The educational visit allowed students to experience first-hand many of the sites they learn about in class as part of their GCSE studies of Weimar and Nazi Germany and the Cold War 1945-1990.

Sites included the Topography of Terror exhibition on the site of the old Gestapo headquarters, Sachsenhausen concentration camp used by both the Nazi regime and GDR authorities, the GDR living museum highlighting life in the Communist bloc and the Allied Museum which commemorates the Berlin Airlift operation of 1948-49 and includes an actual Handley Page Hastings plane used to drop supplies over Berlin.

In visiting these sites, students enhanced their knowledge and understanding of GCSE topics.

Equally importantly students got to experience Berlin and Germany as a modern, diverse, prosperous nation – very different from the one they learn about in History lessons!

It wasn’t all History though – students also got to go up the TV Tower for a 360-degree aerial view of the city, go bowling and enjoy free time in the Mall of Berlin and the AlexanderPlatz.

This is an annual trip which current Year 10s will be attending in March 2023.