Alright so we are back and better than ever and this time I will be reviewing with you the latest installment in my grade 10 education experience. The last unit that we have just finished was about  World War 2. The unit that we did previously was the World War 1 unit so it was fitting that we did World War 2 next. If you would like to read my World War 1 Blog click HERE. Alright now back to World War 2, the project for this unit was to put together a website or a web page that would be based around a country during that time that we chose.

So our teacher Ms Maxwell sent out a Google survey at the beginning of the unit asking what three countries we would like to research during this unit. I picked Italy, Germany, and France in no particular order. After we sent in our preferences we were put in groups of three or four. Ms. Maxwell put me in a group with Alex and Mimi, and I would make up France.

Alright now that we had our groups we could start the project. But wait, first we had to learn a bit, as a class, about what really happened in World War 2. Ms.Maxwell taught us about significant battles such as the Blitz, Operation Barbarossa and the famous Battle of Dunkirk. As well as starting to do the project and simultaneously learning about what really went on in World War 2, we had to read a book about the War. I chose a New York Times bestseller called Unbroken. If you would like to read my book review click HERE. Also, somewhat of a side lesson to the World War 2 unit was that we learned how to properly use citations. For the website we had to learn how to properly citate websites, videos, and books.

One of the cool things that I like about PLP is the first hand encounters that you get when you are learning about a topic. An example of this is the memory project that we did in relation to the World War 2 unit. The memory project was a podcast that we had to create from a discussion that we had with a World War 2 veteran. A German World War 2 veteran named Helmut Lemke came to our class to discuss what the War was like for him. Our class got to ask some questions of Helmut and he gave some very interesting answers. As well, Helmut told a bunch of amazing stories such as his time on the Russian front. If you are interested in listening to his story about the Russian front feel free to listen below.

Now that we had all of the important background information, it was time to move on to the main aspect of this unit which was the website. My group and I started with a template of a website that we used from  Weebly which is a website creator. We played around with different versions of the template until we found one that we liked. We added all of the research information that we had done earlier in the unit. After we had proofread and finalized the website it was time to do everyone’s favourite PLP activity, critique our class mates’ work. We looked at other websites and gave some feedback on what we thought they could do to improve it. The feedback that we got was

After we had made some revisions to our websites, it was time to move on to the last stage of the unit. Our website consists of a Before German Occupation page, a During German Occupation page and an After German occupation page. This was presented to the entire class as well as District 44’s district administer Kathleen Barter. Overall I thought that this project was very informative and a great way to mix technology with learning and real life information. I applaud Ms.Maxwell for a great job designing and teaching us the project.

Click Here to view our website.