Good afternoon (here in the UK)!
I've been advised to post this here by one of your fellow gamers (I was actually suggested to go to TMP, but a quick bit of googling very quickly diverted me here instead!). I am well aware that this is my first post to the group, I would really appreciate it if you could take the time to have a read for me? If people feel it would be better posted elsewhere please let me know.
I’m messaging today on behalf of the school where I work. We provide education and support for pupils and families who have been let down by the mainstream education system. Pupils who can show great difficulties in behaviour and in socialisation who come from some of the most deprived areas in our community.
Although we provide the key subjects (Maths, English, ICT) as part of our curriculum we are limited by the needs of the children in how we can get them to access wider subject areas.
One of the ways in we have found is through engaging a number of our pupils in tabletop wargaming. We have been able to link this to areas of the curriculum based around AQA unit awards in history as well as the maths and literacy skills needed to play and the important social aspects of wargaming. as a result we have found we can ensure our students will be leaving us with certification in a variety of fields of history including WW1 and 2, dark ages, ECW, ancients (romans and greeks mainly) and medieval Europe.
Through using wargames (up to now Flames of War) we have been able to give our pupils hands on experience with representations of the peoples of the time and then built in educational presentation and involvement (which the handful of rules and sourcebooks I own has been really useful) as we play through the games. This has been especially useful in modules covering WW2, and we are due to be looking at modules on Roman and medieval warfare and conflicts in Europe (Napoleonic) as well as continuing the WW2 sessions as some of the pupils have requested we look at Bolt Action.
Unfortunately at the moment the number of pupils we can involve in the sessions at any one time is limited by my own collection as the pupils do not own anything of their own barring some Flames of War that was kindly donated by Battlefront, so I struggle to get more than two pupils involved at any one time which then has an impact on the engagement as we are limited to one session a week.
Because nothing ever happens unless you take the chance and ask, I thought I'd approach the community on behalf on of the school and our pupils as I've found the gaming community will often rally around projects like this, especially when it comes to working with children who we support.
I know its cheeky, but for our pupils, does anyone have anything in their lead and plastic mountains or superfluous books that they can spare to provide the opportunity for us to continue to build on this aspect of our support and education?
We are seeing measurable improvement in the academic and social skills and behaviours of our pupils as a result of the limited gaming they’ve been able to take part in with improved relationships between their peers and a reduction in any negative incidents in free time as the children focus their attention on the game and stay later after school reducing the incidence of concerns in the community.
I have included links to our website so you can verify that I am who I'm saying I am and also the work we have been able to do with Battlefront who were amazing in being able to support us in developing our WW2 sessions.
http://www.pivot-group.uk/the-pivot-academy/http://www.pivot-group.uk/team/paul-sutcliffe/https://www.flamesofwar.com/hobby.aspx?art_id=6401I shared this post out over a couple of the facebook groups yesterday and the response so far has been amazing for the pupils, including from the editor of War-games Soldiers and Strategy and Footsore Miniatures / Warbanner. One of the group suggested I add an Amazon wishlist that I've had the pupils come up with:
http://amzn.eu/6u0EJAv.
I appreciate you having taken the time to read over this post and fully understand if this is not something you can support, at the very least hopefully it’s a positive story for how wargames and our hobby is making a difference with our young people.