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WW1 trench for school project


Andy350

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My nephew has been tasked with creating something in that reflects life and conditions of WW1.  He's decided that he would like to create a trench, nice and simple!!  Does anyone have any experience of doing this.  I'm thinking cardboard and lot of lolly pop sticks.

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44 minutes ago, Black Knight said:

1. decide on scale

2. What age group? Having worked with various KS1 / KS2 children and craft projects this is key.

 

When I read the thread heading I thought this was going to be a 1:1 recreation!

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6 minutes ago, Paul821 said:

2. What age group? Having worked with various KS1 / KS2 children and craft projects this is key.

 

When I read the thread heading I thought this was going to be a 1:1 recreation!

13 years.  1:1 that would impress the teacher!  

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As your nephew is at secondary school I would expect the overall project to involve more that just a simple trench. They will probably be looking for more "interpretation" than realism.

 

The basic trench could be polystyrene packaging, plaster and lolly sticks but you would need to express either the emotions of war, or the reality death & mud.

Take a look at 

 

https://www.iwm.org.uk/history/the-powerful-western-front-paintings-of-the-nash-brothers

 

scroll down to Oppy Wood, 1917. Evening,  Add a few twigs for dead/blasted tress etc, cooking for  corrugated iron etc..

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I did a scratch built a WWI trench a few months ago:

 

The base is insulation foam – found on a skip and very easy to carve. It's covered in soil from the garden (sieved, cooked and mixed with PVA glue)

The boards are coffee stirrers and the posts are skewers.

The corrugated sheets are from takeaway foil containters.

The sand bags are Milliput (which I forgot about when I said the base cost me nothing, but the amount of Milliput I use was probably 50p worth).

 

It did take more than two days but it would be possible to simplify - if you sealed the foam with dilute PVA you could just paint the foam brown, for example. I did use many photos and diagrams that I found online, so it is based on real trenches, although it is a sort of amalgamation of several trenches. 

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27 minutes ago, Gorby said:

I did a scratch built a WWI trench a few months ago:

 

The base is insulation foam – found on a skip and very easy to carve. It's covered in soil from the garden (sieved, cooked and mixed with PVA glue)

The boards are coffee stirrers and the posts are skewers.

The corrugated sheets are from takeaway foil containters.

The sand bags are Milliput (which I forgot about when I said the base cost me nothing, but the amount of Milliput I use was probably 50p worth).

 

It did take more than two days but it would be possible to simplify - if you sealed the foam with dilute PVA you could just paint the foam brown, for example. I did use many photos and diagrams that I found online, so it is based on real trenches, although it is a sort of amalgamation of several trenches. 

Thanks, you're set look brilliant.

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I saw They Shall Not Grow Old on a flight last week.

 

The movie isn't suitable for a 13 year old, but the trailers are OK. They show some simpler trenches, a lot less structure, literally a dug trench, some bits of wood structure, and water, a lot of water, at the bottom. Perhaps some paper figures standing ankle deep. 

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9 hours ago, dnl42 said:

I saw They Shall Not Grow Old on a flight last week.

 

The movie isn't suitable for a 13 year old, but the trailers are OK. They show some simpler trenches, a lot less structure, literally a dug trench, some bits of wood structure, and water, a lot of water, at the bottom. Perhaps some paper figures standing ankle deep. 

interesting perspective. some of the soldiers were not much older than that.

 

I had a cousin, since passed away, right after WW II, that lied about his age of 14 - said he was 17 and his father signed the papers, enlisted in the United States Marines. went through hell & back in the Korean War, and spent the next 30 plus years serving, mostly overseas, but short in-between stretches here in the States.

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