Educational sessions

Make a leather purse by stitching leather and decorating it in a traditional West African style

Suitable for KS2

Duration: 1 hour 15 minutes    

Cost per child: £3.50

Curriculum topics:

• Supporting Black History Month
• Making a money container
• Citizenship: Living in a diverse world
• The creative curriculum
• Focused practical tasks

Mould a jar and lid in the shape of an ancient Egyptian god, using air-hardening clay.

Suitable for KS2

Duration: 1 hour 30 minutes  

Cost per child: £3.00

Curriculum topics:

• The achievements of the earliest civilisations

Make a leather mask of the ancient Egyptian god, Osiris.  Mould the face and attach the sun disk and horns, and paint the eyes in a ritually significant way.

Duration: 1 hour

Cost per child: £5.00

Curriculum topics:

• What can we find out about ancient Egypt from what has survived?
• Citizenship

Make a leather Asian-style slipper by stitching a vamp and heel piece to a leather sole and decorating it with coloured wool

Suitable for KS1 and KS2

Duration: 1 hour 30 minutes

Cost per child: £2.50

Curriculum topics:

• Design and technology
• Science: Characteristics of materials / Investigating materials
• Visiting a museum site
• Speaking / Listening
• Citizenship: Respecting other cultures

Make a stylish leather cuff or bracelet using a special braiding technique.

Suitable for KS2  

Duration: 20 minutes

Cost per child: £1.00

Curriculum topics:

• Art and design
• Design and technology

Suitable for KS1

Duration: 25 minutes

Cost per child: £1.00

Curriculum topics:

• To develop a wide range of art and design techniques
• To use a wide range of material

Suitable for KS1

Duration: 40 minutes

Cost per child: £3.00

Curriculum topics:

• To develop a wide range of art and design techniques
• To use a wide range of material

Decorate a simple leather friendship bracelet by threading coloured wool through a series of holes.  

Duration: 20 minutes

Cost per child: £1.00

Curriculum topics:

• Investigating materials
• Mother Nature designer
• Following instructions and developing manual dexterity
• Art and design
• Design and technology

Make a striking fantasy mask out of leather.  Children will draw round a pattern, cut out the leather parts and mould them round a block.  This activity requires drying time, so it could be combined with a tour of the museum, other activity, or lunchtime.

Suitable for KS1 and KS2. 

Duration: 3 hours (including drying time)

Cost per child: £5.00    

Curriculum topics:

• Everyday materials
• Art
• Design and technology
• Visiting a museum site

Use a range of leatherworking tools and equipment to create a stitched leather heart.  Write a secret message to place inside.

Suitable for upper KS1 and KS2

Duration: 1 hour

Cost per child: £2.50

Curriculum topics: 

• Supporting anti-bullying campaign
• Personal/social education
• Design and technology

Make a Roman style satchel out of leather, based on a design carved on Trajan’s Column. Stitch, glue and assemble the parts.

Suitable for KS2

Duration: 1 hour 30 minutes

Cost per child: £3.50  

Curriculum topics:

• Why have people invaded and settled in Britain? A Roman case study
• Citizenship: Living in a diverse world
• The creative curriculum
• Learning outside the classroom manifesto
• Visiting a museum site
• Design and technology
• Science 
• Making a money container

Draw round patterns, cut out the parts and assemble the puppet. Children could also design and make their own puppet.

Suitable for KS1 and KS2

Duration:

Cost per child: £3.50

Curriculum topics:

• Design and technology: Puppets
• Science (Characteristics of materials)
• Mathematics (Terms: divide, half, remainder, etc.) 
• Literacy: Following instructions 
• Citizenship: Other cultures
• Mechanisms
• Materials and joining
• Fitness for purpose

Make a necklace of shaped beads in air-hardening clay.  An additional session on handling local finds is included.

Suitable for KS2

Duration: 2 hours

Cost per child: £3.00

Curriculum topics:

• The process of change
• The concept of chronology
• Stone Age technology
• Significant historical events in the local area

Make a teddy bear out of leather!  Children will draw round patterns and cut out the parts.  They will then assemble the bear, tying knots to hold the joints in place.  This activity can be expanded to include a free session looking at toys from the past.

Suitable for KS1

Duration: 45 minutes

Cost per child: £1.50    

Curriculum topics:

• How are our toys different from those in the past?
• English
• Design and technology
• Art

Make a simple leather mask in the style of a plague doctor from the late Medieval/Tudor period.    Children will form a piece of flat leather into a trunk and stitch it to the face of the mask, then stuff the nose with lavender.  

Subject to availability,  there may also be the opportunity to meet a Tudor Wise Woman re-enactor and learn about potions and folk remedies.  This would add 45 minutes onto the session, at no additional cost.  Please talk to the Assistant Curator to discuss availability.

Suitable for upper KS1.    

Duration: 1 hour 15 minutes / 2 hours

Cost per child: £4.00

Curriculum topics:

• What were the differences between the lives of rich and poor people in Tudor times?
• Art and design: What a performance 
• English: Non fiction
• Science: Characteristics of materials
• Changes in an aspect of social history

Make a Viking-style stitched leather purse with tie fastening.  This activity can be expanded to include a free session deciphering Viking runes.

Suitable for KS2    

Duration: 1 hour 15 minutes

Cost per child: £2.50

Curriculum topics:

• Why have people invaded and settled in Britain in the past? 
• A Viking case study
• Making a money container
• Citizenship: Living in a diverse world
• Literacy
• The creative curriculum
• Focused practical tasks

Visit our galleries and get inspiration for designing your own bag.

Suitable for KS1 and KS2

Duration: 20 minutes

Cost per child: 50p

Curriculum topics:

• Observation
• Appreciating the importance of planning
• The role of a designer
• Art and design
• Design and technology

Session 1: Suffragettes

Meet two Suffragette / Suffragist re-enactors and stage a protest! Make a sash or an armband to show your support for the cause.

Suitable for KS2

Cost per child: £3.00

Session 2: Democracy

Take part in a British Values guided walk, discuss the Walsall Bomb Plot of 1891, visit the Council Chamber (subject to availability) and discuss whether statues should ever be removed from public display.

Suitable for KS2

Cost per child: 50p

Curriculum topics:

• What are the fundamentals of British values: democracy, tolerance, respect, etc.

The discovery box is full of interesting objects for children to handle and costume to try on.  It can be used as a supplementary activity if children finish their projects early.

Suitable for KS1 and KS2

Duration: 30 minutes

Cost per child: FREE  

Curriculum topics:

• Conservation
• Multi-culturalism
• The joy of self discovery
• Art and design
• Design and technology

Make and decorate a leather slipper, and listen to a reading of the classic fairy tale "The Elves and the Shoemaker"

Suitable for: Early years    

Duration: 1 hour 15 minutes

Cost per child: £2.00  

Curriculum topics:

• Traditional tales
• English
• Design and technology
• Art and design

Compare modern and historic features of horse bit design.  Using deduction and evidence, decide when the object was made and to whom it may have belonged.  Learn about Prince Rupert and the local area at the time of the English Civil Wars. 

Duration:1 hour 30 minutes

Cost per child: FREE

Curriculum topics:

• Art materials 
• The creative curriculum
• Learning outside the classroom manifesto 
• Local history
• Stuart England (local focus)

Make ink from tea and have a go at calligraphy, using a quill pen, inspired by the 1,300 year-old Lichfield Gospels.

Suitable for KS1 and KS2    

Duration: 1 hour

Cost per child: £3.00

Curriculum topics:

• Art and culture
• Christian conversation and invaders and settlers, part of a long tradition of outsiders coming to Britain

A guided walk around Walsall, including a visit to St Matthew’s Church (subject to availability of a church guide).

Suitable for KS2

Duration: 1 hour 30 minutes

Cost per child: 50p (plus donation to the church if we visit)

Curriculum topics: 

• A study over time tracing how several aspects of national history are reflected in the locality
• A study of an aspect of history or a site that is significant in the locality

An actress plays Walsall’s nursing hero, Sister Dora, in a Walsall before the NHS, antibiotics, and health and safety legislation.

Suitable for KS2

Duration: 1 hour

Cost per child: £3.50   

Curriculum topics:

• The Victorians, then and now
• The history of medicine
• A significant local individual
• The role of women in society

Suitable for KS2

Duration: 1 hour

Cost per child: 50p

Curriculum topics:

• Local history: The Victorians in Walsall
• Transport
• The Empire
• Disease and sanitation
• Education

Dress up in Victorian style clothes and sing along with us!  A fun opportunity to experience popular entertainment enjoyed by the Victorians.

Suitable for upper KS1 and KS2

Duration: 1 hour

Cost per child: FREE

Curriculum topics:

• The Victorians
• Local social history (then and now)

A local history talk about the dramatic raid by German zeppelins on the Black Country during the First World War

Suitable for KS2

Duration: 1 hour 15 minutes

Cost per child: 50p

Curriculum topics: 

• A turning point in British history: air power! 
• WW1
• A significant event in the locality