For anyone feeling a tad discombobulated about what “Brexit Day” actually means in practical terms, a group of pupils have come to the rescue.
The students at Paisley Grammar School, in the West of Scotland, have posted a video this afternoon explaining what it all means.
Using a liberal dose of gifs and arch humour - a quality some might say has been conspicuously missing from the fractious Brexit debate of the past few years - they round up (almost) everything you need to know in a little over a minute.
The senior pupils all take modern studies, a subject unique to Scotland which involves the study of current affairs and sits alongside other “social subjects”, such as geography and history.
Teacher Michael Shanks said that the pupils all do modern studies at National 5 (broadly equivalent to GCSE) in which they are not required directly to learn about Brexit, although students taking Higher - the next level up from National 5 - do cover it.
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“But we were learning about UK politics and the role of the prime minister so it seemed to fit, plus they came in every day with more questions about Brexit so it seemed to make sense to just cover it,” said Mr Shanks, who is a newly qualified teacher.
“I have a tendency to put a few too many gifs in my lesson presentations so I suspect they were having a bit of a joke by making this one full of gifs, but it works!”
The video packs myriad cultural and topical references into its short running time, including Harry Potter, SpongeBob SquarePants and Donald Trump.
And there may well be a sequel from the Paisley Grammar S5 and S6 pupils: they sign off with a reminder that today’s ending is really just a beginning, since the UK now has to negotiate a trade deal with the EU.
“So come back soon for an update,” they write.
