On Wednesday 29th November, the children in Class 3 travelled by coach to Barnsley - 'the place of possibilities', to take part in a full day Stone Age and Iron Age workshop, linked to what they had recently been learning in school.
Ally met with us first and spoke to us about her role in the museum, what the role of an archaeologist is, and she wanted to know what we had already found out about the Stone Age. The children weren't shy at answering her questions and she seemed impressed with Class 3's knowledge! She spoke to us about the meaning of chronology and what this meant in terms of how long the Stone Age lasted in comparison to the Bronze and Iron Ages.
For the rest of the morning, we split up into 3 groups with 3 activities each. These involved handling artefacts and grouping them according to the dates they would have been around and used; exploring the museum for pictures of unusual plants to decide whether they were edible or non-edible (which is what the hunter-gatherers would have to have been careful with) and then a mix of cave painting style artwork and a replica sand dig for pots and fossils etc.
In the afternoon session, Kate showed us how to create a basic clay pot each, using strips of clay rolled out to build up the sides. We learnt the technique of using water to smooth the sides and then used special tools to mark engravings and patterns on the outside. We were allowed to take our pots home to dry.
Avelynn enjoyed handling the objects and discovered that, 'one was a long metal object that no-one could guess what it was used for - it was actually used for currency.'
India describes the process of pot-making, 'First, we made a small circle and added texture using the tools we were given. Then we made something that looked like a sausage or a worm, added water and wrapped it around the circle. We repeated that step until it was full enough.'
Lily D said, 'after we were shown the artefacts, we went into the museum to find pictures of plants to see if they were edible or not.'
