Our project on ‘Refugee Boy’ is an exciting and new approach to this inspiring story by Benjamin Zephaniah.

Part of the blurb says, ‘Life is not safe for Alem. His father is Ethiopian and his mother Eritrean - and with both countries at war, he is welcome in neither place. ‘ So, before we began reading the book, we learnt about Ethiopia and Eritrea. First we learnt about the geographical position of Ethiopia and Eritrea. Then we used a range of sources to begin to find out about life in Ethiopia and life in Eritrea.

We were then ready to start reading. Before we did we read the blurb and looked at the front cover and made predictions about the story.
After reading the two opening chapters, ‘Ethiopia’ and ‘Eritrea’ we realised both chapters described very similar, very frightening events. What was the same in both chapters, what was different?

Alem and his Dad come to England. They stay in hotel in a village near to Heathrow- Datchet Village in Berkshire. On their first full day in England they go to London and have a great time seeing the sights. We did some geography work using 4 fig grid references to find where Alem had been in London- we also completed a jigsaw puzzle of a London map and identified features on an aerial photo. Then we wrote letters back home to Alem’s mum, telling her about the day in London.

After reading Chapter 2, ‘Alone in the Country’, we did some poetry writing. We also went on a 3 day school journey and did a village study on Datchet Village. We had to do the two-mile walk from Datchet to Windsor, just like Alem. (But it seemed easy after the 7 mile walk we did the day before!) Chapter 3, ‘This is War’ described some of the places Alem had lived in during his life. We linked images to these places and explained key points.

In ‘The Road to Nowhere’ (Chapter 7) Alem attempts to escape from the children’s home he is in. Here are some examples of the diaries we wrote from Alem’s viewpoint. We also found the answer to the question ‘What is a screening interview?’ Alem has to have one.

Alem moves to a foster family in East London. What were they like? The area he moved to was called Manor Park. Like Datchet, it turns out it is a real place.  Could we use 4 figure co-ordinates to identify features on a map of Manor Park? How many features could we identify on an aerial photo of Manor Park? A while later Alem gets his first letter from his father. We changed this part of the book into a play.

Chapter 10 is called ‘What the paper say’. In PSHCE we investigated the question- ‘What do newspaper articles say about refugees? Fact or fiction?’ And soon we were back doing geography. Alem has to go to court. How did he get there?

‘Loved and Lost’ was a very moving and tragic chapter. We investigated changing tenses and the viewpoint. What impact did this have?

Some good news next and Alem’s dad is back in London. First of all he has to go to the Refugee Council to find out where Alem is. How would he have got from Heathrow to the Refugee Council? Where is the Refugee Council?

We then needed to find out about a place called Campsfield detention centre. Shortly after we were finding out about another hotel- not like the hotel in Datchet.

After Chapter 20 we did some discussion writing, ‘Is the campaign for Alem and his father a good idea?’

Towards the end of the book we wrote a newspaper report. We also wrote a letter to Alem, to tell him how we felt. Finally we wrote poetry, inspired by Alem’s character, about the difference he has made to us.