The first year of using the WWI topic as part of internal assessment is over. It was a success! 

This year I tied the project to some of my internal assessment at level 1, and chose to craft a 1.5 Writing Portfolio task around Shared Histories. In cooperation with our partner school in Amiens, my year 11 class set up an exchange of letters and other texts that the students from both countries posted on our wiki (one of the last texts written is attached to this post: a poster).

While the actual information exchange was sometimes difficult and took time (due to different term times etc.),  the topic was overall a success. The variety of texts was astounding, and the quality of the written work exceeded my expectations.  I will repeat the topic in 2015 with a new year 11 French class.

Student feedback given on google forms revealed that most students liked the authenticity of the letter writing as well as the variety of topics and text types. Some didn't like the fact they had to use so much war vocabulary, and some weren't all that interested in the war. However, most students' feedback was extremely positive and helpful. Here are some comments:

"The writing topics we did were very good."

"I like the way it was this year. By being able to pretend you are a relative of a solider you are able to write a variety of texts."

Three student comments (thanks, Holly!) inspired me to come up with a second version of the 1.5 task:

"Change it to have like someone writing from the present day to the past, etc. like in the movie The lake house."

"Change the topic because I didn't know much about war time and what peoples lives were like, so it was difficult to write in context"

"Make it more current".

Have a look at both 1.5 tasks below. The full version of the Achievement Standards, including tasks, a range of suggested text types, marking schedules, etc. are attached to this post.

Task 1: Teenage life during the First World War 

For the writing portfolio you will create a fictitious character, a person your age, who is communicating with a person your age in France about a number of things related to World War I which influenced the lives of adolescents in the respective countries. As part of your task, you must imagine to have a relative or friend who went to war in France before you start writing. Seeking information about this person will be part of your letter writing. You write in French, and your partner in France will to respond in English. 

Task 2: Letters from a ghost

Your class will be part of an interdisciplinary project which involves English and French. The set-up of this project is similar to the movie "Lake House": A teenager exchanges letters with a ghost from the past.

Students of English in France create a ficticious (or research a real) character of a person who lived in the early 20th century, and who can give testimony of the things that happened during the First World War in France. This can be a soldier, a child, a teenager or any other person of your choice. This character will be used by the students in France to provide the students in New Zealand with information about a range of topics. The students write letters to the NZ students in English.

The students in New Zealand write from the perspective of a teenager today. They write in French, asking and answering questions, exchanging information and discuss a range of topics with their "ghost".

The aim of the cooperation is to learn more about the history, geography and the lives of the people involved in the war in France and contrast their lives with yours today. By doing this, you will complete your 1.5 Writing portfolio where you collate a range of texts. These may be stored on the wiki "poppelicot", or on google drive

Have fun trying it out!