Summer School with Pendraken Miniatures

Started by sunjester, 06 August 2010, 11:12:38 PM

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sunjester

I’ve just finished running a summer school of my Tabletop Generals course for the third year. The theme was 1940 Blitzkrieg, the Fall of France. I had 12 students for the week, aged 13 to 16, and judging by their evaluation forms, they all had a great time. On the first day they got a morning on the history and armies involved, then played a couple of short scenarios to get the hang of the rules. The rest of the week we looked at more complex actions from the campaign. Games included a airborne assault on Dutch forces, fighting in the Ardennes, river crossings and one half of the Battle of Arras. I had originally intended to play two scenarios each day, but the players tended to take longer over the game than most adult players so we ran out of time each game. To give the attackers a fair chance I swapped to just one scenario each day, which also allowed plenty of painting time. With 12 players I ran two games simultaneously, interestingly they often had very different results, and three games on the last day so I got a chance to play.

The participants were also each given two starter forces of BEF and German 10mm Pendraken miniatures (Dave very kindly gave a very substantial discount to help set this up, THANKS DAVE). Various of the boys had been on my course last year and already had some early war desert kit from that. During the week they painted the models, so by Wednesday some of them were playing with their own stuff. Prior to that they used a mix of my own models (Pendraken and Pithead) and lots of top-down paper counters form the Junior Generals website.

For rules we used a slightly simplifies  Blitzkrieg Commander 2.0. All but three of the boys had either been on last year’s course, or else been on some of my 6-week Saturday courses so they were familiar with the rules. The newbies, all of whom played Warhammer in some incarnation, picked up the rules really quickly, which I think is an indication of the strength of BKC.

On Friday, when I actually got to play in a game, it was an interesting lesson in how much (or how little) attention they actually paid to the scenario notes. For each game both sides were given a map with notes on deployment, terrain etc. Over the course of the week we had used various waterways,  a canal, a river and, on Friday, a stream which was fordable by infantry and tracked vehicles. The objective was for the Germans to capture a road bridge over the stream and on all 3 tables the French deployed as if the bridge was the only point that the Germans could cross!

A fun week and by Friday I was constantly being asked what we would be playing next year. Two boys also wanted the course to run for 2 weeks but I don’t think I could really face that!
I was also told by one lad that he had already ordered more Pendraken models online.

I have put some photos here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/sunjester/


Graham

lentulus

Wargaming summer camps!  These young folks are coddled I tell you!!!  ;D

nikharwood

It's all good Graham - you might need to keep an eye on adult gamers trying to sneak in to improve their skills though!  8)

Nosher

Cool SJ - is this something in the UK?

I keep pondering something similar as my work is largely around engaging young people. I've noticed a recent trend amongst kids thats moving towards traditional play activities as opposed to XBox, PC online sh*t and would love to develop something similar where I live/work
I don't think my wife likes me very much, when I had a heart attack she wrote for an ambulance.

Frank Carson

sunjester

Nosher, I am in the UK. I've been delivering courses for teenagers at weekends and during the holidays for about the past 7 years on various subjects. The Tabletop Generals have proven to be the most consistantly popular, but I've also had success with courses on boardgame design.

Nosher

Sunjester - you and I need to talk at some stage. Could you ping me an email off forum so we can chat htrough things?

scarborolad1atskydotcom ;)
I don't think my wife likes me very much, when I had a heart attack she wrote for an ambulance.

Frank Carson

Leon

This is great stuff Sunjester, we were talking about getting the youth into wargaming in another thread just the other day.  Things like this are an excellent way of showing them what it's all about. 

I think 'Blaker' does something similar in the US as well?
www.pendraken.co.uk - Now home to over 7000 products, including 4500 items for 10mm wargaming, plus MDF bases, Battlescale buildings, I-94 decals, Litko Gaming Aids, Militia Miniatures, Raiden Miniatures 1/285th aircraft, Red Vectors MDF products, Vallejo paints and much, much more!

Blaker

YAY Sunjester!!! That is awesome that you have the program going in the UK. Like Leon said, I have been running Wargaming Classes during the summer for the past 14 years now! This past summer, which ended Friday, 6th August, began in June. I am now running classes on three different campuses.  The first 3-5 years the kids use to get painted armies and we played for three days, Monday was usually a history lesson about the period the class was about and on Tuesdays we would learn the rules, then Wednesday til Friday we played and they took the armies home. But, after 5 years of painting 120 armies a year, I got burned out and my friends wanted to paint their own armies instead of helping me, what?

So, the class format changed to history and cleaning, priming and painting for two to three days and gaming on Thursdays and Fridays. The kids still take their armies home but now, they have some connection to them. I usually run 6 - 8 classes on each campus, each class lasts one week. Almost all of the classes use armies made from Pendraken minis, except the ACW class I had to get some Old Glory Confederate Cavalry in slouch hat. But, this year Leon suggest the Boer cavalry and those work just fine! And the skirmish games like the Wild West classes we use 28mm. Any Wild West figures in the queue Leon?   8)

This last week was a week long DBA tournament.  I called it the DBA Master's Class and you had to have taken one of my DBA classes from previous years or already knew the game. The winner took home a DBA War of the Roses 10mm Pendraken army. Unpainted of course  :D  The kids had a blast.

So Sunjester, keep up the great work!  Getting the young crowd into wargaming is very rewarding and keeps the hobby alive not to mention starting them out right with 10mm  :P

cya


The Wargaming Classes have been well attended and kids cant wait til the next summer to take them again.

Leon

Quote from: Blaker on 07 August 2010, 04:32:35 AM
Any Wild West figures in the queue Leon?   8)

I think they've been requested somewhere?
www.pendraken.co.uk - Now home to over 7000 products, including 4500 items for 10mm wargaming, plus MDF bases, Battlescale buildings, I-94 decals, Litko Gaming Aids, Militia Miniatures, Raiden Miniatures 1/285th aircraft, Red Vectors MDF products, Vallejo paints and much, much more!

Last Hussar

Quotestrength of BKC.

Weakness, the word you are looking for is weakness :D :D :D
I have neither the time or the crayons to explain why you are wrong.

GNU PTerry

sunjester

Quote from: Last Hussar on 10 August 2010, 08:07:24 PM
Weakness, the word you are looking for is weakness :D :D :D

Much as I enjoy the rules, I challenge you to run games for 12 teenagers using Troops Weapons & Tactics! :o

17-21l

Yea hats off Sunjester- good call mate , tis lads like you that keep the flag flying and kids off their PCs.
Jolly good show
:)
God Save the Queen
2011 Painting Competition - Winner!
2012 Painting Competition - Runner-Up!

Pruneau

Fantastic job to do that with those kids.  Being dad to a 14yo (and his sis) I find there is no better way to inspire some interest into history than miniatures and games.  We started doing that 2 years ago, and back then the history course was considered 'more boring than drying paint', but in the meantime it has become one of his two most liked courses, next to music.  So that says something.

Don't wanna go out on a rant, but part of the problem is history teachers with NO imagination.  When my son told about the roman vs celt games we played, the teacher only replied with polite indifference, instead of asking my son to bring the figs along.  Probably worried about finishing the curriculum.  It's just lists of names and dates, you can't believe what they have (and haven't) learned in their ancient times course.  No background, no philosophy, no stories.  Just dry fact.

Most of the times my son considers me an old nagger, but when I start telling stories about Ceasar, or Alexander, or Leonidas, or Napoleon for that matter, he just listens intensely, so the interest is definitely there. 
Boardgames: MMP ACW, ASL ᴥ BKC & SSOM - WW2 (In development) ᴥ Flying Lead - Sci-Fi: Shocktroops, Pulp, Spugs ᴥ WH - Greenskins, Dwarfs

http://hiording.blogspot.com - http://runequestfun.blogspot.com - http://secondsquadonme.blogspot.com

ʎɐqə ɯoɹɟ pɹɐoqʎəʞ ɐ ʎnq ı əɯıʇ ʇsɐl əɥʇ sı sıɥʇ

Last Hussar

It's lack of time, and needing to make sure certain facts are hit.

A few years ago I had to take my step son to Parents evening.  Talking to his history teacher (a mountain of a man, who had a torso of an iverted cone, and appears in the video "Rugby's best 100 punch ups") I explained how I tried to get him to look at history, and how it relates to everyday life.  He said "Brilliant - I want them to do that, but too often you have to boil it down to Henry VIII was fat"
I have neither the time or the crayons to explain why you are wrong.

GNU PTerry