PLANNING STAGE

1. PLANNING STAGE • After our visit to the battlefields last year, we wanted to create a really special way to commemorate the fallen. • We were inspired by many of the moving tributes we’d seen on our visit. • We wanted to: • Link the display to our local area • Reach out to as many people as possible • Have a practical impact, helping soldiers today

2. We worked with the other Year 11 history ambassadors to plan and create our display. • We started it in July 2015 and completed it in the October half term • The most ambitious part was we created a life size model of a WW1 soldier (out of paper mache). We named him Gilbert. He came to symbolise the fallen – especially from our local area. • We researched the names and stories of local soldiers using the Birmingham Mail website. We covered our display and our soldier in these names

3. Making “Gilbert”!

4. Making “Gilbert”!

5. SCHOOL/LOCAL IMPACT • The next stage was involving as many people as possible in order to help people reflect. • We delivered assemblies in school for every House. This meant that 500 people had a chance to reflect and to write on a poppy. • The following slides give an idea of the assembly.

6. REMEMBRANCE DAY 2015 “Lest we forget” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t0BPONgX9Tw

7. In March 2015 we visited the Somme and Ypres Battlefields where so may soldiers fell.

8. Thousands returned home ‘shell-shocked’. This was a psychological condition caused by the horrors they had witnessed. However, there was no, or at least very little, treatment for this.

9. Our display is meant to make you remember how war affected individuals. Our soldier represents these stories. The names around him are of soldiers from our area who fought and fell in WW1

10. Private 6322 John Condon was one of thousands of lads who lied about their age to fight for their country, he is recorded as the youngest soldier to die in the war. He was only 14 years old.

11. What can you do? • Take a moment and reflect. Look at the display and write your thoughts on a poppy • 2) Help us help wounded soldiers today at Christmas. Donate a small gift to Operation Christmas Cheer. • (Box is under table in reception!)

12. PUT A SMALL GIFT UNWRAPPED IN THE BOX UNDER THE TABLE IN RECEPTION BY MONDAY NOV 16th Thank you!!!  See Miss Thatcher if you have any questions.

13. PUT A SMALL GIFT UNWRAPPED IN THE BOX UNDER THE TABLE IN RECEPTION BY MONDAY NOV 16th Thank you!!!  See Miss Thatcher if you have any questions.

14. WIDER IMPACT • The next stage was ensuring that our research and exhibition had a wider impact. • We invited pupils from the primary school next door (St Joseph’s) to come and see the exhibition. • We led a workshop for them telling them about WW1 and some stories about soldiers in the local area. They had a go using the Birmingham Mail website to research local connections. • The St Joseph’s pupils wrote reflections on poppies and created the 3D poppies that spilled out of the suitcase.

15. “I never realised that men and boys from like Kings Norton and Bournville fought in WW1. They could have come from my roas even. That is really sad” • Comment from St Joseph’s pupil after workshop led by the year 11 students.

17. PRACTICAL IMPACT • We were very moved by the stories we had heard both on the battlefields trip and during our research for the exhibition. • We wanted to do something to help soldiers still coming back injured today from the various wars around the world. • One of us has a cousin who has recently joined the army and this made us even more inspired to do something practical • We looked into the Help for Heroes Charity and came across the Christmas Stocking Appeal.

18. We wrote to the Operation Christmas Soldier and told them about their exhibition/research. • They were very keen for us to collect and contribute. • The students collected gifts for the Help a Hero Christmas stocking appeal and sent them to the collection point.