• Women stretcher bearers

Learning Objectives

• know about the types of war work that local women engaged in
• understand why women's contribution to the war effort was important
• consider how and why women's history has been overlooked in the past

Suggested Activity

1. Pupils work in groups. Each group is issued with a different archive item that shows a type of war work that local women were engaged in.
2. Each group writes and presents a short speech that explains why their type of work was important.
3. Discussion: How did local women contribute to the war effort? Why was this work important? What was the situation in other countries such as Germany? Did women help to win the war? Why might this contribution be overlooked?
4. Pupils could write an article for a bygones column in a local newspaper that explains how women helped to win the war.
   

• Land Army recruitment

Learning Objectives:

• know about the national drive to recruit women
• understand why women's contribution to the war effort was important
• understand how and why propaganda was used to recruit women

Suggested Activity:

1. Interrogate an archive item that relates to the recruitment of women. A particularly interesting example is ARP recruitment campaign, female audiences 
2. Discussion: Who produced this item and why? How might a woman living at the time have responded to it? What methods have been used to communicate the message?
3. Pupils could design a poster, leaflet or radio / cinema advertisement that encourages other women to enlist for war work.

• Women on factory production line

Learning Objectives

• know about the types of war work that local women engaged in
• understand some of the ways war affected the lives of local women
• recognise the link between local and national history

Suggested Activity

1. Pupils use a selection of the archive items to test the statement, 'Women had an easy time during WWII.'
2. Discussion: What do these archive items tell us? How did local women's lives change during WWII? How easy / difficult was it to be a local woman during WWII? How does the experience of local women compare with women nationally?
3. Pupils could design and write a page for a school textbook about British women's experience of war.