Silent Night 2 - War Games, Discussion, and Songs
"My name is Francis Tolliver. In Liverpool I dwell. Each Christmas come since World War One I've learned it's lessons well.
That the ones who call the shots won't be among the dead and lame and on each end of the rifle we're the same." John McCutcheon
Silent Night - War Games, Discussion, and Songs : Today we reflect on The Christmas Truce of 1914. We begin by watching a short (28 mins) animated film on the Truce, which in turn was based on a children's book: "War Game". While the students are watching - they relate it to the idea of "a true war story" (from The Things They Carried). They also relate it to their reading from "Silent Night (the Christmas Truce)" and finally they bring in what they've read in All Quiet on the Western Front. We then listen to a beautiful NPR story on The Christmas Truce, a folk song written about the truce from the perspective of a participant, and finally - we form two trenches and serenade each side - in English and German, with the song "Silent Night".
Lesson Overview
You will need every minute today - I was able to do this in a 50 minute period - but only by making sure we moved on from one part to the next immediatly - and you really want to make sure you get to the end of the lesson.
Watching War Game
I make sure the handouts for today's lesson are already on the desks so that we can begin as soon as all the students are in the room. We watch the 2002 movie, War Game. I included a link to the film below (it's free on YouTube). It's a wonderful (if quirky) animation based on a children's book about the 1914 Christmas Truce. The handout has the following instructions:
As you watch War Games – consider the following:
1. What makes it in Tim O’Brien’s words – a true war story (especially the ending…)
2. How does it “gel” with your reading about the Christmas Truce
3. How does it fit in or connect with All Quiet on the Western Front
Listening to "Christmas in the Trenches"
We then listen to a modern folk song - told from the point of view of one of the combatants (peaceatants): "Christmas in the Trenches". It's a poignant song and I instruct the students to write down any impressons at all - that they have - directly on the handout (the lyrics).
Listening to an NPR story about "Silent Night" and the Christmas Truce
Next, we listen to a beautifully reported National Public Radio story about the book, "Silent Night" - including an interview with the author - Stanley Weintraub. But the most touching part of the audio comes at the end - when they interview one of the soldiers who took part in the Christmas Truce - now a very, very old man.
Our own song: Silent Night sung in English & German
If you do all of the preceding you will only have about 5 minutes left in class - but it is enough. Quickly have the class divided into two. Each half of the class should now (and quickly) physically turn their desks so they are facing each other - with a sizable gap in the middle. Yes, we are creating our own versions of the trenches - with no man's land in between.
On the handout (found below) - are the English and the German lyrics to the Christmas Carol, "Silent Night". Assign one half (side) to sing the song in English; the other half will sing in German. Give them a signal and begin. As the teacher, you are a kind of conductor - I usually sang with the German side as this was a lot different and as a result harder. It also helped to keep the two sides together - on the same line of the song.
The effect was always magical and I don't think there was ever a year I did this - that I was not in unrepentant tears.
Here is the description from the creators (Illuminated Films): Based on the picture book by Michael Foreman, WAR GAME tells the story of Will, Lacey and Freddie – three young Suffolk lads who leave their idyllic country lives to fight in the trenches of World War I. Surrounded by the chaos and confusion of war, they can only dream of their football team, their friends and the families they have left behind.
On Christmas Day 1914 however, a football game is started between the Germans and the English. Scrambling onto No Man’s Land, the men come face to face with the enemy they have never seen and the true futility of their fight. For a brief moment - differences are forgotten, the men unite and the seeds of hope are planted. But joy has no place in war and the men are soon recalled to the trenches to continue the battle.
From a football game in the fields of Suffolk to a football game in the heart of Flanders - WAR GAME follows the realisation of three young men’s ambitions to play for England and the ability of the human spirit to exist even in the harshest conditions. Featuring a powerful and moving sound track from the composer Julian Nott, and including Kate Winslet on the voice track.
You can find the lyrics to the song in the handout - here is a sampling: "He's singin' bloddy well you know", my partner says to me. Soon one by one each German voice joined in in harmony. The cannons rested silent. The gas cloud rolled no more as Christmas brought us respite from the war.
As soon as they were finished a reverent pause was spent. 'God rest ye merry, gentlemen' struck up some lads from Kent. The next they sang was 'Stille Nacht". "Tis 'Silent Night'" says I and in two toungues one song filled up that sky.
worldwar1truceNPR.wavThe Christmas Truce - An NPR Radio Story
A beautifully reported National Public Radio story about the book, "Silent Night" - including an interview with the author - Stanley Weintraub. But the most touching part of the audio comes at the end - when they interview one of the soldiers who took part in the Christmas Truce - now a very, very old man.
Here is the description from Amazon: SILENT NIGHT brings to life one of the most unlikely and touching events in the annals of war. In the early months of WWI, on Christmas Eve, men on both sides left their trenches, laid down their arms, and joined in a spontaneous celebration with their new friends, the enemy. For a brief, blissful time, remembered since in song and story, a world war stopped. Even the participants found what they were doing incredible. Germans placed candle-lit Christmas trees on trench parapets and warring soldiers sang carols. In the spirit of the season they ventured out beyond their barbed wire to meet in No Man's Land, where they buried the dead in moving ceremonies, exchanged gifts, ate and drank together, and joyously played football, often with improvised balls. The truce spread as men defied orders and fired harmlessly into the air. But, reluctantly, they were forced to re-start history's most bloody war. SILENT NIGHT vividly recovers a dreamlike event, one of the most extraordinary of Christmas stories.
Remote Enhancements
I actually did this remotely - the singing is a mess because of lag - but otherwise it was amazing.
A Christmas Memory Reading and Homecoming: When I first started teaching - the second or third year (I guess it could have been the first), I decided to teach Truman Capote's nonfiction novel - In Cold Blood. We were reading it in the fall - and our unit ended just before Winter Break. Well, I felt that Capote's novel was way too bleak a way to end our time right before the holidays. So, I thought about it - and having just heard his long short story "A Christmas Memory" read on PBS - I decided it would be the perfect (and connected!) way to say goodbye to the old year. I think it went well - and in June - some of my students who were graduating asked me if they could come the following year - to hear me read the story for the next class. And so, a tradition was born.
WHAT CAME BEFORE:
Thoughts on the Lesson
I remember the poingnant sadness that I (and the rest of the class) felt when during the teaching of this unit - it was announced on the news that the last survivor of the the Christmas Truce had passed away. A few years later, the last survivor of World War 1 passed away as well. Everything changes; nothing is lost.