Unlocking Creativity: A Teacher's Guide to Creativity Across the Curriculum

199 Pages·2005·1.55 MB·English

by  Robert Fisher

CREATIVE TEACHING:
HISTORY IN THE PRIMARY
CLASSROOM
Also available:
Unlocking Creativityby Robert Fisher and Mary Williams (ISBN 1 84312 092 5)
Creativity in the Primary Curriculumby Russell Jones and Dominic Wyse
(ISBN 1 85346 871 1)
CREATIVE TEACHING:
HISTORY IN THE PRIMARY
CLASSROOM
Rosie Turner-Bisset
David Fulton Publishers Ltd
The Chiswick Centre,414 Chiswick High Road,London W45TF
www.fultonpublishers.co.uk
First published in Great Britain in 2005 by David Fulton Publishers
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Note: The right of Rosie Turner-Bisset to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her
in accordance with the Copyright,Designs and Patents Act 1988.
David Fulton Publishers is a division of Granada Learning Limited,part of ITV plc.
Copyright © Rosie Turner-Bisset 2005
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN 184312 1158
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced,stored in a retrieval system or trans-
mitted,in any form or by any means,electronic,mechanical,photocopying,or otherwise,without the
prior permission of the publishers.
Typeset by RefineCatch Limited,Bungay,Suffolk
Printed and bound in Great Britain
Contents
Acknowledgements vi
Preface vii
1 Creative teaching 1
2 History in the primary curriculum 15
3 Artefacts 31
4 Using written sources 46
5 Visual images 59
6 The historical environment: maps,sites,visits and museums 69
7 Storytelling: ‘putting the book down’ 85
8 Drama and role-play 102
9 Simulations and games 112
10 Music and dance 123
11 Classroom discourse and generic teaching approaches 138
12 Ticking the boxes 143
13 Putting it all together: planning and creativity 160
Appendix 177
References 184
Index 188
v
Acknowledgements
Several people have helped either through inspiration or practically in the creation of
this book. The first people to acknowledge are three heroes of mine from the Nuffield
Primary History Project: John Fines,Jon Nichol and Jacqui Dean. The late John Fines
was a wonderful teacher and storyteller: the source of much inspiration for the way I
teach now. He is greatly missed but lives on in the memories of those fortunate
enough to have experienced his teaching. Jon Nichol has been a colleague,mentor and
friend for the past ten years,and without him I would not have learned so much about
high-quality history teaching so quickly. Jacqui Dean is a marvellous innovative
teacher,from whom I have also learned a great deal. All three have been instrumental
in my development as a teacher and teacher educator. It was a privilege to be asked to
research with them,and to work with these colleagues on in-service courses for teach-
ers. I extend my thanks to teachers on these courses,many of whom were excellent
examples of creative teachers. I also thank the teachers who allowed me into their
classrooms to carry out curriculum development and action research. One of the
factors that has made this book possible has been the award of a National Teaching
Fellowship, which has given me time to work on projects such as this. I thank my
colleagues at the University of Hertfordshire for their support during the process of
application and award. In particular I would like to thank Mary Read for her contin-
uing support over the years. Much practical support has been given by the publishers,
especially by Tracey Alcock. Finally,thanks go to my family for enduring the writing
process.
vi
Preface
‘Only connect!’
(E. M. Forster,Howards End,ch. 22)
Possibly this quotation is well used to the point of becoming a cliché: yet it is com-
pletely apt for a book about creative teaching. The concept of creativity presented
in this book is one of connecting different frames of reference to create humour,dis-
covery or works of art. It is about opening the mind to perceive things in alternative
ways. The concept of creative teaching similarly is about using those connections
to help children learn through a range of representations,teaching approaches and
activities,which enable children to be active agents in their own learning. Through
being in role in approaches such as storytelling,drama,simulations and songs,they
experience aspects of past historical situations as ‘players in the game’. In this sense,
both children and teachers are being creative.
All this happens within the structures of history as a discipline: the combination
of historical enquiry,interpretation and exercise of the historical imagination to re-
create the past while remaining true to the surviving evidence. In faithfulness to the
umbrella nature of history,concerned with all aspects of past societies,examples of
curriculum history are given,not merely integrated by theme or topic,but by concept,
process,skill and content. There are more connections,between aspects of different
subjects,which those subjects have in common,such as enquiry in history,geography
and science,or sequencing in history,English,maths,PE and dance.
The book is structured around the pedagogical repertoire for teaching history: all
those approaches and activities which teachers can use to connect their learners to the
subject matter to be taught. The intention is that each teaching approach receives
more than a few lines: usually a whole chapter is devoted to each approach. Through
the detailed narratives for each approach,teachers can gain access,for example,not
only to the practicalities of how to do storytelling,but also to underpinning theory
and to the pedagogical reasoning of planning for such teaching.
Finally the book is by way of homage to those three great heroes of creative
teaching: John Fines,Jon Nichol and Jacqui Dean. Their work was illustrated in the
vii
e excellent Teaching Primary History(Fines and Nichol,1997) which is now alas out of
c
a
f print. If you can get hold of a copy of this book,you will find it an invaluable source
e
r
P of teaching ideas and approaches for history in primary schools. In the meantime,
I offer up this book as emulation and adaptation,and as a source of understanding
creative teaching. I hope you enjoy it and find it useful.
Rosie Turner-Bisset
September 2004
viii
CHAPTER 1
Creative teaching
Examples of creative teaching in history
Cameo 1:Local study
A teacher working in tandem with a colleague is doing the local study unit. They have
recently taken their classes to St Albans Abbey for combined history, geography,
religious studies and art work. At the Abbey the children undertook history/RE trails
and art workshops with Abbey staff,and drew maps of the Abbey’s layout. Back in the
classroom,the teacher gathers her Year 3 class on the carpet. She tells them the story
of Athelstan,the medieval peasant with a problem,and the Abbey tax collector who
upset his plans by calling for his tithe (see Chapter 6). Just before the end of the story,
she pauses and asks the children where Athelstan might have hidden his money. They
have one minute to discuss it in pairs. She takes feedback quickly from the pairs,
praises the children for good ideas,and finishes the story. She shares with them some
documents from the Abbey which list the different goods sold in the market: butter,
cheese,vegetables,apples and pears,meat,fish,leather goods,wool,linen,silk,cloth-
ing, basketry, jewellery, pottery and glassware. She divides the class into groups to
make paper versions of these goods. There are three or four children to each stall mak-
ing goods. All children have access to a loan collection from the library on medieval
times so that they can make their goods look ‘right’. They have access to paper,pens
and crayons. When they have made enough,they rearrange the room as a marketplace
and the groups set out their stalls. They may carry on making goods while selling
them. The children can take it in turns to go around and barter goods with other stall
holders,while other children in their group mind their stall and make more goods.
Suddenly the teacher announces that the tax collector will be coming around in a
moment to collect his tithe (one-tenth of all they have made or sold). The children
frantically search for places to hide some of their goods,just as Athelstan did in the
story. Some put them in storage trays, in folders, or in exercise books. Others,
despairing at the last minute,sit on them. As the teacher comes around,each group
has worked out one-tenth to give to her. There is much ‘innocent’talk of ‘It’s been a
bad week, sir, haven’t made much’ or ‘One of my cows has been ill’. After this the
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