HISTORY
Day Programme for Key Stage 2 - Year 5 or 6

HOW DID LIFE CHANGE IN OUR LOCALITY IN VICTORIAN TIMES?

Unit 12 QCA/DfEE - A scheme of work for history

This one day programme has been designed to meet many of the requirements of the revised Curriculum 2000 and is based on Unit 12 from the QCA/DfEE - a scheme of work for history, a local study of New Mills in the Victorian era.

The day programme of classroom and fieldwork activities will enable children to investigate some of the ways the local area changed over the period and look for some of the reasons for those changes.

The children will use buildings, maps, census data and old photographs as sources of information.

New Mills was a thriving small cotton manufacturing town in the Victorian period. Several large cotton mills were working in the gorge bottom by the river and above, on the cliffs, the town was growing fast with, by the end of the century, a Town Hall and Town Council looking after a number of civic amenities. The railway came and fantastic feats of engineering were needed to take the tracks through tunnels and long viaducts over the valley.

The Victorian period was a time of rapid change in all areas of life and New Mills will make an excellent case study to enable children to understand how and why some of these changes came about.

The programme has been designed to touch on many aspects of Victorian times. However, a day programme can be designed to focus totally on industry, transport, homes, civic or service buildings, schools, places of worship, if required.

9.30 Welcome and introduction
Key Question
What evidence of industry in Victorian times remains in our area?
Activities
A range of class work and fieldwork activities to investigate the remains of the mills in the river bottom

10.30 Break - everyone will be given a drink and a biscuit

11.00 Key Question
How did the arrival and expansion of the railway affect our area?
Activities
A range of classroom and fieldwork activities to investigate the impact of the railways on the town

12.00 Lunch - please bring own packed lunch to eat at the centre

12.30 Key Question
What evidence of the town remains from Victorian times?
Activities
A range of classroom and fieldwork activities to find out how the town grew during the period and the nature of the buildings such as schools, banks, the Town Hall and churches that were built to meet the needs of the town

2.30 Leave