Share your thoughts on historical days out and events with your children - £300 voucher to be won NOW CLOSED

[JustineBMumsnet]

It can be difficult to keep kids’ boredom at bay during the school holidays. English Heritage sites in London and the East are putting on events throughout the summer to help keep children entertained and they’d like to hear your thoughts surrounding historical days out and events you’ve attended with your children.

Here’s what English Heritage have to say: “English Heritage have a host of sites across London and the East that are perfect to keep your little ones entertained throughout the summer holidays. With a new themed activity each week at each property, your little adventurers will be thoroughly entertained (and may secretly learn a thing or two along the way!) during those long hot (here’s hoping!) holidays.

From London to Suffolk to Derbyshire and everything in between, English Heritage have castles, manor houses and sites with acres of beautiful gardens that are sure to keep even the most active of children busy! Not only are the sites fantastic, but each has a varied event programme for children throughout the school holidays. From becoming a home front hero to learning the ropes as a budding knight; from being inspired by Darwin’s science experiments to taking to the stage 1920s style and from going on a bug safari to playing games like a Victorian – your little time travellers will get hands on with history with English Heritage this summer.”

So, have you been on a really great historical adventure or attended an event which really brought history to life for your children? Do you think events you take your children on should be educational, or purely fun? Maybe you think that they should always be both? Whatever your thoughts or stories surrounding events and days out for your children, share them with English Heritage below.

All those who leave a comment below will be entered into a prize draw where one MNer will win a £300 voucher from a store of their choice.

Thanks, and good luck!

MNHQ

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My DS (7) loves History, we have a NT property a 10 min walk away and we are always there. My DS loves to see how things were back in the olden days so he loves a stately home all decorated as it would have been etc.

This week we have been doing a train trail around town and in the surrounding villages. We ended up in a church with a visitor centre and my DS loved dressing up in all the old costumes they had and watching the old footage of the village on a DVD they put on for us.

I've always loved history so I'm glad he does too.

I think having fun, fresh air and a bit of education thrown in is great. When something is interesting, you don't realise you are learning too.
I enjoyed watching a man make simple, leather shoes - my children didn't like that so much as I asked him too many questions.

They did love archery and generally exploring the castle. Sorry, but we've been to so many over the UK (EH and National Trust) I can't remember where it was.

I like the idea but think mine are probably too littl eto get it yet. I must admit that I haven't seen anything like this locally, they seem to be more of the lame craft activity vaguely related to the theme type things

Belsay and Dunstanburgh Castle are favourites with us, we are lucky that we have lots of choice when it comes to castles in Northumberland.

We do quite a lot of daytrips to places anyway, but have gone to themed events and really enjoyed them. I'll never forget DD2 when she was only about 3yo rushing up to join in a soldier parade, in front of hundreds of people. All the other children were much older boys. She did everything late and kept turning the wrong way. I laughed so much I thought I'd be sick

I think events should generally be a mixture of educational and fun.

A trail always works well for our DC (5 and 3) and helps to focus them so we get to walk around the whole property rather than just the parts they think look more exciting! If they can win a prize at the end it is even more exciting. Judging from the number of Uni students proudly wearing their Corfe Castle medals a few years ago this appears to work for quite a wide age range! For our young children short displays work best - we saw a great falconry display at Leeds Castle. They have also loved interacting with staff dressed as characters from the period.

We live 5 minutes away from lancaster castle/remains of Roman baths and they do lots of events so we've seen a full Roman battle and been in the courts, done an event on the pendle witches, all very good

We love visiting Dover Castle. Their Roman festival is absolutely amazing!! With gladiator combats and even people cooking genuine roman food!

We also love their WW2 event, it's amazing to see all the costumes.

We love fun events, but my eldest loves to learn, so he enjoys the educational parts too. I think historical destinations like Dover Castle have a part to play in education, so it's great to see events that include this in their programming :)

I work in heritage, but believe I was inspired by some very memorable days out as a child. I know how important those experiences were in giving me my love of history, so now I try to take my son to historic venues and museums to inspire him. I don't want it to seem forced though- I want him to explore and find things he loves for himself.

We love exploring ruins and figuring out what they used to be. Recently we've loved Whitby Abbey and Glastonbury Abbey. We also love castles like Farleigh Hungerford, Pembroke and Harlech where my son can put on his knight outfit and climb up tall towers. We don't need much to entertain us, we love taking a picnic and having free access to ramble around. Our imaginations are free to wander. We prefer those places to attractions with a theme park feel. I've been going to Warwick castle for years and seen it become more and more a cheesy theme park.

We always take the time to visit historical sites with the kids and love to take the opportunity to discuss the country's past with them. They find it all fascinating, as do we.
My kids particularly enjoy costumed characters and re-enactment.
I love they way a lot of places are updateing the way they interact with the kids too through use of ipad apps etc. It certainly keeps my kids interested.

We love a family day out to a castle or stately home! Dunster is great as are the Welsh castles near us. Sadly NT/EH membership is too expensive for us but we've had memberships in the past and it's great as you can visit at leisure rather than trying to cram everything into one day!!

The imperial war museum is great also looking at blue placs on buildings to see who used to live there.

We have a cadw membership so take them to lots of events at the castles in Wales. It is really important to teach about history and taking children to historical sights helps learning and actually retaining what they've seen and heard.

We had a wonderful day at Warrick castle. There was plenty to see and do with interactive displays. The grounds are lovely so we took a picnic and had a memorable day out.

We had a great day out at Warwick Castle when they had a special events day. There was plenty to do all day.

A trip to Portsmouth Dockyard is great for children so as to explore HMS Victory and the new improved viewing deck at the Mary Rose experience.

I think they should go easy on the 'education', at the outset at least, and keep it fun. Children seem to learn best when they're interested and so the priority should be on gaining and keeping their interest so they can learn from it however they need. Having said that, adults deciding what is fun for children doesn't always work! I suppose I think the main thing is giving children free access always and as much of it as they need; interactive interesting displays and people there to answer questions... as little structure as possible.

We have been to loads of historic places. They have particularly loved Dover Castle, Stonehenge, Osborne House, Framlingham, Bodium (the opposition) and the Bayeux tapestry. They like places which tie into what they are studying and places which tell stories of the real people behind the place

It is always such an interesting day out when you get to learn so much about the history of this great country.

we live near York, and have days out there. We go on the train and visit all the amazing sights this magnificent city has to offer - we love the castle and they boys have lots of hours spent imagining they are king of the castle, putting on imaginary armour going to to battle to the crusades on their 'horses'. we even have an execution for the loser ! (it is often me lol)

We started with small places like Portland Castle in Dorset so that the children didn't have time to get bored and to assess which children responded and which did not. We went on a day when they were allowing dressing up which one child loved and the other thought ridiculous. I read up a few interesting facts before we went so that I could enliven the trip. I always keep trips short and sweet. They usually have good shops so a little spending money is welcome and we usually find a nice spot for a picnic.

A cheeky tip for MNers rather than something for EH - Cadw (welsh version of EH) membership gives free entry to EH monuments but is considerably cheaper than EH membership.

We love London - so many museums - our fave is HMS Belfast - great views along the Thames too!

I think you need to have combination of historical and fun. That provides interest such as quiz that need to be complete on the way round or being able to dress up in period dress. That said there needs to be plenty of historical information available.

Great day out and normally cheap

I grew up in a family that loved visiting these properties, and have now passed this on to my DC (7 and 5). We have EH and NT memberships as we just love the mix of outdoors and history.

We love just pottering around the properties, although they still really enjoy a trail. We have plans to attend lots of these events at EH places over the Summer. I am hoping that they will really enhance the enjoyment for DC. I think being fun is really important, but both my DC really enjoy learning as well. They see this as part of their fun. First day of the Summer holidays here and I am excited!