St. John's War Memorial Tablets
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 St. John's Football Team 1911-2 |
One of our youngsters at St. John’s, Sara James, together with two friends, won first prize out of 1000 students who had entered a recent TV competition in Channel 4’s Lost Generation season. Entries were open to students aged 11-16, working in groups of three or five to create a short project about World War One.
One of the documentaries in the TV series was ‘The Somme’ and ‘Not Forgotten’ presented by Ian Hislop. Competition entrants were encouraged to think of the Great War from the point of view of the young people who had left to join the war effort and never returned. The students could either ‘Adopt a Tommy’ or ‘Adopt a Memorial’ and uncover the story behind the name(s) of the lost lives.
Sara, with her friends Rebecca Smith and Zeenat Pelaria, decided to adopt the war memorial dedicated to the lost lives at St. John’s. The three 14 year olds represented the Chadwell Heath Foundation School and were up against GCSE students from the best private and grammar schools from all over England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland.
After obtaining some information from Lester’s historical research of St. John’s they obtained more information at the church, and also on the internet using sites such as the Commonwealth War Graves Commission, 1837 Online and the Western Front Association. Their competition entry, along with all the others, were judged by a panel of historians, writers, teachers and others involved in Channel 4’s history programmes.
They won a ClipBank History Library worth £700 for their school’s history department, which will enable everyone to obtain further wide-ranging historical materials about the two World Wars. There will also be a VIP trip for Sara’s class of around 30 students, along with some humanities teachers, to the Imperial War Museum in London.
If you have access to a computer and the internet, the winning entry and more information about the competition can be found at www.channel4.com/lostgenerationlearning followed by the Competition hyperlink. Alternatively, see Sara and she will show you a printed version which includes photos of the church memorials. What a great achievement!