After the great success of our October 25 event we were really keen that the community should be given more opportunities to access the physical displays into which so much love and care were poured.
With this in mind we were delighted when Newton Primary School reached out to us, asking us to bring the display to the school. We popped down for a chat with head teacher, Sarah Hughes and we discussed how we could reach both pupils and parents with a display event in the school hall.
It was decided that we should have a spring event in April with the pupils having dedicated access first, followed by an invitation to the community to visit the display in the afternoon. The hope being that parents, grandparents and the wider community who may not have been able to attend the October event, would be able to attend this time.
After school dinner time we got stuck in setting set up displays while the mid day staff bustled around clearing the lunch equipment. We soon had a hall full of things to look at, buttons to press and activities to try.
The classes visited the display in turn. 140 children attended across multiple class groups and primary ages.
Each class got the opportunity to explore the displays and listen to the oral histories. It was lovely to witness the reactions to them listening to some of the stories with giggles and gasps along the way. The children in particular enjoyed the oral history of going to collect vinegar in a bottle and the shop staff joking about whether they wanted it in the bottle.
All the ages of the children enjoyed using the headphones to listen to the oral history stories. For the younger children in particular they were drawn to practical engament and were seen listening and repeating sections to friends and passing headphones between them while spotting elements in the models.
Having things they could touch and move (opening up the front of the buildings, handling the peg figures, hearing real voices) provided an integrated learning and sharing opportunity above those which are purely relayed information.
The children enjoyed looking at the artwork created by other pupils in their school with many expressing that they too would like to have a try. Janet who works at the school and head teacher Sarah were keen to use the spare equipment to expand this opportunity to other children. Its lovely to witness projects rolling forwards and having a life beyond the time we are in the building.
Every child was given a recreate the street biscuit to take home which included a QR code link back to all the blogs about the previous events and work on this project, this enables wider family members to access the project and see what their children have been involved with. 7 QR codes were scanned within the 2 hours after parents collected their children.
The biscuits were made by local baker, Amy Bakes, who also has children at the school and is very involved in community links. Amy has produced many bake goods for us across multiple events and they are always eagerly enjoyed.
The kids loved the quiz which guided them to hunt for things in each building. They delighted in going back and forth relaying the answers.
We received in 22 completed quiz sheets with an amusing range of ways to spell sausages, plus many more quiz sheets were kept by the children and the younger children engaged with the quiz verbally relaying there answers to us and then hurrying off to search for the answer to the next question. In doing this hunting for answers the children found they had many questions of their own.
It was interesting to discover that this group of children knew the game pool but weren’t familiar with the word snooker. The older children knew what stained glass was but some of the younger children thought the picture was painted onto the glass. This led to chatting about skills and building methods through the ages.
| Questions from the children, sparked conversations with Tony, who was on hand to give the background historical detail.
Questions such as:
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There was much amusement on the question – Is the drapery shop, open or closed? – The children found they could turn the sign around to be whatever answer they wanted.
The kids also loved our feedback board letting us know what they’ve enjoyed and what they’d like to see in their community next. With one family having recently moved into another pub in the area and doing restoration work they were keen for a future project to cover the history of their pub : The George and Dragon. Other requests for further areas to cover in future projets included Newton School itself, Sherwood Street and the park.
Several children noted that they enjoyed the headphones.
Watching the children engage with the feedback for was brilliant to see. Its great to give them an opportunity to use their voice to tell us what really matters to them.
When the project had first began Tony had been mocking up pictures of buildings around the village to engage conversation about structure and building materials.
These images we reused as colouring sheets at this event and many children enjoyed tracing or colouring in the designs, while others drew their own homes. The children had an opportunity to discuss what their local buildings looked like, were made from and how they compared to the buildings of the past.
Hearing them chatting, spot features of local buildings and making connections with their local heritage was a really joyful experience.
After the school hours the hall was opened to parents and the public to visit and a highlight was watching the children come from the classrooms and take their parents to look at particular elements. An additional 60 people (parents, teachers and wider community members) engaged with the displays bringing the total number on the day to approximately 200.
Bringing the display out on tour was a great opportunity to share it with a wider audience in the Newton Community and see intergenerational groups interacting with their own history.
What a success.
