Any teachers of KS2 who can help me handle this?

[scrappydappydoo]

DD is about to go into yr6 and has just had a complete meltdown. Her topic this term is ww2 and she is terrified of talking about war because she's scared it's all going to happen again and because she 'doesn't want to talk about death'. She is genuinely worried about how she she is going to cope in class.
This is the first I've heard about it so we're going to try and help her at home and I'm going to try and contact her teacher on Monday to talk it through with her but I don't know what I'm going to say or what help the school can be. I mean she can't leave the classroom everytime they talk about ww2 as all their work will be based around it but not sure what can be done to help in the few days before school starts.

Could you perhaps do some pre researching/ teaching at home before school? Not necessarily history related but perhaps via art, literature, food etc during WW2. Do you have any family members who lived during that time? Perhaps visit a museum beforehand (depending on where you live)...

Definitely let the teacher know - at the very least they can tell you when it’s timetabled for, they might not even have history in the first week back. Maybe you, teacher and DD could sit down together after school one day and have a chat about what’s planned.

Sorry - just realised it’s topic-based so not just history. Even so they might be able to share some plans. There’s a big difference between reading the war poets and having fun making recipes using rationed ingredients. A lot of it won’t be distressing at all (hopefully!)

DS 'did' WW2 in year 6 and it was mostly based around evacuees, Anderson shelters, rationing and black outs. They didnt seem to focus on Concentration Camps and death that much.

Yes, it’ll likely be a focus on life for children in WW2 and what the impact was for them. Evacuation, rationing, blackout, maybe Blitz, School life, perhaps reading Goodnight Mr Tom or The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas.

Perhaps you could reassure her from the perspective we’ve moved on so much technologically and internationally that a war of this kind is unlikely - blah blah blah. Whether you believe it or not...?

Thanks for the replies. We sat down and had a long chat and we watched the newsround video about when the news upsets you. I just don't know what to suggest for in the classroom. There is no way she could handle the boy in the striped pyjamas but stuff about evacuees is fine ( my grandmother was an evacuee and she knew her when she was little).

So then you’ll have to speak to the teacher and agree that if she gets upset she can have a time out card to go and sit in X room doing X for the remainder of that particular lesson.