With engaging and immersive activities that support the different subject areas at Key Stage 2, a visit to the Weald and Downland Living Museum is a great way to explore life in the past and inspire learning.
With a focus on hands-on learning, our Key Stage 2 workshops can accommodate a wide range of schools, SEND and home education groups. From science and design and technology to English and history our sessions aim to stimulate communication and thinking skills, develop creativity and encourage team working.
To find out more about each workshop click on the links below.
Self-Guided Visits
A self-guided visit to the Weald and Downland Living Museum is an excellent way of enriching Key Stage 2 studies. From the Anglo-Saxon to Edwardian era, our buildings tell stories about the people who lived and worked in the countryside over a 1,000 year period.
A self-guided visit allows you to explore the homes, traditional working buildings and beautiful landscape in your own time and our Resources page has materials to help you plan plus activities to support a visit.
Tours Through Time
Duration: 1 hour
Cost: £50 for 15 pupils
Join us on an interactive journey through time where your tour guide will take you on a whistle-stop tour of 4 different houses from 4 different time periods. Pupils will be challenged to spot the difference between the houses and take part in an immersive hands-on activity at each stopping point along the way which will help bring the history of each house to life and enable a better understanding of what it was really like to live in the past!
Choose from the following tour options:
1. Saxon to Tudor Tour (stops at Saxon House, Hangleton, Boarhunt and Bayleaf)
2. Victorian to Medieval Tour (stops at Whittakers, Victorian school, Bayleaf and Boarhunt)
Expect to take part in historical crafts, horrible chores, lessons in apothecary and become time travelling detective along the way.
How to Book
Visit our Plan & Book page for all the information you need to organise and book a visit, including prices.
Online booking formNeed More Information?
Please email schoolbookings@wealddown.co.uk or call us on 01243 811459
Onsite Workshops
Shelters and Survival
Duration: 1 hour
Cost: £50
Bring your class on an adventure that will test their survival and problem solving skills. In this session aimed at building confidence and team working, pupils work together to build a shelter out of natural materials using techniques from the past.
They have a go at using tools and search for plants to eat or use as medicine. By the end of the session, they will be able to discuss risks and responsibilities – and hopefully survive in the wild!
What will they do?
- Work together to hold and manipulate wood to weave a section of wattle fencing and make a shelter using the techniques from the past
- Handle and use tools in a carefully supervised setting
- Watch a fire lighting demonstration and then have a go themselves
- Search for edible and other useful plants and materials used by our ancestors to help them survive
How to book
Please complete our Online Booking Enquiry Form
Alternatively, call us on 01243 811459 or email schoolbookings@wealddown.co.uk
Time Travellers: Home Life Through the Ages
Duration: 1 hour
Cost: £50
Take your group back in time to discover how people lived in the past. What were their homes like? Where did people sleep, wash and cook? What furniture and equipment did they have?
Pupils will visit our artefact store and then explore either an Anglo-Saxon, Tudor or Victorian home to discover and compare the differences with home life today. Along the way, there will be hands-on activities and demonstrations to bring the past to life.
What will they do?
- Visit to the Collections Store
- Match the object to its modern day equivalent activity
- Mystery Object handling activity
- Carry out a historic skill or craft
- Get dressed activity – chance to try on replica clothes from the Saxon, Tudor or Victorian period
How to book
Please complete our Online Booking Enquiry Form
Alternatively, call us on 01243 811459 or email schoolbookings@wealddown.co.uk
Woodland Ecology Detectives
Duration: 45 minutes
Cost: £40
From the smallest insect to the biggest tree everything in our woodlands is connected. In this outdoor session, pupils investigate how ecosystems function.
They visit our woodlands using hands on practical exploration and observation to find out about producers and consumers, food chain and webs. Identifying trees and plants, they discuss their features and role in the ecosystem before going on to work as environmental detectives and complete an Impact Assessment.
What will they do?
- Get to know a tree – hands on activities to identify, measure and discover the age of trees
- Use sampling techniques and keys to classify and record plants and animals that live under the trees
- Complete an Environmental Impact Assessment to identify how developments could affect the ecology and habitats
How to book
Please complete our Online Booking Enquiry Form
Alternatively, call us on 01243 811459 or email schoolbookings@wealddown.co.uk
Farm to Fork
Duration: 1 hour
Cost: £50
In this hands-on workshop, pupils discover how farmers worked in the past and follow the story of everyday foodstuffs from field to fork.
They visit our animals and learn how farming relied on animals like our heavy horses. They then take part in activities to find out where the ingredients come from and discover the processes behind bread-making before taking part in our bake off challenge to make rolls to take home.
What will they do?
- Take part in a food chain challenge
- See our Percheron heavy horses, Southdown sheep, Saddleback pigs, chickens and geese
- Carry out practical farm activities – e.g. using a flail and quern stone to mill wheat
- Visit Lurgashall Mill to see how grain is ground into flour
- Visit Newdigate Bakehouse to knead and shape dough for a bread roll
- Walk out to the fields to learn how crops are grown
How to book
Please complete our Online Booking Enquiry Form
Alternatively, call us on 01243 811459 or email schoolbookings@wealddown.co.uk
At Home With the Anglo-Saxons
Duration: 45 minutes
Cost: £40
Get ready to discover the Anglo-Saxons in this hands-on workshop. Pupils will experience Anglo-Saxon home life in this fun-packed workshop based in our Anglo-Saxon hall house.
They will get to grips with how they built their homes by helping to split logs and make hurdles, before going on to act as house detectives to discover how Anglo-Saxons lived. Along the way, they will also dress-up as Saxons, forage for food and learn traditional crafts.
What will they do?
- House detectives activity exploring our Anglo-Saxon hall house
- Take part in practical activities to learn how Anglo-Saxons built their homes – including mini hurdle making and using a wedge and maul to split a tree trunk
- Explore the trees, plants and hedges to discover how Anglo-Saxons used them
- Learn to weave like the Anglo-Saxons and make braids using lucets
- Get dressed Saxon-style activity
How to book
Please complete our Online Booking Enquiry Form
Alternatively, call us on 01243 811459 or email schoolbookings@wealddown.co.uk
Bringing Beowulf to Life
Duration: 1 hour
Cost: £50
Delve into Anglo-Saxon culture to bring your Beowulf topic to life.
This activity-based workshop in our Saxon Hall house will help pupils understand the historical context of Beowulf. They will investigate what Anglo-Saxon warriors wore and dress up as one of Beowulf’s men. They will then enjoy games from the time period and take part in our Riddling Challenge.
What will they do?
- Replica artefact handling – including a warrior’s shield and helmet
- Hierarchy activity
- Dress as a warrior
- Learn to play Knucklebones and Nine Men’s Morris, a Saxon board game
- Riddling Challenge game
How to book
Please complete our Online Booking Enquiry Form
Alternatively, call us on 01243 811459 or email schoolbookings@wealddown.co.uk
Medicine and Magic: Anglo-Saxon Remedies
Duration: 45 minutes
Cost: £40
What did you do in if you felt ill in Anglo-Saxon times? Where did you go to for treatment and what did they give you?
In this session, there will be a chance to identify medicinal herbs and plants, mix the 9 herb charm to make a salve, practice some magic by chanting charms and discover some of the drastic methods used in Anglo-Saxon healing – but would they kill or cure you?
What will they do?
- Investigate the 3 types of medicines in Anglo-Saxon times – herb medicine, spell medicine and knife medicine
- Look for potential remedies in the natural world
- Hear and chant charms from the Lacnunga
- Mix up a remedy following an Anglo-Saxon recipe
- Kill or Cure? – activity comparing and contrasting Anglo Saxon medical ideas with what we know today
How to book
Please complete our Online Booking Enquiry Form
Alternatively, call us on 01243 811459 or email schoolbookings@wealddown.co.uk
At Home With the Tudors
Duration: 45 minutes
Cost: £40
Travel back in time to investigate the daily life in the Tudor period. What was life like for people living in the countryside? What did they wear? What were their homes like – where was the loo?
This workshop gives pupils a chance to get hands-on with history, taking part in chores and investigating homes and artefacts from the time to give them a unique insight into the sights, sounds and smells of Tudor life.
What will they do?
- Visit a Tudor farmstead
- House detectives activity exploring a Tudor home
- Hands-on object handling with genuine artefacts from the period
- Take part in everyday Tudor chores such as carding and spinning
- Get dressed Tudor style activity
How to book
Please complete our Online Booking Enquiry Form
Alternatively, call us on 01243 811459 or email schoolbookings@wealddown.co.uk
Tudor Fun and Games
Duration: 45 minutes
Cost: £40
Bring your class to play like a Tudor in this fun, interactive workshop.
Using a 15th century painting as a starting point, pupils investigate the evidence and a mystery object to discover how Tudor children played. They then have a go themselves with our range of replica games.
What will they do?
- Investigating the evidence and mystery object activity
- Learn how to play Nine Men’s Morris and Game of Goose
- Play indoor and outdoor games including stilts, hoop and stick, skittles, hobbyhorse, quoits and more
How to book
Please complete our Online Booking Enquiry Form
Alternatively, call us on 01243 811459 or email schoolbookings@wealddown.co.uk
Kill or Cure? Tudor Apothecary
Duration: 45 minutes
Cost: £40
Feeling a bit under the weather? It could be your black bile!
In this session, pupils train as Tudor pharmacists learning apothecary skills to uncover fascinating and amusing facts about medicine in Tudor times. Why were smells important? What are the Four Humours and what is the frog for?
Pupils explore the different concepts of Tudor health and medicine learning along the way that there really is a cure for everything!
What will they do?
- How are you feeling? Diagnosis activity – the Four Humours and urine colour (not real!)
- Kill or cure – match the ailment to Tudor remedy activity
- Garden Medicine Cabinet – plants for health and hygiene activity
- Make a pomander bead to take home following a Tudor recipe
How to book
Please complete our Online Booking Enquiry Form
Alternatively, call us on 01243 811459 or email schoolbookings@wealddown.co.uk
Spit and Polish: Victorian Chores
Duration: 45 minutes
Cost: £40
Immerse your class in Victorian home life with this activity-packed workshop.
After exploring our Victorian cottage, pupils roll up their sleeves to get stuck in to some typical chores. From doing the laundry to cleaning the house, they learn about life before electricity and the tiring tasks children like them had to do every day. Will they get everything done on time?
What will they do?
- Explore a Victorian cottage
- Test and try out Victorian gadgets
- Victorian washday challenge using a dolly and mangle to get the washing done
- Spit and polish activities – beating rugs, sweeping and polishing
How to book
Please complete our Online Booking Enquiry Form
Alternatively, call us on 01243 811459 or email schoolbookings@wealddown.co.uk
Victorian Cooking
Duration: 45 minutes
Cost: £40
What’s for dinner? Pupils begin this session by investigating food sources, diets and mealtimes in Victorian times.
They then learn about weights and measures before working in teams to gather ingredients and follow a recipe to make a treat for dinner. If all goes well they then get to eat the results!
What will they do?
- Grocery basket activity – discover where the Victorians got their food
- Investigate original kitchen utensils and equipment from the Victorian period
- Use Victorian scales, weights and measurements
- Follow a receipt (recipe) to mix ingredients and make drop scones on a griddle over an open fire
How to book
Please complete our Online Booking Enquiry Form
Alternatively, call us on 01243 811459 or email schoolbookings@wealddown.co.uk
Sit up Straight! Victorian Schoolroom
Duration: 45 minutes
Cost: £40
Transport your class back in time to the reign of Queen Victoria for a lesson they won’t forget.
This immersive role-play session will instruct pupils in the 3Rs and a physical drill giving them a genuine taste of Victorian classroom learning and discipline. Who knows they might even be happier about their real lessons after this. Remember to sit up straight!
What will they do?
- Experience a lesson in a real Victorian Schoolroom using slates
- Take part in a physical drill exercise
- Undergo good manners training
- Complete short activities linked to the 3Rs – Reading, wRiting and aRithmetic
How to book
Please complete our Online Booking Enquiry Form
Alternatively, call us on 01243 811459 or email schoolbookings@wealddown.co.uk
