Visit HMS Alliance, newly restored after a £7m refit and ready for patrol! Assault all of your sense by walking on board HMS Alliance, the only remaining WW2 era British ocean-going submarine.
History
History
History tells stories about people, places and things to help explain to young people of any age why the world is as it is as they grow up and begin to question it.
Schools will choose different periods and settings and topics to cove during different Key Stages, but all of them are pretty well guaranteed to be rooted in actual places that can be visited, explored and enjoyed.
It has been a curious fact that for many years primary classes have studied the Roman, Anglo-Saxon and medieval periods, while secondary school syllabuses have been more engaged in post-medieval periods. For a while secondary courses involved a great deal of ‘topic work’. While this discipline still exists, the recent examination syllabuses have returned to an emphasis on historical periods and links.
But all periods and topics provide fantastic opportunities for school visits. We are so lucky that so many general and specialist museums and visitor centres exist in the UK. The problem is not a shortage of possibilities but how one sifts through the available opportunities to make choices.
The Historical Association website carries information about course, conferences, study tours, and the Association has published ‘The Historian’ magazine for many years. Handsam is also happy to help, please contact us on 03332 070737 or email info@schooltripsadvisor.org.uk.
Most venues will have teaching materials and activities geared to students’ different ages and aptitudes whether at primary or secondary level. All of them will set out to develop students’ ability to understand, analyse and evaluate key features and characteristics of historical periods and events studied.
Some venues will be easy to identify because they fit neatly with the period and topic being studied but others may offer new possibilities, not least to the teachers themselves. Teachers need and deserve their own stimulation.
Over the next four years there will be an upsurge in visits to the First World War battlefields. Because of this there will be an increase in companies offering visits and requirement for battlefield guides, especially in northern France and Belgium. There are bound to be discrepancies in guides’ knowledge and experience. Close research into the credentials of the company you are contracting with, and the company’s guarantees about guides, will ensure that your group will not be disappointed.
Main organisations:
Commonwealth War Graves Commission
Inclusion: NASEN
Thought of visiting?
Roman Vindolanda and Roman Army Museum at Hadrian’s Wall
Viriconium, Wroxeter, Shropshire
The Jorvik Viking Centre, York
Offa’s Dyke Trail and Chirk Castle
The National Trust for Scotland
Clan Donald Visitor Centre, Isle of Skye
Bosworth Battlefield Visitor Centre
Haus am Checkpoint Charlie, Berlin
Exeter Cathedral Education Centre
The National Maritime Museum, Greenwich
The Mary Rose Museum, Portsmouth
East Anglia Railway Museum, Colchester
The National Tramway Museum, Matlock
Venues for this Curriculum
Welcome to Liverpool’s Metropolitan Cathedral.
Savour the silence. Join us in prayer. Take a tour. Whatever shape your visit takes, we’d love to welcome you to Liverpool’s Metropolitan Cathedral of Christ the King.
Perched high above the city, our Cathedral offers a place to pause. A sacred place to stop, recharge your spirits and reawaken your senses.
One of the finest local history collections in Hampshire, exploring 100 million years of history Displays include prehistoric tools, Roman pottery reconstruction, Saxon burials, the Battle of Alton 1643, the notorious tale of Sweet Fanny Adams and Hop picking and brewing.
Jane Austen Trail at the Curtis Museum
Discover the geology, archaeology and history of the Peak District through seven time zones, experience the Wonders of the Peak Time Tunnel and step into a Victorian scientists study in the Buxton Museum.
Education sessions in the museum
Award-winning museum of Great Yarmouth life
Set in a beautifully preserved Victorian curing works, Time and Tide tells the story of Great Yarmouth from its Ice Age origins to the present day. Discover the town's rich maritime heritage and its development as a popular seaside resort. Hear gripping tales of wreck and rescue and meet colourful characters who made their living from the sea.
Make a voyage of discovery about Gosport in this exciting display, with objects, display panels and set pieces which trace the story of Gosport through the centuries.
Escape city life and step into tropical paradise of an aquarium in the heart of the buzzing city of Birmingham. At the National SEA LIFE centre you can take an amazing marine voyage beneath the waves and experience so much more!
The National Maritime Museum (NMM) in Greenwich, is the leading maritime museum of the United Kingdom and may be the largest museum of its kind in the world.
Penydarren was the site where the World's first Steam Engine ran on rails. Designed by Richard Trevithick, in 1804 his steam locomotive hauled a train along the tramway of the Penydarren Ironworks in Merthyr Tydfil.
Experience the extraordinary at the Royal Pavilion, an exotic palace in the centre of Brighton. Built as a seaside pleasure palace for George IV, this historic house mixes Regency grandeur with the visual style of India and China.
Set in the picturesque valley of the Porter Brook, Shepherd Wheel is a unique working example of Sheffield knife grinding industry.
It was one of many small water-powered grinding workshops along Sheffield's rivers and is the earliest complete example of this industry with evidence dating it back to the 1500s.
Located in one of the city’s oldest industrial districts, the museum stands on a man-made island over 900 years old.
Kelham Island Museum was opened in 1982 to house the objects, pictures and archive material representing Sheffield’s industrial story.
Whether you are studying the Romans, Normans, castles, Victorians, or the Home Front and World War II, you will find plenty to keep your pupils engrossed both whilst visiting Cardiff Castle and during preparation and follow-up work at school.
In our fun, free and interactive galleries, discover how Cardiff was transformed from the small market town of the 1300s, to one of the world's biggest ports in the 1900s, to the cool, cosmopolitan capital we know today.
Small Tudor artillery fort guarding Dartmouth's inner harbour, picturesquely sited on the quayside.
Bickleigh Castle is sure to cast its magical spell on you. With its romance, rich history and stunning setting it has become a unique venue.
There are a huge range of activities available both at the Castle itself or very nearby, including:
Discover the true spirit of the characters from South Molton's past, through the exhibits and interactive displays. The collections reflect the life and times of the town and the surrounding countryside. Local trades, agriculture and domestic history are also strongly featured.
A fascinating medieval cob house, containing a cross-passage screen decorated with a painting of St Andrew. See the smoke-blackened timbers. Discover the fascinating history behind the cottage and enjoy the garden with contemporary cob summer house.
Dartmouth Museum is a small, fascinating and interesting museum housed in an atmospheric old merchant's house, built in approximately 1640.
The Valiant Soldier is an amazing place. It is a pub that closed in the 1960's creating a time warp within its walls. It had been a village inn for more than two centuries. but when it closed furniture, pub artefacts and domestic items were simply left where they stood as the last customer walked out.
A dramatic 17th century fortress built to defend the coastline from the Dutch, and keep watch on a recently rebellious town. Still in use by the military today.
The Brixham Heritage Museum and History Society was founded in 1958 for the purpose of recording, saving and displaying the heritage of the historic town and fishing port.
Since 1976, the Museum has been located in what was once the Police Station and Sergeant's House, built 1902.
Dingles Fairground Heritage Centre is a 45,000 square foot indoor attraction that provides a unique opportunity to view our Fairground Heritage in a beautiful rural location. It is a facility unique in the UK, designed to capture the magic of a bygone age through exhibits, vintage engineering and stunning artwork displays - offering a great day out for all the family.
The displays in Dawlish Museum are changed regularly and aim to represent life past and present in the town, for example the acclaimed display of the February storms which severely damaged the railway.
Children as well as adults are catered for and there are activities especially for them.
As the site of officer training for the Royal Navy for over a century, Britannia Royal Naval College in many respects resembles a living museum, not unlike a stately home, in which modern day-to-day life exists in parallel with a rich history and tradition. The College is an imposing Edwardian building that stands on Mount Boone overlooking the town of Dartmouth.
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