Hello blog readers, 

This unit has been a big one and I’m here to break down every detail to you before we move onto our final project.  From starting the project and learning about World War 1 to finishing the project and showing kids our work. 

Driving Question 

How did WWI Impact Canada’s Identity?

Before spring break our class started to learn about WWI. First we started by asking questions about WWI and brainstorming them. Then Ms.Maxwell brought to us our Driving Question for this unit. Our driving question for this unit was “how did WWI impact Canada’s identity?” Now that we had our driving question for the unit we started by learning the basics about WWI and how it made a domino effect.

Creative Book Report 

One week before we were off for spring break we got a book report project. We had three book choices to extend our understanding of WWI. All three books were easy reads about WWI. The three choices were War Horse, Private Peaceful, and Generals Die in Bed. Most people picked Generals Die in Bed but I picked the book “Private Peaceful”. Over spring break everyone had to read there book. We also had to pick which project out of 5 choices. This was a to display our understanding of the novel we read and for the teacher to make sure we did all read the book we picked. 

Soon spring break was over and I had finally finished the book. We had a few days to make our first draft of the book report. I had picked to draw a scene of the novel. My first draft was very rough and immediately when I handed in I could see multiple things I wanted to change. I had looked at it as if it was a peers work and for me looking at my work as if it was someone’s else really helps me to critique and revise my work. I also got some critique from a peer which was helpful. I changed lots of things and handed it in again multiple times. At the time I liked the outcome mostly because I was so excited to be heading to Ottawa and wanted it over with but I have this thing were I can never go back and look at my old assignments and videos because I want to change everything about it. Overall this mini project was easy and we had a fair amount of time to do it which was good. I didn’t want to do homework during spring break but reading a book is not that bad especially when the book was easy to read. 

Ottawa

We were about to head to Ottawa to learn all about the war but first we needed some knowledge so we wouldn’t be lost. To not be totally confused in Ottawa we got this small WWI battles chart assignment that we did. Soon we had gone to Ottawa and back. I don’t want to spend to much time talking about the Ottawa trip because I have a whole post for it that you can check out here. 

Let me just give you a run through of what we learned in Ottawa. We learned all about every battles of  WWI. We learned the struggle of the people at the time like the soldiers, women, and even the children. Also we had a great time and got to experience so much. By far one of my favourite trips and it wasn’t even a real plp trip. Encounters with Canada gave everyone a experience they would never forget and personally I know I learn better this way.

WWI Info 

Most people believe that WWI started by the assassination of Franz Ferdinand. Franz Ferdinand was the archduke of Austria-Hungary and he got assassinated in Sarajevo. When the war started the two sides thought they were ready for battle. Little did they know they were unprepared for the bloodshed that was about to happen. The two sides were the Triple Entente and the Triple Alliance. Canada was on the Triple Entente side because Great Britain was on that side and that made Canada automatically join the war and join that side. The battles of WWI started with the battle of Ypres, then the battle of Somme, then the battle of Vimy Ridge which was known as a Canadian milestone, and finally Passchendaele. Now that you have some basic knowledge on WWI, I can move onto the next assignment.

Franz Ferdinand⬆️

Shattered Ground

We were about to start our project but our teacher felt like we should do this one last assignment. The assignment was to read this comic book with fictional characters but helped us more deeply understand what life was like in war. After we read the very short six chapters of the comic we had to make a pages document and write a reflection on every chapter. This little assignment did not take long to do. I basically only worked on it in class. It just made me more clear about how hard it was to be a soldier and how many risks they had to take everyday. 

WWI Comic

The time was here, we all were waiting for this final project the one our teacher had been dropping hints about. For this project we were going to make a comic book. Have you heard the saying “a picture is worth a thousand words”, well we acted upon that and decided to make a comic. We were able to pick any interest we had about WWI and make a comic about it. Our comic had to have a tittle page, 2-3 pages of comic, and a story at the end. Also at the end of the project when everyone finished there comic the teacher would make it into a book and we had to go down to cove cliff to share to the grade 6 and 7’s. 

The topic I decided to do was the Treaty of Versailles. I picked this topic because no one else picked it an it is an important factor in WWI. It’s the treaty that ends the war so it should most likely be mentioned in the book. I started to research my topic and I learnt a lot of things about my topic.

Before I start putting my comic together I’m going to write a brief paragraph about the Treaty of Versailles.  On June 28, 1919 a very important peace treaty was signed, the Treaty of Versailles. The impact of the Treaty of Versailles was important because it was the final doors of WW1 closing. The treaty was signed in Versailles France hence the name of the treaty. Germany surrendering ended the war but the signing of this treaty was the formal and official ending of World War 1. Germany and the Allied Nations all came to France to sign the treaty. The Allies were mostly able to gain from the war but Germany could not gain anything. Germany only surrendered and signed the treaty because they had no realistic chance of winning the war.

Now I needed to put this knowledge in a comic and make it interesting enough for kids to want to read it. Thinking about my target audience I started to get to work in making my comic. When I first finished my first draft, I did the thing were I pretend my work is a peers work so I can give myself critique. I realized a lot of mistakes and did all the revisions I knew I should do. After I made the story page. My story page was about David Lloyd George. He was the prime minister at the time of WWI and he helped the treaty get negotiated and signed. Soon it was time the for the teacher to give me critique on Showbie and as soon as I got the critique I revised. Finally I got some peer critique and I was able to make some revisions after that. Once everyone was happy with there work we handed in our comics to our teacher and she made a book out of them. 

A draft

Some peer critique I got

The Final Comic

Ms.Maxwell payed 50 dollars and bought a colour version of the book that we had planned to give to cove cliff teacher but Ms.Maxwell made another copy of the book in black and white to give to them instead. 

May 9th the day was finally upon us. We walked to Cove cliff with our iPads in our hand ready to teach some kids about our topic. I was imagining that we would be presenting to only one grade 7 each, and it turns out that we were each presenting to 4-5 grade 6 and 7’s. For each group we had to present our topic for around 20 minutes. We switched groups three times so we each got three groups of kids.

My first time I got a great group of boys who had many questions were genuinely interested in my topic and I didn’t feel like I ran out of things to say. They are all very interested in plp and are going plp next year. Then my second group was a bunch of girls who felt like they didn’t learn much so I had lots to teach them and for the last five minutes I let them ask questions and they didn’t have any or they were shy. My last group of kids were all boys and they pretty much knew everything so we had a lot of extra time after I told them about my topic. So about 10 minutes we just talked about the difference between elementary and high school.

Overall this unit has been an amazing one. I learned so much about WWI, the battles, and Canada’s Identity. I have come to the conclusion that WWI has effected Canada’s identity deeply. This project has taught me so much about the treaty and I’m glad we did this project. This unit had taught me everything I needed to know about WWI. I learned about the soldiers, the battles, the women, the treaty, and Canada’s identity. I’m proud of the comic I made and the work I was able produce, now it’s time for the final project before summer.