Trench warfare Project
Here is a reminder of the work you have already been set:
The Western Front: A project on Trench Warfare
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teaching page
1. Title Page: Marks will be awarded for a relevant and creative presentation. You need to include an investigative title.5 marks
2. Introduction: Explain how fighting in the trenches began. Explain the term stalemate. Give a clear outline of the aims of your project. 6 marks
3. Content:
A. Cross-section diagram of a trench with labels and a brief description. 8 marks
B.
Conditions in the trenches. You need to describe the diet, health and hygiene, the weather, leisure time and the bombardments. 8 marksC. Casualties. Use Excel to create a bar graph to show the number of deaths and casualties for both sides. Write an evaluation of your findings. 8 marks
D. The nature of fighting: Describe the role of the generals, the weapons used, the camaraderie and the effects of shell shock. 8 marks
OR
E. Case-study of a battle: Plans, tactics, events, results and evaluation of success. 8 marks
OR
F. War psychology: Study some war poetry to explain and describe the emotions and feelings of the soldiers. 8 marks
4. Conclusion: Give a brief outline of the end of the fighting on the western front. Summarise what you have discovered. Have you answered the question you set yourself in the title. 7 marks
TOTAL 50 MARKS.
Optional section
You have already completed tasks 1, 2, and 3A. Now you are going to tackle 3B with the help of
computer hyperlinks to the Internet. When you see anything underlined you can click on it to get more information.
WARNING!
DO NOT COPY AND PASTE HUGE CHUNKS. USE THE INFORMATION TO MAKE NOTES OR WRITE YOUR OWN VERSION IN WORD.
What was the
food like? (The picture on the left shows soldiers cooking in the trenches.)
Describe the
weather conditions.
There is a huge amount to learn about
Health and Hygiene. If you click on Health, use the section on 'Life in the Trenches' to look up the health problems of Dysentery, Trench Foot (see picture|), Shell shock, Amputations and Self –Inflicted wounds. The Hygiene problems are covered in the sections on Body lice, Trench rats and Latrines (next section on the 'Trench System'). You might get some ideas on how the soldiers spend their Leisure time by looking HereTrench Foot make a diagram or a chart to show its causes, effects and attempted cures:
|
Causes |
Symptoms/effects |
Cures |
Or, make a Spider diagram using some of these labels:
Causes
Symptoms
Cures
When you work on
Body lice read the soldiers accounts to find out how they tried to relieve the itching. Explain why lice were such a significant problem and why ‘delousing’ didn’t work. You can copy and paste the cartoon if you want to!
You are now ready to tackle 3C. Here are the statistics you need:
Casualties in the First World War
|
Country |
Killed |
Wounded |
|
Germany |
1,900,000 |
4,250,000 |
|
Russia |
1,700,000 |
4,950,000 |
|
France |
1,400,000 |
2,500,000 |
|
Austria-Hungary |
1,300,000 |
3,620,000 |
|
Britain and Emp |
998,000 |
2,300,000 |
|
Italy |
615,000 |
947,000 |
|
Turkey |
350,000 |
450,000 |
|
Romania |
340,000 |
510,000 |
|
Bulgaria |
95,000 |
155,000 |
|
Serbia |
50,000 |
134,000 |
|
Belgium |
44,000 |
45,000 |
|
Portugal |
7,500 |
14,000 |
|
Greece |
5,500 |
9,000 |
|
Montenegro |
3,500 |
6,000 |
Using these statistics your task is to create a bar chart in Excel, which you need to open now. When you are in Excel copy the statistics into the columns. Highlight them,

click on the chart wizard (above) then you can choose the Bar graph option and click on the ‘next’ box to put in labels and so on. When you are happy click on ‘finish’. You may need to ask for help with this. In order to get all the countries fully labelled it is necessary to change the font to ‘Times New Roman’ and alter the point size to 8. In your evaluation, explain which alliance had the most casualties and which countries suffered the most. Remember that these figures are only estimates!
Now you have to decide whether you are going to tackle D, E or F. You will find plenty of ideas for the first two
Here if you look at 'The Trench System' or the 'Trench Warfare' sections. For D you must look at the role of Haig. Create a timeline for his life. Look at his quotations and explain why Haig became known as 'the butcher of the Somme'. If you're interested in Weapons look at this page. If you are interested in F then look at Poetry.Now you have to write your conclusion to finish your project. Perhaps you could go to this site to find out why we wear poppies today to remember those that died in the First World War. Well done!
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