With the new term only a week a way my thoughts turn to the topic for this term – In Granny’s time / fifties. This blog post will be on some of the thoughts/ideas I have had on this topic, any thoughts, advice etc most welcome.
My starting point for this topic is the children. I thought of having the role play area as a child’s bedroom starting with it as a modern bedroom then moving it back gradually to 1950s. For example the first part of the term is 5 weeks so each week could be a different decade week 1 – 00s , week 2 – 90s, week 3 – 80s, week 4 – 70s week 5 – 60s so that after half term the bedroom would be in 1950s. Is this too much work for myself? How could I change it for each decade? I thought the things that could change are toys, posters, bedding – but how can I source these?
With each week being a different decade as a class we could investigate changes that happen in that decade – looking at how it would be to be a child in that decade.
My other thought for my role play area is to make a time machine so we could all travel back in time – any suggestions on this?
After half term the theme would be the fifties looking at childhood in that decade.
My other thoughts on this topic are -
- children give a talk on their favourite teddy before asking their grandparents about their favourite teddy/toy
- write about their grandparents favourite things they like to do with them
- make a present for their grandparent
- inviting grandparents into class
- visit to the local childhood museum or old school room
This has been a bit of a brain dump of my ideas but I thought I would share them to get help or maybe even help others.
Hello !
Apart from telling you that you look like my WeeMee sister, I thought I’d suggest creating a model Tardis in your classroom ( or nearby) to help with the time travelling. I’ve seen it done in another school very successfully. Pupils, staff and parents got very involved and had a lot of fun with different decades.
If you do decide to go back through the decades week by week perhaps consider contacting your local museum for loan kits with key pieces reflecting the period. These can be supplemented by pupil sourced artefacts. It helps get the creative and investigative juices flowing.
However you approach it I’m sure it will be productive. Get the pupils to suggest ways to ‘kick off’ the topic. It’s empowering, challenging and draws out their enterprising streaks!
Enjoy!
Karen
Thanks for the comment. I think the children would enjoy creating a time machine and could leave a lot of the planning to them – that could be my role play with still a weekly focus on the different decades.