Comenius REGIO project with the Somme
Location: Willington
Type: Educational project
Durham County Council has been awarded funding together with its French partner in the Somme region of France to support young people’s understanding of the First World War.
Museums, education officers, archivists and schools in both areas will share resources and work together over the project’s two year lifespan. A teachers’ seminar will conclude the project with pupils presenting their research methods as a template for others to adopt. Pivotal to the project is the new Durham at War website and its mapping facility.
Pupils from Parkside Academy have been in contact with a group of young people in the Somme region for the past year using new technologies to contact their partners and share information about a soldier from Willington who went off to fight in the Somme region. The French pupils are researching the life of the civilian population who were caught in the battle zone.
Pupils will consolidate their research with support from the County Archives in preparation for a funded visit to France to meet their French partners face to face. The County Durham pupils will be telling all about the life of two soldiers from Willington; Thomas William Adamson and Fred Purvis. They will also see where Fred’s name is carved on stone at the Thiepval Memorial to the missing of the Somme.
Remembering First World War soldiers
Durham County Council press release 5 September 2014
Support for this project
This project is part of the Comenius Regio Partnerships programme, a great opportunity for local authority linking within Europe:
http://www.britishcouncil.org/comenius-regio-partnerships.htm
Contact
Brian Stobie, International Officer
Durham County Council
03000 268500
[email protected]