To wonder what year 7 pupils get from building a castle model

[Verycold]

In history? What is the point?? How does it actually improve their higher level history skills?

Task not risk of course.

Not sure I agree with the fun task bit... And understanding what castles looked like seems more like primary level to me?

If it was a scottish school they would still be in primary school these are 11 year old children and a fun thing like this helps them learn I am glad the days are gone of just books and teachers droning on and on AND On,

no offence to any teachers on here i am sure you do not drone

hmm indeed mrsj its called creative planning, not death by powerpoint!

DD is nearly finished high school she loves history and they did plan and make a fort when she was in 1st year children all learn in different ways and if building a castle turns one child onto history then that has to be a good thing, Fwiw i loved history at school in the days before building castles and white boards

My DD age 14 really struggled with the 'build a castle' homeworks and actually even the 'create a poster' ones too.

She really really really struggles with anything crafty. Can't cut in a straight line, zero spacial awareness etc etc. These homeworks are a torment to her and it takes hours to produce anything that looks like anyone older than 6 has produced it.
If I leave her to do them herself the hours spent completely lose any learning that should have been gained.

So I have learned to help her work out what the 'learning' of the homework is, then work with her to ensure she gets the learning without all the grief (which means that I assist alot in any construction, unless it is a DT task where I consider construction to be part of the learning).

To me it is like a cost-benefit analysis.

Also, construction-type tasks are a bit like sport. Everyone sees how good/bad you are. Teachers these days don't tend to read out poor essays to the rest of the class...

I think offering the option of creative homework is a fantastic idea. I think insisting upon it is ridiculous.

Thank you teenandtween, excellent post

And candy

I think varying the outcome written and practical is good practice. Though in KS4/5 I would expect it to be related directly to exam performance (sad I know but thats the game)

I think that is quite a pragmatic approach teen

But if your child is bad at something then surely they need practice. Half the reason so many children in this country underachieve is because they lack resilience in learning and the second they start to 'struggle' they are encouraged to give up. 'Struggling' should be a sign that there is an opportunity to learn something new. If you're not struggling then you have already acquired that particular skill, so what's the point?

feeling good luck with the pysch degree

I don't see the problem with a fun/creative activity once in a while for them at that age? As long as it's not every other week and they are being taught the full curriculum.

I dropped history at GCSE because it was so dry, we had the most feared teacher in the school and no fun was allowed! When I changed school I took it up again for A-level and really enjoyed it, went on to do a degree in it. I think with history it's really important at that age to make it appeal, or no one is going to be interested in pursuing it later.

Not a massive call for pure essay writing in the workplace ...

However, project preparation, team working, presentational skills, problem solving and process analysis are all invaluable.

My heart sank last year when I found the 'build a castle' task.

Then I started thinking positive. DD1 did it collectively with her friends and made the castle out of cake. I did all the 'dangerous' bits - hot ovens, sharp knives etc. - but they researched, designed, mixed, rolled, shaped and assembled. It took about 7 hours and the resulting cake was massive - it fed all of Yr7 and the staffroom, and it looked amazing. The girls learned a lot about the structural difficulties involved in building a defensible motte and bailey castle. I'm already discussing options for Yr7 with DD2 now in Yr6 - we are thinking modelling chocolate.

I appreciate that these crafty tasks are difficult, and it would have been easier if we had been allowed Lego, Minecraft and/or 2D methods, but it was a great experience.

On that argument, maparole, we could do away with a number of academic subjects altogether.

And if she struggles to persevere with this, in what way has she become a better historian?

I couldnt agree more natweb conflict in a childs understanding makes them figure things out, and no should not be allowed to give up. We trya dn instill this work ethic in DS.

He rips through maths homeworks in minutes but writing is a night mare. We are DIYing for 11+so I have started him with English and Scrabble as that is the bits he needs to work on

On that argument, maparole, we could do away with a number of academic subjects altogether.

No, because the skills required for academic study are also invaluable.

And skills are what it is all about, after all: the facts and figures learnt are rarely of much use or significance in later life.

I wonder what you think "being a historian" involves? Certainly not learning a lot of stuff and regurgitating it to order.

www.hist.cam.ac.uk/undergraduate/skills

See the link - no talk of lolly sticks there anywhere...

Where did I say I want her to learn facts and regurgitate them? In history they should learn to evaluate sources, develop an opinion, present an argument... All valuable skills I believe.

A good historian would probably need to have good research skills and a good imagination to bring the history alive and make it relevant.
They might even need the skills to make a model to reach a greater audience.

tell me about it. the person who has decided what year 7 will do about Christmas is having them cut out and colour Christmas trees. in religious education. if i cared, i'd weep. Jesus wept.

teenandtween Then you're lucky those sorts of tasks are few and far between. Unfortunately for some children who struggle with writing - in the same way your DD struggles with craft - they have to do it day in day out and their only relief from it is in tasks like this.

Thing is we all have to do things we don't like in life, I have to do oral presentations as part of my degree which I hate because I have anxiety in social situations, but it's just part of education.

Verycold if you are a teacher, you should be able to acknowledge that things like this do have benefits. It's not just about the topic at hand, it's teaching skills to be able to engage in the topic.

What percentage of the children in the class do you think are planning to become historians, OP? Do you really think that the sole purpose of their lessons is to prepare them to become a specialist academic in that field? PLEASE put us out of our misery and tell us what you teach?!

Evaluating sources, presenting an argument... Skills history can teach you, but which are useful in many areas of life. Planning and constructing a model... Also useful, but should be taught in DT, not history.

I don't really want to say what teacher I am, not sure why I should?