Our work placement students have been sharing some thoughts on their time working with the project team:
As a second year student at the University of Liverpool, I have been given the opportunity to spend Wednesdays on a placement at the field archaeology unit at National Museums Liverpool. We have been involved in a range of activities during our time here, including research tasks and finds processing. We have been able to see a lot of the work going on ‘backstage’ at the museum and it has been a really informative experience, as well as providing new skills and understanding.
This morning (Wednesday, 27 November 2013), we helped at a session for local school children. The aim was to give the children an idea of the kind of things archaeologists are involved in, beyond digging trenches and discovering artefacts. The children took part in activities such as choosing the kind of items an archaeologist might use in the field, sorting and recording finds and learning how to use maps as well as having a go at digging in a ‘mock’ trench before hand.
The children were all very enthusiastic throughout the session and seemed very keen to learn as much as they could on all aspects of the archaeologist’s work, not afraid to get as hands on as possible. They all seemed to thoroughly enjoy their time being taught all about work being done while being able to handle artefacts and try their hands at some of the tasks themselves.
I believe that the archaeology sessions for school children are an excellent idea; I know that I would have jumped at the experience when I was in primary school. Giving the children a full view of all the kinds of things that archaeologists need to do before and after field work gives a well rounded view of the work and potential career as a whole. Now that Indiana Jones has hung up his hat and his whip, the more of these sessions to encourage younger children into archaeology we have the better.
As a second year student at the University of Liverpool, I have been given the opportunity to spend Wednesdays on a placement at the field archaeology unit at National Museums Liverpool. We have been involved in a range of activities during our time here, including research tasks and finds processing. We have been able to see a lot of the work going on ‘backstage’ at the museum and it has been a really informative experience, as well as providing new skills and understanding.
This morning (Wednesday, 27 November 2013), we helped at a session for local school children. The aim was to give the children an idea of the kind of things archaeologists are involved in, beyond digging trenches and discovering artefacts. The children took part in activities such as choosing the kind of items an archaeologist might use in the field, sorting and recording finds and learning how to use maps as well as having a go at digging in a ‘mock’ trench before hand.
The children were all very enthusiastic throughout the session and seemed very keen to learn as much as they could on all aspects of the archaeologist’s work, not afraid to get as hands on as possible. They all seemed to thoroughly enjoy their time being taught all about work being done while being able to handle artefacts and try their hands at some of the tasks themselves.
I believe that the archaeology sessions for school children are an excellent idea; I know that I would have jumped at the experience when I was in primary school. Giving the children a full view of all the kinds of things that archaeologists need to do before and after field work gives a well rounded view of the work and potential career as a whole. Now that Indiana Jones has hung up his hat and his whip, the more of these sessions to encourage younger children into archaeology we have the better.