The History Around Us:

History Through Place and People

Guiding Questions:
● How can we better learn about the past through the use of physical sites?
● How does the National Justice Museum show us about what happened in the
past?

Morning Session - “History Through Place”

Student Objective: How has the site been used throughout its history? What aspects of
this site show us how it has changed over time?
Content Objective: SWBAT critically analyze physical spaces in the site in order to
make inferences about its historical use.
Skill Objective: SWBAT use evidence to support a claim.

Outline of Activities
● Hook: (~20 mins)
○ Students will look at primary sources that are artistic depictions of the
prison over different periods in time, annotating images in small groups of
3 for about 10 minutes.
■ Depending on the number of students and their level of ability, the
facilitator might ask groups to just focus on one of the five images,
or a couple, or all five - discretion should be used.
○ The facilitator will bring all the small groups back together and lead a
discussion about what commonalities the students are seeing in their
different images. The goal of this discussion is to start to give students an
idea of what comes to mind when we talk about the term “prison,” and
what the the term has meant over the course of history.
■ Discussions Questions: Describe the image in front of you. How
does your image show prisons at its point in time? What is the
mood of the depiction? How are the people illustrated? How do the
physical remains inform artistic reconstructions or interpretations of
the site?
● Activity: (~60 mins)
○ Students will receive a graphic organizer with key dates/time periods from
the museum’s history on one side and a blank column on the other with a
guiding question, “What evidence in the museum is reflective of this point
in time?”

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 ○ The facilitator will explain the directions for this activity and give an outline
for what the students will be tasked with:
■ Directions and explanation: “As you receive your graphic organizer,
you will see a guiding question at the top of the right-hand column
that says... Can someone read this aloud for me? Our focus for
today and the GCSE module that we are working with is that we
can learn a lot about what happened in the past from the physical
remains of a place. A real method in which historians work to learn
about what happened in the past is by analyzing the remains of a
physical location, and figuring out what they can infer or interpret
from whatever may be left there. When they look at physical
evidence from a site to determine its purpose, they are doing
historical work. This is what we’re going to be doing here today. As
this site is centuries old, there is a lot of evidence from different
time periods on this location that shows us about what happened in
the past, specifically about what happened in prisons in history.
Together, we’re going to explore different locations in the museum
to find evidence in each location that reflects different time periods
from when this prison was used. You will use what you find to learn
about what really happened here.”
■ Students will explore each of the 4 stops listed on the graphic
organizer worksheet.
● When and why was the site first created?
○ Before students explore the museum, they will complete the organizer for
the first “stop” in the classroom, designated 1449. The facilitator should
allow students to work in small groups, and go over difficult vocabulary
and the questions at the end to check for understanding.
■ It is imperative that students leave this understanding that the
prison might have existed before 1449, but because the first
evidence we have of its existence is this date that we use this date.
○ Students will answer the questions, filling out the organizer as they move
along in the museum. Facilitators should check in with students to help
them find the locations without giving them the answers, just by guiding
them in the right direction. Make sure that students are making the
discoveries and that the answers are not being handed to them.
○ The facilitators should be encouraged to engage in discourse with
students to deepen thinking as they answer their questions.
○ After an hour, the facilitators/teachers will round up the students back to
the classroom to debrief.
● Debrief: (~30 mins)

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 ○ Students will come back to the educational room with their organizers.
○ Facilitator will check for understanding/ensure that students have obtained
the correct information by doing quick trivia as a whole group.
■ Use the true or false answer sheet for the facilitator to read out
loud, and students can respond as a whole group with thumbs up
or thumbs down. This will allow the facilitator to check for students’
understanding of the information they discovered and make sure
everyone is on the same page.
■ If comfortable, be theatrical for this and make it a challenge for
them! Students really engaged with this activity when it was “hyped”
up and when it was turned into a competition.
● What significant events happened here? (peaks and turning
points)
■ The facilitator will give the correct answer after posing each
question and ensure student understanding of the content by
calling on students to explain why or provide further detail, if time
allows.
○ After recapping the tour with the trivia, the facilitator will then lead a
Think/Pair/Share so that students can discuss the following questions in
small groups to deepen their understanding of the activity and address
specific criteria that this module requires.
■ The facilitator will pose these questions by writing them on the
board, give students a minute to think about it on their own, then
they will turn to a partner to share out their thoughts.
● Questions: Why is the site located in this specific place with
its surroundings? How has the site changed over time? Why
has this site changed and why has it changed in its use?
What point in the site’s history do you feel was the most
significant? What is the significance of specific features at
the physical remains of the site?
● Extension Activity (if time entails)
○ The facilitator should lead a discussion on the importance of change over
time in the museum. Since students went through the museum and saw
how it evolved this would be an interesting time to discuss these ideas and
to have them share their own opinions.
○ Discussion Questions:
■ Why do you think this site has site changed; what things would
YOU change and why?
■ What specific things about this museum would you have agreed
with, disagreed with, and why?

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 ■ How would you change definitions of crime and punishment?
■ What do prisons look like today and how does it differ, if at all, from
things we saw in the museum?
○ These types of questions will “plant seeds” for the afternoon session on
people’s experienced here in the jail.

Afternoon Session - “History Through People”

Student Objective: How can we learn about the experiences of people in the past
through this site? What can learn about society and the attitudes that people held?
Content Objective: SWBAT identify different perspectives from the reform time period
of the gaol and apply the effectiveness of on Howard’s reforms based on the experience
of specific individuals.
Skill Objective: SWBAT collaborate in groups to synthesize information and
communicate and compare their ideas orally.

Outline of Activities
● Hook (~25 mins)
○ The facilitator will hand out to students the Afternoon session packet with
the graphic organizer with the three individuals.
■ The three people who will be used in the activity are:
● Valentine Marshall
● Daniel Diggle
● Joanna Ledwich
○ What diverse activities and people are associated
with this site?
○ The facilitator will go over the directions for this activity, indicating that at
each station for Valentine Marshall, Daniel Diggle and Joanna Ledwich,
students should refer to their packets to answer the guided questions.
○ Before leaving the classroom, students should be assigned group
numbers (1, 2, or 3).
○ The facilitator will then take the students around the museum to show
them each location for each station, so it is very clear for students where
they should be when they are allowed to go off for the activity.
● Main Activity (~75 minutes)
○ Each group will start at a different station as indicated by their group
number assigned by the facilitator/teachers.
■ It is recommended that group 1 students should start at the
Valentine Marshall station; group 2 students should start at the
Daniel Diggle station; and group 3 students should start at the

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 Joanna Ledwich station. When groups need to rotate, they will
follow chronological order (so, group 1 will go to group 2’s location;
group 2 will go to group 3’s location; and group 3 will go to group
1’s location) for each time they have to switch.
○ Students will be looking for the individual they are focused on and answer
the questions listed on the worksheet asking about their crime,
punishment, and how this connects to societal context of the time.
○ They will have roughly 25 minutes at each station, which includes travel
time, looking at the exhibit, discussing the exhibit, and answering the 5
guided questions in the packet (in addition to looking at supplement
material for Diggle and Ledwich, which is necessary for students to
answer some of the questions).
○ A facilitator (barring staff availability) should be at each station to hold
students accountable and keeping their discussions focused. They should
be encouraged to look at each part of the exhibit holistically but really
focusing on their specific individual. The facilitators will be sure to tell
student groups explicitly where to go next so that no two groups will be at
the same station at the same time.
■ From experience, students did well exploring each station in
different ways:
● For Valentine Marshall, the exhibit is very intuitive and
follows a clear chronological pattern. Students were able to
explore this mostly on their own, asking the facilitator
questions as they came up
● For Daniel Diggle, students were able to discover the plaque
and read through the information on their own, but needed
helped engaging with the Appendix reading and having a
discussion as a group about that information proved
beneficial.
● For Joanna Ledwich, have a more structured set-up was
beneficial for them as there are two locations at which to
stop. Students explored the plaque about Joanna as a
group, with the facilitator verbally asking questions. They did
the reading as a group and had a verbal conversation about
how Narrow Marsh connected to Joanna before they
explored the women’s cell on their own.
● Debrief (~20 mins)
○ Back in the classroom, students will be asked share out their responses to
each of the stations.

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 ■ Although it might feel tedious, this part is critical to check for
understanding, and reminding students of the information they
learned will allow it to be on their mind to ask more inquisitive
questions about it.
○ Ask them how studying this site is difficult and why it is important for
understanding crime and punishment in Nottingham.
■ What does the site reveal about everyday life, attitudes, and values
in particular periods in history?
■ How does this site compare to other similar sites?
■ How do the physical remains prompt questions about the past and
how do historians frame these into historical enquiries?
■ What challenges and benefits come with studying a historic
environment?
● Extension Activity (if time entails)
○ Students will chose one of the historical figures they researched during the
sessions (Diggle, Marshall, or Ledwich) and write a brief journal entry from
the point-of-view of the individual. Students may use the following prompts
to brainstorm what to write for a journal entry.
■ Imagine you are writing home to your family from prison. What are
you experiencing? What feels unfair? What do you miss about
home? What are your hopes? Your fears?
■ Write about a typical day spent here in the gaol. What do you do
throughout the day? What parts do you like the worst? The best?
■ Imagine you have been imprisoned for a crime but do not know
what your punishment will be. How do you feel? What do you
wonder about each different form of punishment?

*Note: Please distribute the vocabulary sheet of new terms for students at the start of
the day for students to have access to throughout the sessions.