Trips and Exchanges
Our partner schools offer a range of exciting trips and exchanges to their students. Here are a selection:
Durham and Kreis wesel school exchange: World War One Christmas Truce Commemoration
Pupils from Seaham School of Technology are to re-enact the World War 1 Christmas Football Truce with their German partners on the school’s No Man’s Land at noon on 10 December 2014. The Headteacher of the school has commissioned a trench to be built in the school quadrangle and it is from this trench that the thirty German and British pupils will emerge onto No Man’s Land to the sound of the school choir singing carols in both languages.
The pupils have been researching the lives of German and British footballers who took part in the Great War and will be sharing their research during the visit. The Seaham pupils will learn about the life of Charlie Buchan – a Sunderland player and teacher who went on to become a professional football writer and journalist. The Seaham pupils will take their German friends to the Stadium of Light where Charlie is remembered.
Pupils from Germany come from County Durham’s partner region of Kreis Wesel. They have been also involved in researching the life of a former Schalke 04 player, Willy Gies, who went to fight at the Front. The pupils will also be taking part in workshops at Beamish where they try to understand why underage lads lied about their age and went off to fight. Beamish will also be supplying replica period football shirts for the pupils to wear on the day of the match. Other highlights of the visit will be workshops at the DLI museum and a chance to visit the Books for Boys exhibition at Durham University’s library.
The project has been generously sponsored by UK-German Connection