The Legend of King Arthur (Year1 work, 2006-07)

The Legend of King Arthur is a literacy based project. The topic of Myths and Legends in literacy this half term fits in well with our history topic of Castles.

Both projects have gripped the children’s interest from the start. They have thoroughly enjoyed hearing about King Arthur’s adventures with Excalibur and the Lady of the Lake and they have also been highly motivated in researching and learning for themselves about life in medieval times.

During literacy lessons the children have used ICT to rewrite the stories of King Arthur which we made into a class book.

They have written poems using their knowledge of life in ‘days of old.’

We have researched medieval tapestries and wall hangings which the children then used to design and draw their own. These are on display in the classroom.

In Art and Design the children made hand puppets of characters in the King Arthur stories, such as Uther Pendragon, the Knights of the Round Table, Guinevere, Merlin the magician and of course King Arthur himself. They also made puppets of other medieval legends such as Robin Hood. This was part of a very successful and enjoyable day spent with Chris Mitchell, the textile artist. During this visit by Chris, the children used wool, felt, sequins, beads and shiny material to dress their puppets. They used glue and they also did a bit of sewing. We also made ‘life size’ wall hangings. One represented a forest, where the children used collage materials to decorate it with leaves, bushes, flowers, toadstools and animals such as butterflies, ladybirds and squirrels. The other hanging represented a castle. The children designed and made shields to decorate the castle.

The role play area itself is based on ‘The Great Hall’ inside a castle. The children have researched what the room actually looked like: how it was used, the decorations, furniture, food and objects (such as a ) and food we needed in order to make it look ‘authentically medieval.’

After learning about medieval people and clothes, it was the children’s idea to bring their own dressing up clothes to school so that when they play in the castle, they look the part!

An excellent way of drawing our project to a close will be our planned visit to Skipton Castle during the last week of school before half term. During Science and History lessons the children have learned about how the castle was built, who lived there and how the castle was both a home and a fortress.