Scottish Catholic Observer

The Catholic primary beat schools from across Scotland to win the Royal British Legion competition to learn about the conflict, which will be marked in centenary events throughout this year.

Pupils were tasked with investigating a local war memorial and creating a film about what they learned. The winning St Andrew’s film illustrated the pain and suffering of WWI soldiers by having pupils write and read letters they imagine soldiers lost in the trenches would have written to their parents. Pupil Mia Rinaldi narrated a poem she wrote over footage of St Joseph’s College Chapel, which houses a roll of honour to people who have died in war.

After being short-listed in the top four for the competition, St Andrew’s pupils (above) learned they had won the award, and will now travel to London where they will show their movie to veterans and tour a Royal Navy warship.

Joanne Aitken, a teacher at St Andrew’s, said the schoolchildren came up with the idea for the film themselves, deciding to dress up in costume as soldiers after discarding slightly less practical ideas such as digging trenches in the school playground.

“They were so engaged,” Mrs Aitken said. “They learned everything form how the war started to the politics at the time, who was involved and the life in the trenches. They already understood about the war but having a link to the local community really brought it home to them. The kids will tell you this was their favourite thing they have ever done.”

Mrs Aitken said the pupils were initially reluctant to win the competition as the prize trip was only for ten people, but after the school announced that they would fund the London visit for all the children involved they became ‘so excited.’

“They feel like local celebrities because they have been in the paper and on the radio,” Mrs Aitken added.

Kevin Gray, CEO of the Royal British Legion Scotland, congratulated the school and said the winning film ‘showed how much the pupils had engaged with their history and war memorial heritage through the stories of real people.’

Keith Brown, Minister for Transport and Veterans, helped judge the competition applauded the children for their creativity. “With more than 70 entries to choose from it was clear to see that young people have a thirst for knowledge about our history,” Mr Brown said. “Innovative competitions like this are an excellent way of teaching children about WWI.”

As part of the competition, all the research from every entered school will be submitted to a national online archive of war memorials to help catalogue, preserve and protect war memorials across Scotland.

The competition victory came as part of a week of success for St Andrew’s with pupils from the school picking up a number of different awards. The school’s table tennis boys and girls teams won a local tournament after victory evaded them for the previous 20 years while P6 pupil Alasdair Little won a local badminton championship, making him the best P6 in the region. St Andrew’s were also crowned the winners of a football tournament involving teams from across Dumfries and children from P6 and P7 completed the school’s accomplishments by winning a number of cross country trophies and medals.