Hillsborough: Children learning about tragedy in school

Ninety-seven people died as a result of the crush at the 1989 football match

School children are learning about the Hillsborough disaster through a specially-designed assembly.

A digital tool kit has been made available to every school in Liverpool as part of a campaign by MP Ian Byrne, who survived the 1989 tragedy.

Ninety-seven Liverpool fans died as a result of the crush at the FA Cup Semi-Final in Sheffield.

The Labour MP for Liverpool West Derby wants the tragedy and its aftermath to be on the national curriculum.

He said the assembly resource pack, which launched this week, was the first step.

Maureen Ungi, assistant head teacher at St Teresa of Lisieux Roman Catholic Primary School, delivered the assembly at two primary schools.

She said "At my own school, not many of the pupils knew about Hillsborough - around three out of 60, which shocked me a little bit.

"It was a very moving assembly and the children asked some really thoughtful, deep questions - they didn't hold back."

Mrs Ungi said the subject matter was dealt with in an age-appropriate way, adding: "It is a distressing topic and many families are still affected by it."

Mr Byrne said the assembly took 18 months to create, working with families, survivors and educators.

He said one of the ideas explored in the assembly was the aftermath of the disaster, the way it was reported at the time, the cover-up and the subsequent legal battle.

The MP said the idea was "to keep remembering Hillsborough and future-proofing younger generations about what may happen moving forward".

MP Ian Byrne was at the stadium when the crush happened

"We've had some great questions from the kids," he added.

"One little girl asked 'why do women footballers not get paid as much as male footballers - they're both on the pitch for 90 minutes?'

"So it encourages critical thinking, and shows they are thinking about injustices as they perceive them."

Schools Minister Nick Gibb welcomed the use of "high quality" resources for Liverpool schools, but rejected calls for the event to be made a compulsory part of the national curriculum.

"Schools do have the flexibility to teach things beyond the national curriculum; within history you can teach things which happened within living memory, it can also be brought into citizenship," he said.

"What we don't do generally is prescribe detailed teaching materials to schools.

"This material will be available for schools to use in citizenship lessons if they wish to, or as part of the history curriculum - schools will be free to do that.

"Schools up and down the country will understand what an important event (Hillsborough) was, and what a tragic event this was."

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