Redbridge Museum Schools Programme
Redbridge Museum offers a stimulating, exciting and varied programme for schools. We deliver sessions online, at Redbridge Museum and Valentines Mansion & Gardens.
Redbridge Museum has built up an excellent relationship with local schools over a number of years.
Visit Redbridge Museum with your class to enhance and consolidate your pupils' knowledge, skills and confidence, through peer group learning.
The learning environment of Redbridge Museum allows classmates to investigate displays, consider local objects and information in context. Skills such as historical enquiry, communication and literacy, interpretation and common sense are developed. Sessions are rooted in relevant local experiences, and the subjects we cover are varied and always cross-curricular.
See below for education sessions for Key Stages 1 and 2 at Redbridge Museum
The collections of Redbridge Museum and Redbridge Heritage Centre give you access to a depth of detail across the curriculum:
Resources include objects for handling, photographs, maps dating from 1863, censuses from 1841 – 1911, local newspapers on microfilm and oral histories. Combined with the Museum's permanent displays all these resources can facilitate discussion and hands-on learning.
Please contact the Museum Education Service to discuss your particular interests and to plan a session tailored for your group.
Find out more about education sessions at Valentines Mansion & Gardens
Bring your groups to Redbridge Museum for a self-led visit. Please book in advance.
Whilst sessions at Redbridge Museum or Valentines Mansion take priority, the Education Officer is willing to visit your classroom with a limited selection of objects for a handling session. The current cost of this is £30 per class.
The Museum has an object collection that could be used to enhance your teaching. We welcome your requests and enquiries for one-off sessions and projects.
Tailor-made INSET sessions can be arranged for you and your colleagues at Redbridge Museum and Redbridge Heritage Centre.
You can also use materials from past Museum exhibitions for your research.
More information about Redbridge Museum's Education Service is available online at: www.redbridge.gov.uk/museum
Pre-ordered 'Goody Bags' with pocket money gifts are available for £2-3 per bag. Groups visiting the shop will need to factor in extra time. Please order at time of booking.
KS1 & KS2 History: Local History; Geography: Changing Environment
Children will learn about prehistoric Redbridge and find out why Ilford is one of the most important Ice Age sites in Britain. Children will explore the history of Uphall Iron Age camp in Ilford, take part in a mini archaeological dig and uncover facts.
KS1 & 2 History
Your class will focus on Ilford and Wanstead in Roman times. They will learn about daily life in Roman times, and use IT skills to build a Roman villa. In small groups they will take part in a mini-dig and handle real archaeological artefacts.
KS1 & 2 History: Local History; Geography: Changing Environment
Explore the borough’s rich history through artefacts, Museum displays and IT. Children will see and touch mammoth remains, find out about a local Iron Age settlement, Roman archaeology and Historic Houses. In small groups the children can take part in a mini-dig, handle real archaeological artefacts and record their findings from Roman or Tudor times.
KS 2 & 3 Geography: Changing Environment, Place Knowledge; History: Local History
The Museum can teach a Local Geography / History session specific to your school. Before the sessions, teachers will be expected to visit the Museum to choose historic maps, photographs and newspapers. These resources will then be used to help pupils explore changes in their locality over time, alongside a visit to the Museum or field work in Ilford Town Centre.
KS1 History: Way Of Life; Science: Materials
KS2 History: Changes In Society
Children will examine period room sets to consider how life was different for a Victorian child, including a classroom at Barnado's Girls' Village Home, a living room and a kitchen. Pupils will investigate Victorian clothing and find out how this would have been laundered on washday. They will engage in role-play whilst comparing modern technology with the past. Alternative handling activities, for younger age groups involve touch and experience of Victorian objects, clothes and replica toys.
KS2 Local History
This session uncovers the local impacts of the First World War in Ilford, Wanstead and Woodford. Pupils will explore personal stories of local soldiers, nurses and children using a range of real artefacts, archives and handling resources.
KS2 History: Local History, Way Of Life, Britain since 1930
This session gives your students an opportunity to handle and discuss objects from wartime Redbridge, such as ration books, gas masks and ARP equipment. In the Museum they will study the experiences of a local soldier, air raid warden and an evacuee and even see an unexploded bomb.
KS2 History: Local History, World History
PSHE: Diversity
Links with Black History Month
This workshop considers the role of Commonwealth countries in supporting Britain in World War II. We will look at photographic evidence from around the world and discuss the experiences and impact of the war that they show. The Museum visit will focus on what happened in Redbridge during the war.
KS2 PSHE: Multiculturalism; History: Way of Life; Geography: World Map
KS3 Citizenship: Diversity
Links with Black History Month
Using the experience of local people pupils will discover the reasons why people moved to London and Redbridge over the last 100 years. Children will think about the changing nature of migration and explore how different cultures such as Jewish, Irish, Caribbean, South Asian, African and Eastern Europeans have settled in Redbridge. The session will use objects, photographs, maps and personal histories from Redbridge Museum's collections. The session can open up discussions about the wealth of migration stories in your classroom.
KS1 Science: Materials; Literacy, Describing
Children will investigate how they can use they senses whiles exploring the Museum. Children will be encouraged to touch, listen, smell and handle objects from the Museum collections.
KS1 History: Old and New; Science: Materials; Literacy: Describing
Here the children will investigate and handle toys from Victorian times to the present day. They will examine and play with a number of moving toys, and discuss their materials, design and function. In small groups they will follow a toy trail in the Museum.
KS1 History: Old and New; PSHE: Contrasting Localities; Science: Materials
KS2 History: Cultural Diversity
Links with Black History Month
In this session the children investigate and handle a variety of toys from this country and countries around the world. Children have the opportunity to learn a new game and take part in some imaginative play with Indian puppets.
All Museum sessions are free to book. Sessions take place Wednesday to Friday.
In-person:
Morning sessions: 10am to 11.30am or 10.30am to 12pm
Afternoon sessions: 1pm to 2.30pm or 1.30pm to 3pm
Online:
Morning sessions: 11am to 12pm
Afternoon sessions: 1pm to 2pm
To book a session, please email redbridge.museum@visionrcl.org.uk
Please provide the following information when booking a session:
Cancellations should be made at least 48 hours in advance, otherwise an administration fee of £20 will be charged.
Redbridge Museum is situated close to 14 bus routes serving the borough and is a short walk from Ilford High Rd.
Bus 25, 86, 123, 128, 145, 147, 150, 167, 169, 179, 364, 366, 462, W19
Alternatively, we can arrange transport for Redbridge schools at a special reduced price of £150 per class for a return journey.
Lunch facilities are not available in the Museum. Rooms are available for hire in the Central Library subject to availability. Hiring a room for lunch could enable the class to also visit the Children's Library, Valentines Park, Valentines Mansion or the local area.
Contact Redbridge Halls Lettings on 020 8708 2858
For bookings or enquiries, email redbridge.museum@visionrcl.org.uk
Redbridge Museum
2nd Floor, Redbridge Central Library
Clements Road, Ilford, Essex IG1 1EA
Website: www.redbridge.gov.uk/museum
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