London's Victorian voices

The Victorian age was a time of great change: rich and poor alike were thrown together on the crowded city streets, rail travel enabled some people to travel around England and many women were fighting for equal rights. Looking back in time can help us understand today. This scheme of work inspires young people to discover the voices of London’s past – to investigate what it was really like to live and work in the capital city during the 19th century, to explore the rules of society by using photographs and objects and to consider how our lives have changed. The drama activities are used to spark their imaginations, generate storytelling and inspire the creation of memory boxes to awaken the different Victorian voices of London’s past.

Learning objectives:

By the end of this scheme the students will have learnt:

• They can speak with confidence in a range of contexts
• They can listen, understand and respond appropriately to each other in group and whole class discussions
• They can ask relevant questions to clarify, extend and follow up ideas from their research
• They can talk effectively as a member of a group, qualifying and justifying their opinion or idea
• They can create, adapt and sustain telling a story supported by simple props
• They can use dramatic techniques to explore characters
• They can evaluate how they and others have contributed to creating a story inspired by history
• They can imagine and explore feelings and ideas, focusing on creative uses of language

Number of lessons: 4