History at key stages 1 and 2 (Year 5/6)

Unit 19: What were the effects of Tudor exploration?
Section 5: Why did the Roanoke settlement fail?

Objectives

Children should learn:

to apply their knowledge and understanding of settlement in England to a new context - settlement in America
to understand the difficulties that faced the settlers in Roanoke
to explore the causes of the failure of the colony

Activities

Outcomes

Children:

Ask the children to recall people who settled in England in the past and their reasons for leaving their own country to settle in England. What would it have been like to leave their homelands? Use this as a basis for discussing what it would have been like for English settlers to leave England and go to America to settle: How would the long journey have affected them? What supplies would they have needed on the journey and when they landed? What would they have had to do first? How would they have fed themselves when supplies ran out? How would they have kept in touch with England? What dangers would have faced them? Write the children's answers on a flip chart or white board.

Tell the story of the Roanoke Colony. Discuss the problems these settlers faced. Add 'new' problems (identified with the children) to the list on the flip chart.

Identify the reasons why the Roanoke settlement failed. Statements might be sorted according to the problems encountered, eg Amerindians, supplies, lack of knowledge about farming.

Provide the class with a writing frame to answer the question: What problems did settlers face when they settled in Roanoke? Why did the settlement fail?

know the needs of settlers
identify and describe the problems faced by settlers in Roanoke
identify and explain why the Roanoke settlement failed

Points to note

A word-processing package could be used to support the extended writing activity by providing sentence stems, or paragraphs to be 'pasted' under the correct headings.

The eyewitness accounts that blame the Amerindians for the failed colony could lead to a discussion of how people interpret events in different ways (by drawing on children's knowledge of settlements in England, eg Caractacus, Boudicca's rebellion).

The use of a writing frame provides a context for pupils to apply skills from non-fiction work in The National Literacy Strategy: Framework for teaching.

Sections in this unit

<< previous section

next section >>

This unit is divided into sections. Each section contains a sequence of activities with related objectives and outcomes. You can view this unit by moving through the sections or print/download the whole unit.


	1. How did knowledge of the world change during the Tudor period?
	2. Why did the Tudors explore outside Europe?
	3. How did people explore the world in Tudor times?
	4. Why did Drake circumnavigate the world?
	5. Why did the Roanoke settlement fail?
	6. What were the effects of the English settlement on the people living in America?
	7. What impact has Tudor exploration had on our lives today?