Activity Starters: Teaching Past, Present and Future

Activity Starters: Teaching Past, Present andFutureconsists of a series of short video chips from Teachers TV programmes for use in the classroom as activity starters. There are five starters in all, designed to be used as part of a lesson or series of lessons looking at the future of education and the role of teaching.

The five sections are:

  • Teaching in the Past - The Victorian Era
  • Teaching in the Past - The 1950s and 1960s
  • Primary Teaching Today
  • Secondary Teaching Today
  • Teaching in the Future?

Teaching in the Past – The Victorian Era

In this activity starter we see a recreation of a Victorian classroom, circa 1900, at BlistsHillOpenAirMuseum.

This clip can be used to compare and contrast the differences between Victorian and today’s teachers, teaching methods and classroom environment. It illustrates the strict discipline that Victorian pupils endured, the very rigid teaching style where pupils sit in rows, learn by rote and don’t speak unless spoken to. Would today’s pupils think they could cope with this regime? What do they think of the Victorian teacher’s style of teaching? How would they respond to it?

What would today’s pupil think of the lack of technology? No interactive whiteboards or wireless tablets. How do they think that would affect their learning? Also, would they notice that lack of visual stimuli in the Victorian classroom.

Pupils could reflect on how Victorian schools reinforced the class system as pupils were expected to know their place. How does this differ from their own experiences in class?

Today’s pupils could speculate on the age their Victorian counterparts would have left school, and perhaps how their home environment might affect their school performance. Victorian working class children would have been expected to do many manual chores at home. If this was expected of today’s children, how would if affect their school work? Would today’s children enjoy Victorian school life?

Teaching in the Past – the 1950s and 1960s

This activity starter comprises archive clips of school life in the late 1950s and early 1960s.

Again pupils can compare and contrast school life of half a century ago and that of today. In the opening shot, primary pupils could look for similarities between classrooms in the early 1960s and their own classroom. The chairs have seen better days, but is it so different? Do your children work in groups? Have you plenty of books around the walls? Are they surprised that the class is multi-cultural? Is a teacher wearing such formal clothing a novelty to your pupils?

What do they think of the next shot? Would they feel as happy and full of life as these boys running down the dark, narrow steps, along a corridor of bleak brickwork and railings akin to prison bars?

The next sequence of shots in secondary schools show the segregation of boys and girls in certain subjects. Girls concentrate on typing and dressmaking whereas the boy concentrates on the machine room. Secondary students could debate gender division by subjects, and would they expect it to continue into life after school? What sort of life was yesterday’s school preparing girls and for? Do they think only a certain class of pupil would have done these subjects? Does this still happen today? If so, how? How had school changed since Victorian times just over half a century earlier? What has replaced typing lessons?

The BonnerStreetSchool punishment book gives an insight into what was considered unacceptable behaviour in school. Both primary and secondary students can pass judgement on whether they consider the punishments fitted the crime. The man says he thinks many of the offences in the 1950s – truancy, lying, using threats, continual disobedience, running out of school - are relatively minor and wouldn’t merit punishment today. Would today’s students agree? What do they think about corporal punishment? Would it act as a deterrent if it were implemented today? Would it instil respect for the teacher? What concerns would they have? What misdemeanours would merit inclusion in a punishment book today? Pupils might also want to examine the Victorian architecture of BonnerStreetSchool, which has since been demolished. How does your environment affect how you learn?

What observations could today’s students make in the scene where the man asks the class whether the pupils are going to stay on at school for another year? How old are the children he is addressing? 13? 14? Would today’s student feel equipped to make their way in the world at this age?

There’s a whole 15 minute programme about Bonner Street School, featuring former teachers and pupils revisiting the site before it was demolished to reminisce about their school days, on the Teachers TV website: School Days: Bonner Street Primary School, London. This is part of a series looking back at how schools were in the last century, which also includes School Days - The Liverpool Collegiate, School Days - Ashamed Community School, Reading and School Days - Bran caster Deep dale Primary, Norfolk

Primary Teaching Today

The aim of this section is to show pupils different aspects of today’s teaching. The opening sequence could be compared with the Victorian clip. Today’s children may be sitting on the floor, but the teacher is in front of the class at a white – not black – board. Are there any other similarities? Or differences? What about the demeanour of the pupils? Today’s pupils seem to be smiling more than their Victorian counterparts, but do pupils think they would feel differently about their lesson? Is the relationship between pupils and teacher similar to Victorian times? If not, what’s different? Of course, technology is commonplace today and pupils could consider whether how this affects their learning experience.

The final clip illustrates how learning can be entertaining and fun. What do the pupils think?

Secondary Teaching Today

This section illustrates different aspects of teaching today as we watch Rebecca Wills teach German, starting with her teaching at the front of the class and the pupils repeating the words (is this so different from Victorian times?). There is an element of question and answer in this section before Rebecca gets the pupils to work together through exercises with her prepared teaching aids. In the third lesson Rebecca used a carousel format to rotate groups of students through three activities, one of which is on the computer. How do today’s pupils respond to this teaching style? How do they think it will change in the future?

Although the teacher is dressed casually, are the uniforms of blazer and tie so different from the 1950s and 1960s? What does this say about the teaching style, if anything? How does dress affect students’ behaviour and their attitude towards the teacher? Thinking about this, what do students think will be acceptable school wear for both students and teachers in the future, and why?

The next clip shows challenging children working in groups. What do pupils think is the purpose of this approach? Does it benefit the students? What should the teacher consider as this exercise plays out?

With the help of these clips, students can look objectively and critically at the role of today’s teacher and the dynamics of the classroom. They can then reason how this might evolve in the future.

Teaching in the Future

This is aimed at both primary and secondary students and can be used to spark ideas as to what teachers, schools and lessons will be like in the future. Dan Such from Future lab, which is an organisation that develops resources and practices that support new approaches to learning in the 21st century, demonstrates how he thinks technology could develop in the future with the video paper, magazine and 3D simulators. To what use do students think these tools of the future could be put? Could they design other innovative resources along similar lines? Do they see any disadvantage of these tools?

However, the education of the future is not just about technology but also about environment, and Professor Stephen Chappell, who has his own policy, research and practice consultancy which advises governments and national agencies worldwide on the strategic development of ICT, offers examples of innovative educational environments. Pupils could be asked to design the sort of spaces they would like to experience at school.

In the next sequence BiddenhamUpperSchool in Bedfordshire hasn’t got innovative spaces, but has an innovative approach to school attendance and learning by pupils only attending school when they need to do practical lessons. At other times they study at home or in community establishments such as gyms. Do pupils believe such an arrangement would work in your school? How could it work? What do they think about teaching the teachers? What would they teach? And what would they learn from teaching? Ask students to devise a timetable based on this approach. Do they see any disadvantages to learning in this way?

SudburyValleySchool in Massachusetts goes a step further: students from pre-school through high school age have no formal timetable, lessons or teachers. They are encouraged to explore the world freely, at their own pace and in their own way. Is this the teaching model of the future? What are the pros and cons of their approach? What about discipline? Do they believe that it disappears when a formal structure and timetable go? And what would they see to be the role of the teacher?