Global learning is not an approach but an action. Students situate themselves in the diverse contexts of the world, and in doing so discover it as connected and unbound. We ask students not only to identify the connections that already exist between the world's peoples, places, histories and cultures, but to ask which connections will exist — and which ones we, as a learning community, have the power to create.

Studio's Global Learning programmes are residential summer programmes for Studio students, taught by Studio teachers. They take the reading, writing, thinking and performing of the Studio classroom and set it down in the places the reading is about.

All photographs on this page are from The Story of England, 2015–2019.

History | Literature | Drama

The Story of England · 12 to 26 July 2027 · ages 11–15 · Studio students only

Fourteen nights in one place: Wasdale Hall, a National Trust house of 1829 on the shore of Wast Water, the deepest lake in England, beneath Scafell Pike, the highest mountain. The whole house is ours. Twenty-four students aged 11 to 15, with a lead teacher, Studio's founder James Jobbins, a second teacher for Literature and Drama, and pastoral staff from Studio in Shanghai, led by a Pastoral Manager the children already know.

Seven days out by coach, plus a valley walk, an outdoor day and a mountain day on foot from the house, classes on ten of the fifteen days, and two showcases filmed for parents. The Story of England from the stone circles to Wordsworth, told in the order it happened — and all of it within reach of the house. Monday 12 July to Monday 26 July 2027. Younger students are admitted by exception. Dates are held pending confirmation of the group booking with Juneyao Airlines.

Why the Lake District?

• More than three thousand years of English history, from a Bronze Age stone circle to the Romantic poets, all within an hour of the house
• Wordsworth's home at Dove Cottage, where modern English poetry began
• Drama classes that build and perform scenes about real people who lived here
• A National Park and a World Heritage Site: the landscape and its history in the same place

Classes

Three subjects: History, Literature and Drama. There are classes on ten of the fifteen days, most of them in the morning before the coach leaves, and teaching on site every day out. The students work in two groups of twelve; each session pairs two of the subjects, and the groups swap halfway.

History. The spine of the trip: before each visit, and making sense of it afterwards. Taught by the lead teacher, Studio's founder James Jobbins, who also gives the short seminar in the house before each day out.

Literature. The writing that came out of these places, read where it was written: Wordsworth and Coleridge in the valleys, the Norse poems behind the carvings at Gosforth, Kipling's Roman centurion on the Wall, the chroniclers of the abbeys. And Shakespeare, whose histories run through the trip: the students learn the St Crispin's Day speech from Henry V by heart, and meet the one thing from the Lakes that Shakespeare ever mentions. Read aloud, argued over, and some of it learnt by heart. Students keep a trip journal throughout.

Drama. Scenes built from the places and people we meet — the Roman auxiliary at Hardknott, the Viking carver at Gosforth, the last abbot of Furness, Wordsworth at Dove Cottage — and a scene from Shakespeare: Henry VI, in hiding, taken in a northern forest. Performed at the two showcases.

Thinking and speaking. Discussion points on every site; a seminar before every day out; the closing debate. What they take home: reading aloud, arguing a case, and presenting to a room.

The fifteen days

Monday 12 to Monday 26 July 2027. Days out and class days in the order the history happened, from the stone circles to Wordsworth.

Never more than two places in a day. Classes on ten of the fifteen days, usually in the morning before the coach leaves; a short seminar in the house before each day out, and discussion points on site.

The chronological spine runs prehistory, Rome, the frontier, Vikings and Normans, the Hundred Years' War and the Wars of the Roses, the monasteries, the Georgian and industrial town, the Romantics.

A day on The Story of England

On a class day the two groups of twelve work through paired sessions of History, Literature and Drama, with rehearsal in the evening and time to write up the journal before dinner. A day out begins with a short seminar in the house after breakfast; there are never more than two places in a day, and each site comes with its own discussion points, worked through in front of the thing itself. On the two longest drives a recorded talk plays on the coach.

A day in full

Every day is planned to the quarter-hour. This one shows the shape of a day out.

Friday 16 July — the edge of the Empire

Online to onsite

The programme begins before the flight. In the months before departure, students join six live online sessions with the lead teacher — an introduction to the history and the literature they will meet, the reading to do beforehand, and the first drama work — so that they arrive in England already inside the story.

Showcases

The Interim Showcase on Day 8, Monday 19 July, and the Full Showcase on Day 14, Sunday 25 July, are filmed and sent to every family. Parents who are in England are welcome at both, by prior arrangement.

What a child gains

• The story of England from beginning to end, and how it connects to the history of the rest of the world
• Practice in questioning what they are told, and in working out how events are connected to each other
• Literature read closely, and two performances in front of an audience
• An understanding of how a place, what happened there and what it means now fit together, and a clearer sense of their own position in the world

Care and safety

Students stay together with their teachers and pastoral staff at Wasdale Hall, which we have entirely to ourselves. Four to six children to a room, boys and girls separately; staff sleep on the same corridor as the children, and two adults are on call through the night. The pastoral staff come from Studio in Shanghai, so the children already know them, and are led by a Pastoral Manager: one pastoral adult to every eight students, about one adult to every five overall, male and female. Medication is held and logged by pastoral staff, and parents receive a daily WeChat update with photographs. Qualified mountain leaders accompany the ascent of Scafell Pike, at one to eight; if the summit is not safe that day, the group walks lower. UK staff hold enhanced DBS checks; staff from China are police-checked in their home country. A first-aider is always present, and care is in place around the clock.

One phone each, used once in the morning or evening for calls home; a smartwatch that can send messages counts as a phone. Cameras are welcome, with a clear policy on when photographs are taken. No tablets, laptops or e-readers.

Global Learning since 2015

Studio’s first Global Learning programme was The Story of England in 2015: three weeks across England, from the far south-west to the Lake District, with drama every day, actors in residence, theatre at the Minack and at Tolethorpe, and performances for parents at every base. It ran every summer until 2019. The Ancient World, a journey through Greece from Knossos to the tombs of the kings of Macedon, ran from 2016 to 2019; and in 2018 Studio students also travelled to Alaska and Hawaii for Fire & Ice, to Scotland for The Edinburgh Society, and to Yunnan, China, for Comparative Societies and Cultures and Literature and Culture. After a Covid-induced abeyance, Global Learning returns with The Story of England 2027.

“Delight and liberty, the simple creed of childhood.”— William Wordsworth

Joining

The Story of England 2027 is open to Studio students aged 11–15; younger students, from age 8, may be admitted by agreement with their Learning Consultant. Students' academic English level should be TCI or above. Everything is taught in English, as at Studio. It is not advertised publicly. Twenty-four places. Enrol through your Learning Consultant.