War and Freedom: First World War centenary project

[Guest SweetPatootee]

Dear Great War Forum

We are London-based oral historians and producers of Educational resources. Our latest resource is being developed in collaboration with the Open University (Dr. Chris Williams) to support teaching and learning (Schools KS2 to Adult Education) around First World War themes (direct and inter-related study) – now given added focus by the 2014-2018 commemorations. Our subject is the British Caribbean experience in the First World War era, focusing on the British West Indies Regiment.

We are keen to do what we can to create a mainstream resource that also supports the work of Supplementary teaching and learning – for example, in the areas of Literacy, ESOL, History, Citizenship and PSHE. We welcome your feedback at this initial stage - we will happily follow up any recommendations for direct contact.

This project will make use of our collection of material developed in the course of a previous treatment of this subject, an educational documentary for Channel 4. The key assets are oral testimony interviews with Black Caribbean veterans

We now have a selection of UK schools on board to work with us on producing the War & Freedom digital resource. We aim to develop the resource in 3 phases of consultation with a broad range of potential users and interest group in schools, learning and teaching – reflecting both EMAS, and mainstream Schools Improvement Teaching and Learning (KS2 to Adult Education and Life-Long-Learners). We hope to start the first phase in September next year (2014)

We believe our collection and proposed development have strong flexibility and relevance for complementing and comparisons with existing studies of personal, community and national experience and impact because:

• The British West Indies Regiment (1915-1919) enlisted and deployed 15,204 Black volunteers.
  
• Our oral testimonies span pre-war memories, wartime experiences that include basic training in Britain, trench warfare on the Western Front, desert warfare against the Turks in Palestine, and demobilization
  
• We extend the inclusive focus created by study materials dealing with Black British enlistee Walter Tull
  
• We enable additional inclusion in mainstream study materials and lesson plans (eg. One of my great uncles served in the British West Indies Regiment – his record is listed in the National Archives recruitment files, another of my great uncles joined the merchant navy in 1914)
  

Our working outline for the project is copied below. We look forward to hearing your thoughts

Best wishes

Tony T

Rebecca Goldstone

Open University/Sweet Patootee

Edited 10 April , 2013 by SweetPatootee
Font size

[stevem49]

Welcome but a font I could read would be nice

[keithmroberts]

I have edited the font size but no further information is attached.

Note to poster, best to upload a file in RTF format. We don't accept some advanced formats that can contain macros. You can do this by going to EDIT your post, and then use the option of full edit which allows you to upload a file. That will be the easiest way to add your detailed information.

Keith Roberts

[Alan Tucker]

Looks like a very interesting project. Good luck.

[Guest SweetPatootee]

Many thanks Alan. We will post reports of our progress and details of the events programme in due course

[SteveMarsdin]

Good morning,

i wish you every success with your project. The only point I would raise is the case of Walter Tull which I think needs treating carefully. Please see this thread (if you haven't already);

http://1914-1918.invisionzone.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=191480&hl=%2Bwalter+%2Btull

Behind the enflamed rhetoric are some pertinent points which you may wish to consider..

[Andy Wade]

Looks very interesting! Any chance of seeing the working outline please?

[CarylW]

On a recent trip to Antigua, (daughter married there) we visited the small museum in St John's where they had a display devoted to those who had fought in WW1 &WW2. I took a photo of the list they had up for 'Antiguans who fought for Britain WW1& WW2'. I posted the list in the thread here 'Carribean soldiers and units?' :

http://1914-1918.inv...67#entry1668310

You might find the whole thread to be of interest, if you haven't already seen it. There is also a photo posted by another member of one of the soldiers (unidentified)

Good luck with the project. I look forward to reading more about it