Panda Girl is in her last few months of studying with me. In the new school year she will join her sisters with their US High School Diplomas - still studying from home, but working independently towards their future.
While we are still in Lockdown, I thought a World War II project build up to the 75th VE Day celebrations would be apt.
We started with learning the reasons behind the rise of the Third Reich and Hitler's Poland invasion.
I am blessed to be taking care of my grandparents' war artefacts. We looked for their National Registration Identity Cards and discussed the differences between primary and secondary sources.
My Great Grandfather had a stamp collection and we looked through his German stamp collection with Hitler on the design.
The children made their own National Registration Identity Cards
They role-played being in Neville Chamberlain's government in 1939 and deciding which courses of action to prioritise as Britain went to war.
Evacuation.
Aiming to evacuate 3,000,000 children, the government organised gas masks, transport and new homes for inner city children before the expected bombings arrived. We read their stories and looked at government leafelts and postcards for evacuees.
Anderson Shelters
We watched some awesome videos of people discovering Anderson shelters in their back gardens and then we made our own, with some Dig for Victory gardens.
Making ration books
Weighing weekly rations
Making a cheesey pudding pie which was a ration recipe.
Eating it for lunch! It wasn't too bad! Just super cheesey!
Using primary sources to learn how to track Nanny and Grandad's service record in the WAAF and RAF.
More ration recipes
My Nanny never touched another tinned apricot after the end of rations. I bought some to try with the children to see why she disliked them so much during so many years of rationing.
Ballet Girl is our Battle of Britain expert so she spent a morning teaching the younger ones.
Cupcake flags ready for our VE Day celebrations
World War II slogans and propoganda. We referenced current government Covid 19 slogans and information delivery. Mummy gets texts from the government now!
Looking at statistics for how successful the government campaigns were. E.g. in 1939 there were 815,000 allotments. By 1943, after the Dig for Victory campaign, there were 1,400,000 allotments.
We had an interesting morning listening to all the allied and axis powers leaders' speeches to replicate what the citizen of those countries would have heard. We listened to Neville Chamberlain telling the nation that Britain had declared war on Germany, we listened to Franklin D Roosevelt the day after Pearl Harbour; Winston Churchill's victory speech, the Japanese surrender speech etc. Many leaders, many speeches, many languages and accents and very interesting.
The chidren noted each leaders with their flags.
Experimenting with the best materials for Black Out. This ended up being very silly and funny!
Bletchley Park
We've visited Bletchely Park several times before but this time we re-visited online and via code-breaking activities.
The Poetry Society have put together an interesting pack on the brain connection with poetry and code-breaking. The children learnt how to appreciate how their brains recognise patterns and familiar ideas to break codes.
We had a lot of fun with silly words and silly poems.
Learning about telegrams and the telegraph machine.
World War II timeline and vocabulary
Locating allied and axis countries across the world.
Designing an information leaflet for a younger child.
And then we celebrated! We watched a Spitfire fly over on its way to Captain Tom Moore and we social-distance partied with our neighbour who was a child during the war and has told us many stories of Lancasters and unexploded bombs and rationed food.
Thank you Nanny and Grandad for our freedom!
