Remembrance Day with Intermediate Students

I loathe the sound bytes of the dearth of information young people have about Remembrance Day. Many create their own responses to the day, with ceremonies in every school. Some attend the bigger ceremonies, e.g., Ottawa's Memorial. School kids turned out at our local memorial in Perth, Ontario. One nudged another pair to take off their hats in respect. It was a wonderful moment.

In 2001, students wrote letters of appreciation to our Peacekeepers serving overseas. CO1 Dennis Irwin, our penpal, sent us photos of his experiences Students wrote to him and he wrote them back.

Here is some information we gathered from the Canadian Legion's publications.
Printer friendly table
World War I

Canadians Served	Died	Wounded	P.O.W. (Prisoner of War)
328,736*including 4,518 women	66,573	138,166	2,818

World War II

Canadians Served	Died	Wounded	POW (Prisoner of War)
1,031,902 men*including 49,963 women	44,927*including 73 women	53,145*including 19 women	8,271

 Korean War

Canadians Served	Died	Wounded	POW (Prisoner of War)
26791	516	1,558	33

Gulf War

Canadians Served	Died	Wounded	POW (Prisoner of War)
4074* including 237 women	0	0	0

~Table by Andrew ~information from: Speaker's Guide and Fact Book: Royal Canadian Legion

Women had a profound role in war. They flew planes over to their hangers. They worked in factories. CBC archives has several radio and Tv clips.

A Blogger has created a site based on WW1: Experiences of an English Soldier
This blog is made up of transcripts of Harry Lamin's letters from the first World War. The letters will be posted exactly 90 years after they were written. To find out Harry's fate, follow the blog!