Curious Minds

Pupils travel back to Victorian Liverpool

Year 5 and 6 pupils from Broadgreen Primary spent the morning at Williamson Tunnels Heritage Centre, Edge Hill, Liverpool on Monday 10 January to inspire atmospheric writing.

As the school enters the third and final year of the Creative Partnerships Change School Programme, the focus is on improving confidence, quality and enjoyment in the writing process for children, teachers and parents.

 

The last two years of the programme, led by Hilary Keating (writer and lead practitioner) and supported by Caren Greaves (Creative Agent) have developed children's speaking and listening skills.  This year pupils will cement their ability to write competently and confidently in a wide variety of genres.

The pupils were accompanied by creative practitioners Ali Gadema (Beatbox Poet), Leonie Higgins (musician and storyteller) and Alan Gibbons (writer), who are working with Broadgreen on "Write On" - the main programme of work for this third year. 

Pupils donned hard hats and toured the underground tunnels, finding out about the mysterious history of "the mole of Edge Hill", philanthropist Joseph Williamson who supervised and funded the building of the labyrinthian tunnels in the early 19th Century.  There was plenty of opportunity for pupils to ask questions and ponder the enigma of the tunnels' existence.

After the tour, pupils handled artefacts salvaged from the tunnels and worked together to determine their history by asking questions, problem-solving, guessing their purpose and writing about and drawing the objects.

Pupils worked with storytellers Tricia Lee and Susan Cowell (Liverpool Libraries), on riddles, wordplay and ghost stories.  There was lots of interaction and engagement between pupils and storytellers, as the darkness and chill enhanced the spooky atmosphere and made the ghostly stories a bit more credible..!   They then took part in a quiz, working together to work out and write down the answers to some wordy and relevant questions.

Pupils and teachers fed back on the Creative Partnerships programme at Broadgreen:-

Anna (teacher):  There has been a noticeable improvement in children's writing and confidence ...  Pupils and teachers are enthused and enjoying the activities ...

Erin and Lucy (Y5 and 6 pupils):  We've made dens and used them to make stories...  It's been fun working with Hilary [Keating], she's not like a teacher - we can talk to her differently ... 

We create characters and write them up in our stories - it's easier to imagine what they're thinking and feeling... 

We buddy up with reception children and read with them in the dens - we learn more and so do they.

Michael and Tom (Y5 pupils):  We've been doing horror stories with Alan [Gibbons].  We worked in groups to write a story, and acted it out, which was more interesting and we wrote complex sentences ...  It's made us more enthusiastic about writing and inspired us to write at home as well.

We're writing on a blog that our parents can see.

He takes our words for his stories and we take his.

As they left the site, children were asking all kinds of question about the visit and had clearly gathered useful material for writing back in school.