I can't stand it. All this Trick or Treat nonsense. Extraordinary really that for 364 days of the year, parents tell their brats to be rude to strangers, and then on one day, they send them round begging like vagrants. Field day for paedophiles, if you ask me.
In Junior 3 we had a whole week of lessons built around Hallowe'en. We learnt all about the Lancashire Witches, especially of Pendle Hill, and about the significance of witch trials; we learnt about Celtic festivities, and being a Catholic school, we also did All Saints and All Souls. We painted pictures of witches. And then we bobbed for apples.
That's the way it should be.
I have found on the odd occasion when I've been Trick or Treated that the kids don't have a clue what they're doing or why. So I send them away with a flea in the ear, and a promise of an enormous treat if they come back with evidence of scholarly research. I don't see them again.
Penny for the Guy, anybody?
