A debt of honour...

During the months of September to November 2015, assemblies in my school will focus on remembrance relating to the First World War culminating in a special Armistice Day assembly. In conjunction with this focus a possible approach could be to introduce the children to the growth of air power leading to the development of total war and the impact on the home front. My choice of the ‘It worked for me' assembly focus follows the traditional themes of remembrance. Here are a couple more ideas which could be incorporated within this assembly or in those leading up to Remembrance Day.

Who would you choose to commemorate?

On a recent trip to Tyne Cot Cemetery in Belgium, which is the largest British war cemetery in the world, members of my party were each given a small wooden cross on which they could write their own message of remembrance. We were then invited to choose one of the many memorials on which to place our cross. This was a very emotive task as we considered who should be the recipient. We were guided by the messages on the memorials, local links, the names of the fallen and so on. In school you could show the children a variety of memorials and outline the stories of the soldiers so they too could make this choice. The children could then compare their decisions and consider how challenging a task this is and how important it is to remember all those who died...