Tom and Helen were lucky enough to visit Nottingham Primary Academy last week, and had a great time playing BNW Goblin with Year 6. As always, the reflections and responses from the pupils were both thought-provoking and inspiring. Not only did the players enthusiastically compete in the goblin realm, they very quickly made connections with issues in the contemporary UK. They readily made parallels between struggles for control/leadership in the game, and the recent general election. Social inequality and injustice also featured strongly on their agenda, and many of the comments demonstrated an extremely nuanced approach to questions around Parliamentary Sovereignty and human rights. Certainly a lot of pupils appreciated the idea of there being a trade-off between flexibility and protection when in comes to Constitutional models. In other words, there are advantages in a codified Constitution which enshrines certain values as absolute, but there are also potential problems when radical change is wanted or needed. So in the final analysis it isn't so much a question of good versus bad when comparing the UK and a State like the USA, but a choice between options with different strengths and weaknesses.
The pupils were also not afraid to call out adults for their collective ineptitude in running the world. One class in particular demanded to know why ten year olds weren't allowed to vote, when so many grown ups were far more immature and silly than they were. That's certainly a question to ponder!