DS 7 has been asked to pretend he is in the battle fields and about to go into war and write a letter home to his family for homework

[Lemith]

This terms topic is ww1, but this piece of work really takes the

I don't want my ds to be thinking about what it is like to go into war. This topic is not suitable for someone so young, war is a terrible thing and the people that survived it were mentally and physically scarred for life.

Aibu?

Its not really the death that bothers me. I wouldn't mind so much if it was about an ill person going into surgery the next day where they have a 50 50 chance of living. I'd think its a bit too young for that.

What does bother me is the war aspect and that I don't agree with killing each other on battlefields. Sending many people barely adults to go and kill other young men as cannon fodder.

Oof. When I was nine or ten and studying WW2, we had to pretend that we were the pilot who dropped the bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki and write an account of the mission. It was only in later years it occurred to me what a horrendously inappropriate thing that was to set a bunch of children to do. The only explanation I can think of is that the teacher wanted to impress upon us the horrors of it, but we had already learned about it in detail and several kids got very upset. I don't know what extra she thought we'd get out of doing that.

It would be much more appropriate for him to imagine he's being evacuated and write a letter about the new place he's in, how he's settling and how he feels. Seven year olds should be relating to other seven year olds...

I've taken my 6 year old to so many museums, pretend trenches, and any event I can. I want him to understand what those men and boys went through for us to have our freedom. I don't want to scare or upset him, just have understanding, respect & empathy. At the moment he's hugely interested in the evacuees in ww2.

He's not being told what he should think - he's not being told about the bits that could actually scar a child (awful disfigurement, war rape etc). He's being asked to think about how he would feel, ergo, he's only going to think about it in a way that he's already innately mature enough to! So probably scared about being hurt in quite an abstract way, homesick and cold and uncomfortable.

There's loads of kids books that talk about conflict that didn't scar me! We had The Silver Sword read to us at school at that age. Would it be better to totally shield children and then suddenly dump the whole brutal reality of life on them at x age? Of course not. What age? And how would they deal with it with zero preparation?

YABU.

ooh the Silver Sword. Brilliant book - about Jewish children escaping the Nazis. I read it when I was a child, and read it with DS when he was about 8. He and I both cried at the end. He still sees it as his favourite book.

I don't get why some people think we have to shield kids from emotion. Sometimes those same people then ask why many of our young people lack empathy.

Teaching often uses an approach where a topic is looked at in a lower year, and then revisited in a different way later. So WW2 - you might look at evacuation and the Home Front in year 5, but look at the Holocaust later in secondary school.

So I still think YABU.

I have to add: Zlata's Diary was started when she was 10. She's about the same age as me and I read it when it was newly published. I very much hope you give it to your DS when he is about that age. Far from scarring me when I read it it was a fascinating and formative experience which led me to travel round Croatia and Bosnia a decade later and meet more of her generation over there whose entire childhoods had been lived in refugee camps.

Of course 7 is old enough to be taught the very basics of WW1. Otherwise what's the point in teaching anyone anything until they are able to understand the full complexity of everything?

You can't understand Moles? No chemistry for you until you're 17. What do you mean you don't know any Latin? No Romans for you until you do!

Show your son this ad (Sainsburys Christmas 2014 ad)

My slightly older children have learned about war at school but this sort of work is a good starting place for imagining what war is like in a way that is suitable for young children.

Dc2 did this topic last year at school (aged 8) I thought the teacher handled it really well and in an age appropriate way - it was in no way glorified but dc wasn't at all traumatised either so I think they got the level of detail right. The message given was definitely that this was something we should never let happen again.

Most of history is bloody - we wouldn't teach any history at all to 7yo unless we adapted it to make it age appropriate.

that I don't agree with killing each other on battlefields. Sending many people barely adults to go and kill other young men as cannon fodder.

I don't agree with this either. But this exercise could arguably encourage your son and his classmates to think about exactly this; rather than just covering the 'exciting' parts of war, they'll get some insight into how actual people might feel when they actually go to war. From there could come discussions and thinking about whether that is OK.

Sorry, but I think "for goodness sake!"

Yes war is a terrible thing. That's why its important children are taught about it!

Second, they are letting the children take the lead in imagining what its like. They aren't taking them on a tour of the trauma unit or discussing PTSD.

Your son will only imagine what he can imagine.

As for the suitability of WW1 as a topic, my personal opinion is that all primary school children in the UK should know why we have Poppy Day.

I'm fascinated to hear that primary school history should be chronological now. My children found KS1 history very dull (Florence Nightingale, Fire of London etc) where as they found KS2 history much more interesting (Ancient Greeks, Tudors, Titanic, Egyptians etc)

My DS did WW1 at the start of Y2, at age 6. He did a similar piece of work, plus poetry about experiences in the trenches.

Can't say I thought about complaining, some of the pieces the class produced were amazing.

If I was discussing this homework with my 7 year old, I'd be talking about stuff like

• What kind of food do you think you'd eat bearing in mind you can't cook, refrigerate or go to a supermarket?
• How cold do you think it would be being outdoors all day every day with no bath or kettle?
• How muddy do you think you'd be without a washing machine or bath?
• How would you feel with no Internet, TV or phone?
• How would people pass the time without books, Internet, TV, phones, toys?
• How would you feel when food was rationed and you wouldn't see food like bananas for many years?

My first thought wasn't that it was inappropriate, but that it was way too difficult for a 7 year old!

I read an interesting study on how fairy tales are gruesome to help children deal with scary emotions in a safe way and our modern obsession of sanitising them (eg none of the three little pigs is eaten) isn't helping our children's emotional development

The natural step up from fairy tales is history and starting to deal with the fact that these emotions are 'real world'. A lot of kids will have experienced these emotions first hand of course and apparently the fact that they can contextualise it from these 'pretend' emotions can be helpful.

Unfortunately I can't find the article I read but I thought it was really interesting!

I can think of lots of stories children are taught from a young age (eg the Easter story) where there is no hiding the gruesomeness.

I'd love my ds to get homework like this although he's only 4 so we've got a while to go. It sounds like a wonderful way to get them to empathise and put themselves in someone else's shoes.
As others have said, I'm sure it's being done in an age appropriate way. stompy, I really like your post. They're great points to get them thinking about life back then.

Fwiw I can't really get worked up about 7 year olds learning about WWI when there are many many children, some much younger than 7, living in terror like this on a daily basis.

darbarnensover.aftonbladet.se/chapter/english-version/

I completely agree BYOSnowman. 'Mild peril' beats the shit out of real-life serious peril, and gives them some practice in coping with it.

BYO Snowman- I agree.

Most 7/8 year olds will have watched Star Wars, Dr Who, Frozen or other programmes with mild peril and will have played these out it in the playground or in their imagination.

tdlr yes this is my feeling too, there are accessible ways to teach about wars in the modern era, but asking a 7 year old to write about going to war isn't one of them.

I don't have a problem with gore in fairy tales. They are stories. We are talking here about a war in which a million british soldiers died, often unnecessarily, and many of those who survived lived with the consequences for the rest of their lives. I think sanitising lessons about conditions on the front, in order to make them teachable to 7 year olds, is wrong.

I'm 27, I have a postcard in an old memory box from school. Each year in school was devoted to a specific historical period, egyptians, romans, greeks, anyway, we had a WW2 one about the same age. It's a postcard written to my mum, I'm a refugee and I miss her and I am scared, I think we watched Goodnight Mr Tom a couple of years later too....

I thought awwww how sad, when I read it (mainly because my mum is no longer with us). Never thought it was inappropriate.

But it doesn't have to be sanitised so it is all jolly hockey sticks. My 8yo had a conversation with his grandmother about how her grandfathers alcoholism (borne from a need to suppress memories of ww 1) destroyed his life. Children of that age are incredibly perceptive and understand a lot more about the human condition than we give them credit for.

If it is taught appropriately children will understand the senseless nature of war.