Crew Wilkinson deepened their understanding on the early conditions of the mine from the last lesson by exploring the dangers that people faced due to these conditions. To begin with, we looked at some artefacts that would have been used within the mine (helmet, gloves, pickaxe etc.) and discussed what these told us about working in a mine (e.g you could hit your head, get blisters on your hands, be injured by the pickaxe). We then worked in mini crews to create freeze frames of some mining situations that all involved a danger which helped us empathise with a miner’s plight. Can you guess what these are from our photos?

Finally, we got into the roles of miners and interviewers. We split into small groups and each group was given a role to play based on the experiences in the mine (ranging from young Victorian children in the mine to grown individuals who have worked in the mine their whole life and developed health conditions from the work). This further embedded the children’s understanding of empathy for the miners.

Crew Wilkinson took a close look at the mining industry, how it has changed over time and the reasons for changing. We started by piecing together a timeline of key events through mining history then began to look at these critically and reason why they might have happened. E.g. Why did the increase of steam trains require more coal? We then categorised these changes into political, social and technological to further embed the reasoning for change.