Yesterday there was a tweet asking for
ideas for what to put on a history teacher's class-room wall. So this
seems a good moment for me to try and remember what worked for me,
and what did not.
Perhaps I should start by admitting
that when I was a pupil there was almost nothing on the walls that I
now remember, except when one admired teacher put up various jokey
headlines and adverts that included his name or initials. Also I
began my career in a room which had no useful display space. However,
in due course I reached a large room (Scottish Enlightenment,
Regency, big windows, south facing: wasn't I lucky!) with pin-boards
on the back wall ready for use. Sometimes the displays were less than
wall-paper, but some things worked, perhaps, so here goes.
For sheer colour and vibrancy I once
bought a load of old calendars (which can usually be picked up very
cheap from about February) and got my form-class to use a
class-teacher period to use them to cover every inch of space on the
boards. This got a good deal of reaction from other classes and led
to some intelligent conversations.
Occasionally with pupils of about 13 I
would set an exercise of wall-chart making. In the end I found this
was best done in pairs, not because it produced better charts, but
because the process of collaboration was in itself valuable. The
intelligent conversations (again) about a worthwhile project were
part of education. There would be a central theme (The Reformation,
the Napoleonic Wars or whatever) but each chart would be on a
different subject, chosen by lot. There would be fairly strict rules
about size (A3 paper provided) and a rule that there had to be a
mixture of pictures and writing. Once the charts were all posted on
the wall I would make a work-sheet and have a lesson in which each
pupil took the worksheet on a circular tour round the charts, all
starting in a different place. This not only perhaps increased their
awareness of history, but also achieved that difficult objective of
getting children to see and appreciate the work of their fellows.
The day after that remarkable
Conservative MP vote which led to Mrs Thatcher's resignation as Prime
Minister, I happened to notice in the newsagents that the headlines
were all different. They even disagreed on the facts. On impulse I
bought all the papers, and went back to school to put up their front
pages as a display that spoke for itself. This led to more debate and
discussion than anything else I remember and I wish I had done it
more often. However, it did require an event of similar type, the
time to get the display up within 48 hours, the chance of noticing
the papers, and the chance of having enough cash-in-pocket to buy
them all on impulse. But it is recommended.
As far as pictures are concerned the
work of great artists (in reproduction) is always worth displaying.
Since this was also where I spent my working day I was happy to spend
a little money on it (the wall was in front of me all the time;
behind the pupils). And one can never tell if a great work of art may
strike some chord in a viewer which may bear fruit in the future. In
a recent TV documentary I heard Prince Charles make that point about
growing up in Buckingham Palace.
When I bought a reproduction of the
Bayeaux Tapestry in Jorvik I was surprised to find that it was too
long to fit between the main door of the room and the door to the
Department Resources. But it was still worth the drawing-pin effort.
This latter is not to be taken lightly, by the way. Many a day my
finger ends were sore because I had been taking down a display.
What was on the front of the room, in
the pupil's view all the time? Well, over the years I moved from a
black-board to a white board to a video-screen to an interactive
computer screen in various combinations. In retrospect I liked the
black-board best. But there always remained, high up, a magnificent
map of Europe which I had been given by my predecessor. Hardly a day
passed when one did not wish to point to the Baltic, or Gallipoli, or
Cork, or Lombardy.
Wall displays were quite a low priority
in my teaching and sometimes the same weary collection of images
would outstay their welcome. But the above stories are all true, and
might give some ideas.
