“Why do wars happen?”

As part of the Global curriculum Year 6 have been looking at “Why Do Wars Happen?” Throughout the term we have looked at the causes of the major wars and if there were perhaps other ways to sort out the problems. Towards the end of term, we learnt about Sadako Sasaki, a young girl who was affected by the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima. Her father told her the ancient Japanese legend that if you fold a thousand paper cranes (origami) you get a wish. Whilst Sadako was in hospital with a terrible illness she tried to fold 1000 paper cranes. With every fold she made good wishes. This week our Learning Objective has been “I can find out if one person’s actions can inspire others to create change for peace.” The children learnt that Sadako’s friends created a peace memorial in Hiroshima for her, and that, even today, thousands of paper cranes are sent to the Sadako peace memorial as part of a massive, beautiful tribute representing countless wishes for peace from children and communities. From their learning, Year 6 all agreed that one person’s actions can inspire others to create change for peace. Yesterday, everyone made their own paper cranes with beautiful message of peace.  

Elena- “I think it was an important experience to learn about world wars and to understand what happened. It was sad and we should all learn from it.” 

Sera-” I think it’s important to understand about the World Wars because it is sad to think that people fight over land”