On 20th February Y3 pupils from St. Mary’s visited Locomotion in Shildon. We were driven there by Neville from J and C Coaches. The purpose of the visit was to start our topic looking at famous people, focusing on those who lived in the North-East.
A very kind lady called Claire met us and our first activity involved handling some very old objects, such as a Davy Lamp and some old tools. We also looked at some photographs of George Stephenson’s house and the room he lived in. We had some questions to discuss about these photographs and objects.
Next involved a role play where we re-enacted the first train journey on the Darlington to Stockton Railway, learning some exciting facts about George Stephenson. We were put into two groups and had to imagine we were doing the train journey from Shildon, to Darlington and then on to Stockton. We wore hats, waved flags, and had signs to hold, showing each destination. It was great fun!
After this we did a craft activity where we had to create our own paper train of the George Stephenson Locomotion.
We had to cut out train parts, colour them in and stick them together as they were on a train. We had worked so hard it was now lunch time so we enjoyed relaxing for a little while before we were to start on our afternoon investigation trail.
In the afternoon we did a Treasure Trail where we had to look at the pictures that were on the sheet and try to locate them in different places around the museum. Also we got to explore inside a couple of the trains, finding out exciting facts. We were divided into 3 groups for this activity, one with Mr. Bowden, one with Miss Wise and the other with Mrs Brown. It was great fun exploring the different parts of the museum and finding where all of the pictures were found in the museum.
Sadly, we came to the end of our adventure, but when we got back to school, Mrs Brown gave us a goody bag that included crayons, a rubber, ruler, pencil, badge, and some colouring activities.
Some of our class had never visited the museum before and will definitely go again. If you have not already visited the museum, give it a go! You will have fun and the best part is, it’s free!
Here are some quotes on thoughts of the day….
“I thought this trip was amazing.”
“Inside the trains were amazing.”
“I loved finding out about George Stephenson.”
“I enjoyed learning about the history of the trains and George Stephenson.”
“I am really excited now to learn about other famous people from our area.”
