart, ‘Big Bernie’ is essentially the same character he was when Grampian Police first launched him as the front man for their Learning for Life education resources.

Bernie is the affable and ever-wise cartoon policeman who guides teachers and pupils through a series of three interactive CD-ROMs created by the force’s Aberdeen-based Education Liaison Unit. Volume One dealt with bullying, drugs sense and vandalism; Volume Two with safety, citizenship and law and order. Volume Three, following its official launch at the Scottish Parliament, is now available to schools and focuses on diversity and harmony.

This comprehensive education resource, reflecting the 5-14 curriculum, came about as the result of what began, nine years ago, as a 40-day secondment with Grampian Police for Aberdeen primary school teacher, Wilma Gillanders.

Wilma explains:

'I was a depute head, working in an inner-city school, and a parent wrote in and asked what we were doing about drugs education. Well, we were doing a bit but my boss and I decided we could be doing more. So I went on a course, then asked the police to come in and talk to the parents and from that we created our own drugs education programme.

'Then the chance of a 40-day secondment came up, working with Grampian Police to create a resource for their officers to use in schools. The idea was that it would reflect the 5-14 curriculum, which had only recently been introduced.

'The aim was to come up with a concept that would go beyond the very obvious, and limited, stereotype police things like: ‘I’m a bobby, here’s my truncheon, my car goes nee-naw.’ We decided to look at areas where a police officer’s expertise would really support a teacher and would also help to inform and support parents.'

Bullying, vandalism, safety, citizenship, law and order and, of course, drugs sense were chosen as the core subject areas. As Wilma points out:

'We wanted to focus on issues that were of common interest to all of us. They’re very relevant to children and they’re very relevant to teachers and parents as well as to the community and society as a whole.'

Although the original aim of the secondment was to come up with a resource that officers could use in schools, Wilma and her police colleague concluded that an education programme that could be teacher-led rather than police-led would be much more beneficial.

Police Box

From the initial 40-day secondment came the concept of the Police Box: an attractively packaged set of illustrated, colour-coded cards dealing with the original core subjects, one side of the card designed for pupil use, the other side designed to support teachers. Says Wilma:

'I was working on the project with a police officer and we both decided that we wanted to do more than just a couple of lessons. We wanted to really look at the issues that mattered, that the police could support, in depth. So we went to the chief constable of Grampian Police and the director of education for Aberdeen City Council and got a further secondment. And after that I was offered, and accepted, the new post of Police Education Adviser in the recently created Education Liaison Unit.

'At that time, the Grampian Police unit was the only one of its kind. Other forces are catching up now but we did lead the way for a while with our school liaison programme and I also trained officers in other forces, in both Scotland and England, for school liaison work.'

The original Police Box was designed for Grampian but Wilma and her team recognised that the issues it dealt with were relevant to schools everywhere. So when the decision was made to present the programme in a more ambitious CD-ROM format, and to market it throughout the UK, policeman ‘Big Bernie’, the star of the whole series, was given a Yorkshire accent. Wilma explains:

'Market research we carried out for the project showed that a Yorkshire accent was perceived as being the most friendly by the largest amount of people. We got quite a well-known actor to do Bernie’s voice but we asked him to speed up his delivery for Volume Three.'

In the latest CD-ROM, Bernie has also slimmed down considerably. Wilma agrees that, in Volumes One and Two of Learning for Life, the affable cartoon cop looked as if he’d been spending too much time behind a desk, eating doughnuts.

'But,' she points out, 'there are serious concerns now about people becoming too body-conscious so his weight loss hasn’t been extreme.'

Each CD-ROM contains a series of animated, interactive lessons dealing with the same core themes but designed specifically for 5-8-year-olds; 8-10-year-olds and 10-13-year-olds. The programme includes printable lesson overviews that provide clear content guidelines, curriculum links, suggestions for assessment, and parental involvement and extension activities. In addition, there are worksheets, an updated printable version of the Police Box and staff development materials.'

Promoting positives

One of the most striking things about Grampian’s all-singing, all-dancing Learning for Life resource is that there is a complete absence of finger pointing, right and wrong answers or trying to make participants feel guilty.

'Absolutely,' Wilma agrees. 'It’s dealing with positives: positive self-image, positive behaviour, positive relationships, positive ethos. For the little ones, we might say in the CD-ROM: ‘It’s not nice to drop litter in the playground,’ but generally, we don’t deal in ‘right’ answers; we deal in thought and opinion, backed up by a lot of real-life stories and statistics.'

In the latest CD-ROM, the core topics of diversity and harmony are addressed by encouraging pupils to empathise with others, no matter how different they appear to be. Wilma explains:

'The activities we’ve created are challenging all the time: challenging prejudice, challenging stereotyping, challenging discrimination. For instance, Squeaky, who is a constant character in the lessons for 5-8-year-olds, loves his hat and somebody puts it in the bin - which is a typical playground situation. But how do you think Squeaky feels? So at that level, it’s beginning to access their awareness of how behaviour impacts on feelings.

'With Volume Three, it had become apparent from talking to teachers that the issues they were most concerned about on a classroom and whole-school level were equality, inclusion and diversity. There was a need for early intervention where these things were concerned, to get children to start thinking about them and to give them knowledge, understanding and skills to deal with those issues. So, for instance, there are lessons that ask you to agree or disagree with statements such as: old people are past it; fat people are lazy; gypsy travellers are messy; asylum seekers are here to take our jobs, etc. And then we give you the facts that challenge those statements.

'I’ve been particularly interested in the subject of violence in our society and how it’s become almost acceptable that your first response to anything is rage - and very often physical rage. So ‘harmony’ in Volume Three also looks at the skills that help you to deal with conflict in all its forms.'

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