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Schools

Groundwork worked with two key schools, Chaddesden Park Junior and Allenton Primary School, as well as other schools local to each park. All participating schools experienced heritage education visits to the park.  Activities included exploring the natural environment, mapping the parks and discovering the ‘lost’ heritage of the parks, by identifying remnant features. 

In addition the two key schools were also involved in the following:

• Links to Rolls-Royce including visits to the its heritage museum and supporting graduate trainees producing a Rolls-Royce Education Pack;
• Research with pupils at Derby Industrial Museum and Derby Local Studies Library;
• Reminiscence interviews with local residents and historians;
• An arts element to the project: Involvement of professional sculptor, Geraint Lloyd, who led workshops at the Key Schools enabling pupils to create their own zoetropes showing animations of their area’s heritage, and also produced a praxinoscope showing animations inspired through the areas’ heritage.  These artworks were exhibited at the celebration events, with the praxinoscope also touring local libraries and museums.
• Links between the two areas of schools through 3 twinning days at the Key Schools to help to compare and contrast the areas.
• School based Activities including role play, poetry, internet research, mapping and comparing local shopping habits in the 1940s with now.  These activities were then included in the education pack.
• Visits to estates where halls still remain.  Pupils from Chaddesden Park Junior visited Elvaston Castle and Allenton Primary went to Sudbury Hall. 

Teacher's Afternoons

Teachers from schools local to Chaddesden Park and Osmaston Park were invited to attend 5 Teacher Afternoons (INSET) between November 2005 and July 2007.  The first event in each area was to consult with schools on the content of the education pack.  The events were very successful with many ideas for activities being shared.  These activities have been summarised in the education pack, and many were trialled by Groundwork through the project and developed into activity sheets for the pack.

In summer 2006, the Teacher Afternoons served as INSET training for staff to visit the parks and try out the activities for use with their pupils.  The final Teacher Afternoon in July 2007 was a celebration of the project, including a preview of the Education Pack and an exhibition of the praxinoscope and all the zoetropes made through the arts element of the project.  Some pupils from each of the key schools attended this event to share their experiences with the teachers.  A Graduate Trainee from Rolls-Royce also attended the event and spoke about the JET programme (Journey into Engineering and Technology) which has become a follow-on to the Rolls-Royce element of the Groundwork project.  The last hour of the afternoon was an exhibition of the artwork and pupils and their parents were invited, along with older people who had been involved in reminiscence interviews.

Celebrations

A Celebration took place in each of the parks at the end of the project, including live interactive acting performances promoting the heritage and future of the parks.  The celebrations were held at existing events to ensure maximum attendance. At Chaddesden Park the event was the Chaddesden Carnival, while at Osmaston Park it was the BBC Springwatch event. The theatre group, Raised Eyebrow, were extremely effective in using the historical information provided to create entertaining ‘time-fracture’ promenade performances, with various local historical and semi-fictional characters appearing!  The performances at both events were filmed and copies may be available to schools and other approved organisations upon request to Groundwork.

The celebrations also provided an opportunity to exhibit the Praxinoscope and Zoetropes made through the arts element of the project.

A celebration CD ROM (including the reminiscence interviews) and website have also been produced to promote the project widely.

Arts

As well as the summarised information above, a full case study about the arts element of the project is available.  Plus look in the gallery for some images of the activities and artworks. You can also download our Arts Case Study.

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