Bringing history to life outside of the classroom
Mercy Wilson, Museum Learning Coordinator at Peterborough Museum & Art Gallery
Using different learning styles and opportunities only found outside the classroom, Peterborough Museum & Art Gallery helps pupils experience the past in ‘real’ ways.
Through exploring objects, learning through play, and meeting costumed characters, learning at the Museum aims to make the unfamiliar familiar, relatable, and accessible. This is crucial for our provision of a learning experience outside the classroom.
Learning with objects, learning through play and with living history characters make sure the Museum provides a unique learning experience in a unique learning environment. Pupils get hands on with objects, such as fossils, that they would not have a chance to without a visit. Role play helps demonstrate activities in the past, such as chores in the Victorian or Roman Kitchens- using real objects from these periods to act out everyday jobs. This helps create a link and a relationship between what people in the past had to do, our lives today, and the change or continuity between them. Learning about the history of the local area at the Museum can foster a new appreciation for the place pupils call home.
All these experiences help make the past seem real, by creating tangible links between life in the past and the present.
The Museum can work with schools to create activities, which is rewarding for Museum staff and for the school. One local school arranged a KS1 visit with us where they could learn about archaeology. It was a challenge for the education team to make these sessions suitable for KS1, as our archaeology sessions were aimed at KS2. By creating extra illustrative resources to help explain key concepts, and assessing the sessions to make them accessible to Year 1, an archaeology day was created for a younger audience.
Peterborough Museum & Art Gallery tells the story of 150 million years of Peterborough’s history, from the Jurassic to the present day, with heritage, arts and community exhibitions. The Museum is housed in a Georgian mansion and became the Victorian hospital; the Victorian Operating Theatre still exists in the building.
The Museum caters for school visits from EYFS upwards. Most of the visits are by KS1 and 2. The Museum has around 100 visits a year from local schools, with 4300 children visiting. School sessions reflect our collections and local area, and cover topics from the Jurassic, Romans, and Anglo-Saxons through to the Victorians, WW2, and Evolution.
The impact of an education experience beyond the classroom walls can have a hugely positive impact on pupils’ learning and their ability to engage with and understand the past.
What can schools expect from your educational experience?
A consistent theme through our feedback is that teachers can see their pupils’ engagement with the subject increase during a visit. The methods of learning we use are great at giving a wow factor, by creating memorable experiences through new ways of learning.
A visit to Peterborough Museum can enhance pupils’ understanding of life in the past, put history and science topics into context and engage children in a new way of learning, and holding the LOtC Quality Badge means that schools can have confidence in a visit here, knowing that we will keep them safe and secure in their learning environment.
.
Peterborough Museum & Art Gallery is proud to hold the LOtC Quality Badge as it gives schools and teachers confidence when choosing the Museum for a visit.
Find out more
Find out more about Peterborough Museum & Art Gallery and the educational experiences they offer to schools at www.peterboroughmuseum.org.uk.
