Happens All The Time

"Vuelta al cole". Back to school. It's that time of year, and tomorrow will see the mass return to the reality of education after the months of beach and play. As every year, the newspapers will doubtless be full of photos of the munchkins returning after having spent a quarter of the year on holiday. Last year when I reported on the "vuelta", I mentioned that the press had reported that the return had gone off "with normality". I'd love to know what abnormality would be, and, as chance would have it, there will be some served up in Puerto Alcúdia. Nothing like a bit of parental direct action, as school will still be out tomorrow if they have their way. There is a touch of local difficulty regarding the temporary classrooms at the new secondary school and their safety. The governmental body for education and culture is getting it in the neck for failing to meet promises. Back to school and back to the beach, it would seem.


The length of the holiday as much as the act of the return adds power to the news that is the "vuelta", and so it will, as always, make the news. A summer holiday double in length of that in England might suggest a pretty relaxed educational regime. It would be an incorrect perception. The total number of hours spent per annum in Spanish schools is not that far behind that of England which not only has some of the longest hours it also has the shortest summer holidays (along with Wales and Germany); the difference is in the region of 450 hours per year. This may seem a lot until one appreciates that, for example, the number of hours in Finland is 1700 less than England; and Finland is a country with a higher level of educational achievement than in England or Spain. The Finns, by the way, have 11 weeks of summer holiday. Spanish kids spend more time in school than do their German counterparts by a factor of 600 hours, despite the twelve-week summer holiday.

The new school term will also see the introduction of English (or French or German) as the language of teaching for certain subjects, the choice and discretion of individual schools participating in the scheme. English, for instance, could be used for maths, art or biology. Hmm. I remember biology. We started with the amoeba, if memory serves, and then the memory fades. I never really graduated much beyond the simple single cell. To have been instructed in Spanish would have made it even less comprehensible. I don't know quite how this English or other foreign language teaching is meant to help. Perhaps simple English lessons might be the answer. To explain relatively complex subjects in an alien language will depend enormously on the skill of the teacher as well, and some crash courses in English for teachers do not necessarily arm them with all those skills.


FLOODS AND ROADS - EVERY TIME
The early arrival of autumn in the form of the storm that struck on Friday left, no surprise, the coast road into Puerto Pollensa awash with flood water. Happens all the time. There was me thinking that they were meant to have done something to have alleviated the flooding problem. Come the rains, and it's going to happen. Mind you, this is a useful way around the road closure-or-not conundrum. Just summon up a few storms and nature takes the decision out of the hands of the town hall.

As the debate about the road rumbles on, I am less and less clear as to quite why there is a desire to pedestrianise it. Or at least pedestrianise the whole length up to Llenaire. There is a perfectly adequate form of pedestrian mobility as it is: the pavement. If the plan were to ban vehicles as far as, for instance, Sail and Surf and La Gola, I could see some sense. This would mean that the areas of Puerto Pollensa's frontline with the main concentration of pedestrians would become more easily negotiated by those pedestrians. But up as far as Llenaire? Why? It can only be as a justification for the new road, which is fair enough - up to a point. The new road is, or should be, to alleviate some of the congestion in the centre of the port, so a partial increase in pedestrianisation would achieve this. To close the road for the whole length, however, would merely create a problem that does not exist.

AND MORE ...
Teach me to put together features a day in advance. So this is by way of an almost immediate update. It now seems that the road will be closed between the Calle Elcano, which is the road opposite the entrance to the wharf (Moll Sur), and the Avenida Paris, which is just a bit past where I had suggested. This means that there will be no pedestrianisation as far as Llenaire and that the bit between the nautical club roundabout and the wharf will remain open. That indeed had been another thing I couldn't quite understand - access to the wharf and nautical club and also to the parking area. Now, it would seem, it is to remain open, though it will also mean entering from Calle Juan XXIII. The compromise closure is to be effected over this coming week. That's it then. For now.


QUIZ
Yesterday's title - The Yardbirds (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZUZg6VHfcLM). Today's title - Northern Irish.

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