Magistrates In The Community

In the UK, from the age of ten, children are deemed responsible for crimes they commit and can be tried in a youth court for lesser crimes or a Crown Court for murder. As a school, we like to prepare our pupils for the next stages of their lives and that includes being good citizens. Being made aware of the law and understanding how it works in the UK is important as the pupils become older, and therefore, inviting Fran Gresty into school, a WPS mother and local magistrate, was the perfect opportunity to expand on the Year 5 and 6 pupils’ knowledge.

In their workshop, they learnt about what magistrates do and how a magistrate’s court operates. There were lots of questions for Fran and the pupils were clearly fizzing with enthusiasm for the session. All the pupils were involved in role play within a fictitious trial and made their own decisions about whether the individuals in the script were guilty or not. The session whizzed by and it was evident that there are some future lawyers and magistrates in the cohorts.