Last term, Upper Key Stage 2 pupils at Billingham South Primary, Stockton and St Joseph’s Catholic Primary in Middlesbrough, worked with Tees Valley Museums, the Dorman Museum and the British Museum on an exciting project – British Museum in your Classroom. Each created an amazing exhibition in their school hall. Pupils went to town planning interactive, immersive, creative and colourful exhibitions with one particular thing in common – both featured a 3,500 year old canopic jar from the British Museum.
In a first-of-its-kind project, the British Museum worked with the schools to support pupils to select an object to borrow. They chose the canopic jar, which then became the centre-piece of their exhibition and an integral part of their history topic work. Not many KS2 pupils can say they learnt about the Ancient Egyptians from online sessions with a curator at the British Museum or through handling genuine Ancient Egyptian artefacts from the Dorman Museum!
The Tees Valley Museums partnership, and especially the Dorman Museum, worked closely with the schools to support them in planning their own exhibitions. Teachers used our Museum in your Classroom toolkit to guide their thinking, but the resulting exhibitions were clearly the work of the children, who were so proud of the experience they created.
The fantastic pictures below give a hint of the in-depth learning that the students gained and shared with other year groups and their families.
