Pupils at Gatehouse of Fleet Primary School are currently in the middle of doing a project on Gatehouse in the Dark Ages, part of an HLF funded project led by the Gatehouse Development Initiative. The school resource pack created for the Galloway Picts Project forms the basis for this project, but which has been expanded to include elements of artistic and literary creativity.<\/p>\n
As part of this\u00a0the children visited Trusty’s Hill\u00a0at the beginning of last week. They were very excited to see a figure standing on the hill above\u00a0and couldn\u2019t believe he was real. When they reached the summit of the hill they discovered he was Androth Siggursson, a Bernician from Northumbria, whose grandfather had burnt the fort!<\/p>\n
He talked about the different roles woman, children and men\u00a0had at the fort, the structure of\u00a0society in the Dark Ages and\u00a0a typical day in the life of a young boy\/girl. He also\u00a0told them about what he was wearing , \u2018translating\u2019 the cost into modern day items (his sword = BMW car for instance),\u00a0which the pupils were fascinated by, and linking his clothes with the making of cloth, leatherwork, metal working and trade.<\/p>\n
This proved to be a great way of provoking lots of questions from the children about life\u00a0on Trusty’s Hill all those centuries ago.<\/p>\n
With the help of a local writer, the children also started working on short poems based on the different roles people\u00a0may have had at Trusty\u2019s Hill. Already there is\u00a0the start of some good poems using the information the children\u00a0got on the hill about life in this Dark Age stronghold.<\/p>\n
The school followed up the visit on Monday with another session with the writer on Thursday,\u00a0learning\u00a0how to edit their poems, and playing the \u2018rubbish game’ to look at and talk about the finds\u00a0we made at Trusty\u2019s Hill last year.<\/p>\n
Perhaps the highlight of Thursday\u00a0afternoon was an oral storytelling exercise where the children created a saga\/story about living at Trusty\u2019s Hill. They really got into this – what started as a large circle of them on the floor got smaller and smaller as the story kept going around and getting more exciting and they kept edging closer and closer together. They used lots of the information they had gathered at the site on Monday and earlier in the afternoon for the story.<\/p>\n
I wish I had done things like this when I was at school!<\/p>\n
The school group approaching Trusty's Hill<\/p><\/div>\n
The past come to life at Trusty's Hill<\/p><\/div>\n
Education can be fun!<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Pupils at Gatehouse of Fleet Primary School are currently in the middle of doing a project on Gatehouse in the Dark Ages, part of an HLF funded project led by the Gatehouse Development Initiative. The school resource pack created for … Continue reading