Recently we read a story called Wilfred Gordon McDonald Partridge by Mem Fox. The story told how a young boy (Wilfred), helped an elderly lady find the memories she thought she had lost by finding objects which help her remember her own childhood so long ago.

Inspired by this story we invited three visitors to our class, Mrs McFarlane and Mrs Rennie, accompanied by Kerry Noor from Alzheimer Scotland. We brought in their own boxes and bags of memory objects from our own past (when we were very young) and shared them with each other and our guests.
Our objects didn’t look very valuable, but because they us to remember people, times and places they are very precious to us. Some memories were happy and some were a little bit sad but we wouldn’t want them to disappear.

A hush fell on the class as both Mrs McFarlane and Mrs Rennie recalled a strong memory from their own childhoods so long ago. Mrs McFarlane remembered a world without sweeties after the Second World War, and Mrs Rennie remembered going to school with her gas mask in a cardboard box over her arm, expecting that they could be bombed at any moment.

P4 will now discuss how we can work more with older members of the community and have conversations which will add to our knowledge of the past.