Section 1: What is our area like today?
Prepare a large simplified map of the area, with a picture of the school as its central point, and collect photographs of nearby buildings or features that the children will recognise. Ask the children what they know about the area and mark on street names. Put the photographs in their correct places on the map.
Use the pictures as a basis for an introductory discussion about how the buildings are used and who uses them. Ask the children to sort the buildings into 'old' or 'new', giving reasons for their choice. Use this as an opportunity to discuss what is meant by 'old'.
View related objectives and outcomes
Section 2: How can we use maps to explore how our area has changed?
Divide the children into small groups and give each group copies of two maps of the same area - one from the present and one from a chosen period in the past. Ask the children to look for and record changes by comparing details shown on the maps, such as roads, railways, housing, open spaces and amenities.
Use OHT acetates on top of the maps of the locality in the past to record roads and the use and range of buildings. Compare this OHT with one from the present. What buildings have appeared or disappeared? How has the type of building changed over the period?
Help the children to build up a 'picture' of the past: choose the same two points for children to 'walk' between on each map, and ask them to describe what can be seen, heard or even smelt today. Ask them to describe what might have been seen, heard, smelt on the same 'walk' at different times in the past.
View related objectives and outcomes
Section 3: What can local buildings or sites tell us about the past?
Arrange a visit to a local building(s). Ask the children to observe and record information to help answer questions such as What does it look like? How big is it? What is it made of? What is it used for now? What was it used for in the past? Has it always been used for this? Is there anything unusual about it? What are the surroundings like? Why do you think it was built here? Lead a discussion on what sort of people the children think might have lived/worked/visited here. Ask them to look at size, number of rooms, decorative features and layout as clues to its use. Encourage them to ask questions about the place as it was in the past - even if it is not possible to find the answers!
Back in the classroom, ask the children to use reference materials, eg books, ICT to help them find out what it might have been like to have lived and worked in that building in the past.
View related objectives and outcomes
Section 4: What do pictures and photographs tell us about past life in our area?
Give the children pictures (paintings, sketches, photographs, postcards) showing how the area has changed. Challenge the children, working in pairs, to ask each other questions about each picture. Help them to ask open-ended questions, such as What does it tell us about the area and people in the past? What has changed and what has stayed the same? Why might this be so? Encourage the children to look closely at the details and compare them with a modern photograph. Ask pairs of children to look at different aspects, eg buildings, transport and roads, street furniture and people.
Lead a discussion about why people have pictures made of the local area. Questions on interpretation might include Why and how do you think the picture was made? Who might it have been made for? Do you think it is natural or posed?
If there are people in the picture, discuss what may have been happening before the picture was made and what may have occurred afterwards. This could lead to role-play or freeze framing as children recreate the story around a picture. Ask the children to write the instructions that may have been given to the photographer or artist who created the picture, eg make it look grander, bigger, tidier.
Lead a discussion to sort the pictures into a chronological sequence and then make a visual time line for the classroom.
View related objectives and outcomes
Section 5: Which written sources can we use?
Using different written sources, the class or groups of children could carry out a variety of activities to find out about the local area in the past and compare it with the present:
Census returns
Use part of a census form to find out about ONE local family in a particular house, their names, ages and jobs. Encourage the children to make deductions about the family structure, their lifestyle, home, where they went to work, school or shop.
Trade directories
Help the children to identify differences in a shopping street in the past by using extracts from a trade directory. Ask the children questions, eg What shops/businesses were here? Who worked here? What could be bought here?
School records
Choose an event from a school log book to provide background information for the children to write their own account of the incident, eg from an eyewitness or participant's point of view.
Inventories
Use inventory lists to help the children see what possessions people in the past owned and kept in certain rooms of a house. Discuss the contents of a particular room for which details are available and compare with the modern equivalent in the children's homes. Children could use ICT to sort information and present it on a database.
Discuss with the children what sorts of information they have found out from the different sources and compare life in the area then and now.
View related objectives and outcomes
Section 6: How can oral sources help us to find out about how people lived?
Identify a topic of interest about the local area and discuss possible questions that could be asked of a visitor to the school who is able to talk about changes over time in the local area. Encourage open-ended questions such as Can you describe your day/house/work/journey/school? What was it like to...? How did you...? What do you remember about...?
Compile a short list of agreed questions and make sure that the children are clear about the purpose of the interview.
Before the visitor comes into school to answer the questions, ask the children to practise interviewing teachers, family and friends. Collect information during the interview by taking notes or recording on tape, or by holding a follow-up discussion and summarising the main points.
Help the children to identify the facts from the visitor's opinions.
View related objectives and outcomes
Section 7: What was it like to live in our area in the past?
The results of the different activities can be organised and communicated to other audiences in various ways and children should consider the intended audience. For example:
Wall or table display
Ask groups to make detailed labelled drawings to surround a large picture or model of their chosen building, to show lifestyle, costume, transport.
Guide book
Decide, as a class, who the guide book is for, its format, content and length of text.
Tape/slide show
Plan a slide/tape presentation using a storyboard technique. Discuss with the children the best length for a presentation for a chosen audience and the number of slides that will be needed.
Oral presentation
What questions would the children ask if they became time travellers and visited their area in the past? Ask different groups of children to take on the role of experts on a particular place at a certain time, while the rest of the class ask them questions.
Drama
Give out a picture or an object associated with each building to small groups. Ask them to devise a story based on it and act it out.
Time line
Select a range of information from the presentation to create a class time line for the history of the local area.
View related objectives and outcomes
|
