Trip to Nantwich Museum
Lesson: History
Class: Year 2 Year: 2017 - 2018
Nantwich Museum Trip
On Tuesday 7th November, Year 2 went on a school trip to Nantwich museum to learn all about the Great Fire of Nantwich which leads us in to our topic this term of the Great Fire of London.
As soon as we arrived at the museum, we gathered on the carpet to talk about some of the features of the Tudor age. We learnt that the houses were made of wattle and daub and were skilfully painted in black and white. Our morning activity had four different stations. We played with wooden Tudor toys, dressed up in beautiful Tudor costumes, wrote calligraphy with a quill and ink and used an old fashioned watering device. The children really enjoyed experiencing what life would have been like in the Tudor times.
In the other room, we learnt about how they used the River Weaver to extinguish the Great Fire of Nantwich in 1583. We all stood in a line and practised passing the leather buckets down the line from the river to the fire. Some of us even got to have a go at running with the buckets back and forth, as they would have done in 1583! After that, we learnt the song of “Nantwich is burning” and had a lively rendition of this, while pumping an old fashioned fire hose. Our teachers even joined in!
After lunch, we went on a scenic walk around the streets of Nantwich and spotted lots of houses built in the Tudor style. Some of us even noticed the calligraphy style letters written on signs around the town! On our tour we learnt that the fire was started by Nicholas Brown who burnt down the town when he was brewing beer illegally! We were shocked to find out that this fire took twenty days to extinguish because four grizzly bears were released from the Bear Inn into the town and were frightening the people of Nantwich.
To finish off our busy day we visited St Mary’s Church. At that time, houses were built very close together and made of wood so the fire spread extremely quickly. The people of Nantwich sheltered in stone buildings to escape the flames. St Mary’s Church was one of the buildings that they used for shelter. We were given a very informative tour of the church and the children found the stain glass windows particularly beautiful. The children had all thoroughly enjoyed the day and I’m sure they slept well on Tuesday evening!
