sue anderson- faithful 1

Working with artefacts

Why? How? When?

History Enquiry 4ab

NC Key Skills ( thinking )Chronology 1ab, Period Characteristics

K+U 2 esp. ab

Organization and Communication 5 acVictorian life, Britain since the 30s

Recap• Scrutiny of documents , e.g., maps and old photos,

newspapers, advertisements etc can support understanding of change and continuity, cause and effect and help establish a sense of what a place was like. It is most powerful if it is a place you know- can link local to national, significant events in a meaningful way

• The census and street directories are helpful too – who , where, where from and doing what..

• Fosters enquiry skills, observing, questioning, inference• Don’t forget eyewitness reports, oral history, film• This week focus on family stories- children making

history- History is now

Why use artefacts

• Objects are central to many human activities • Learn about the present• Learn about other times and cultures• Objects support comparison• Objects are responses to problems• Objects give access to non written culture• significance

Why use artefacts

• To get to the people

• Conditions of life

• Materials technologies

• Ideas

• Values

• Beliefs

• Process, Process, methodologymethodology, thinking, thinking

Typical NC contexts examples

• Victorians – washday, sea side, toys, clothes, cooking

• Britain Since the 30s WW2 ,shopping• Romans, pottery, mosaics• Saxons , food cooking• Tudors- costume, portraits, rich and poor• In class and on site• Theory Bruner, Vygotsky, Gardner ,

Bloom- see intro to assignment

artefacts for learning• Motivation

• Inclusion, collaboration

• Learning styles

• Multi sensory

• Stimulus creative and emotional

• E.g. ideas and feelings expressed other than in words- thought given form

• Real not abstract- memorable

• Help scaffold thinking

Objects help understanding of Historical methodology

• Developing Skills – Enquiry +• Locating recognising identifying• Handling preserving , storing• Discussing, suggesting, estimating, inferring

hypothesising, synthesising, predicting, generalising, assessing influence (Significance)

• Experimenting• Deducing, comparing, concluding ,

evaluating…… Interpretation, Communication• Make your own as a response

• Relating structure to function, classifying , cataloguing

• Recording –writing, drawing, filming, photographing, ICT

• Responding, reporting, explaining, displaying, presenting, summarising

Extending Knowledge

• Different materials and uses

• Techniques and vocabulary of construction

• Social, historic and economic context of items

• Physical effects of time

• Meaning of symbolic forms

• The way people viewed their world

Extending Knowledge

• Existence nature and function of museums, sites, galleries and collections

• Symbol pattern colour

• Appropriateness e.g. the use of rucksacks compared to handbags

• Appreciation of cultural values

Developing Concepts• Chronology ,change, continuity• Design as a function of use, availability of materials and

appearance• Aesthetic quality• Typicality, bias, survival, significance• Fashion , style and taste• Original, fake copy, authenticity• Heritage, collection, preservation, conservation

Durbin, G. et al. (1990) A teachers Guide to learning from Objects, London English Heritage

How?

• Children need training in handling, looking, enquiring and making meaning from objects so that they go beyond just naming or stop at “I don’t know”!

• ( Robert Fisher – Questions for Thinking)• (Blooms Taxonomy)• Thinking frame re objects-helps children develop

enquiry and reasoning( Layers of inference grid or other)

• Behaviour and attitude to learning

Learning to Look closely

• Observation drawing

• Draw from an odd angle (your chair upside down)

• Observation drawing on a big scale

• Look cover/ remove draw check

• Group drawing- talk and collaboration too

• Group screened drawing ‘reconstruction relay’ (collaboration too)

Learning to Describe

• Feely bags

Feel and say

Feel and draw• Yellow pencil game• Blind drawing- pupils sit with screened objects that

they describe in writing or speech without naming the object whilst a partner draws it

• Martian radio interview- One child has an everyday object the Martian elicits info so Martians will understand more about us

Learning to describe

• The confused card index

One object per pupil each writes a catalogue card and reads it omitting to name the object. Others guess which card matches each object

Learning to Ask Questions

• How to get beyond What is it? and How old is it? And help pupils work independently so they can transfer skills

• Back to back game

• Pupil A has an object but only gives information in response to questions from pupil B who has ten or twenty questions to find out

Learning to Classify

• No name game

Team A chooses a familiar object eg chair which they keep secret. Then they start to tell team B facts about it. The aim is to say as many accurate things about the item without the other team guessing.

MORAL There’s a lot more to say about an object than name and function

Relating Structure to Function

• Children need to know that design is influenced by

• Purpose• Aesthetics• Economic considerations• Availability• Appropriateness• So they need experience in the properties of

materials

Conservation game Have • a glossy photo• Piece of cotton sheeting• Tissue paper• Eggshell• Clear plastic• Newspaper• Cut the items in half put one half in a safe place

pass the other items round three times-discuss effects on materials and implications for use, handling durability and conservation

Formulating and testing Hypotheses

• A scaffold to get beyond guess and stop!• No ‘I don’t know!

• Mystery Object

Give children a mystery object and record ideas on a chart with these headings (see handouts Layers of Inference grid and questions)

What we know

What we think possible

What the evidence is

What we need to find out- how we might do this

Left luggage

• Fill a case, bag, basket, carrier bag with appropriate objects for a character. The idea is that the children deduce who it might be from the evidence in the bag e.g. Granny, evacuee, (cross curricular possibilities)

• Elementary!- It works well in Foundation stage

Artefacts activity – evidence and questioning• Focus task- pass the tissue• Pairs- observe, describe, find evidence, connect with

what you know, decide what you don’t know or need to find out

• Complete the evidence or inference grid*-discuss• Can you hypothesise how the objects might relate to

people on the family tree?• Can you match your object to a photograph?• Share your ideas• What do these artefacts( are they typical) tell us about

life and events the twentieth and nineteenth century ?• Add Artefacts to time line/ Date card

• Can you make generalisations from the objects re What Life was like?

Extension tasks

• Make up a (life) story for the object

• Make up a riddle for it

• As teachers think and note which questions could elicit higher order thinking ( Bloom) about your or another object

• Reflect on where using artefacts fits in to NC- history and beyond

Where to get artefacts from• Beg,• Parents, older relatives- costumes, story sacks too• Buy

Car boots, charity shops, Past Times Catalogues but be wary. Place of replicas ? EBay!

• Borrow

Museum and loan collections- e.g. Saxons, Romans Egyptians

www.3.hants.gov.uk/wardrobe - costume and talking boxes

Hampshire History centre

Inter-cultural resources centre

Music room

Simple comparative e.g. irons, phones, coins

NB safety( gas masks)

artefacts can be modern too- and be useful across the curriculum