Building castles in Manchester

Young architect with his model castle - see ICN's Facebook page for more pictures.

The Norman Conquest was the theme explored by students from Saint Paul's Catholic High School in Wythenshawe, Greater Manchester who recently took part in a History project to design and create a castle.

As part of their study of castles, the Year 7 pupils were given a home learning project to design and build a Norman castle. Before building their castle they had to think about the size, the number of levels and the attacking and defensive features. The pupils studied the development of castles and discussed different ideas of how to create castles, combining their ideas for defence and attack meant they created a very good castle which helped them with their designs.

After studying the features of Norman castles, and the impact these castles had on English society in the early medieval period, pupils were asked to design and make their own Motte and Bailey or Stone Keep castles.

The response from the pupils was excellent. The castles produced by the pupils were to an extremely high standard, and contained many of the features found in Norman castles such as drawbridges, gateways, portcullises, and battlements.

Mr Jim Welsby, Head of History, said: "The Year 7s, as part of their History studies, recently completed a project on 'castles' as part of a unit of study on the Norman Conquest. All the model castles this year were of an exceptionally high standard. The pupils spent a lot of time on their castles to ensure they were historically accurate Norman castles. Well done Year 7! I am a very proud History teacher!"

"The Year 7s enjoyed this exciting project which helped them see how they could use simple objects to create a castle and they got a good idea of how hard it was and how long it took to build castles. It made them realise it was not that easy to have both attacking and defensive features," commented Mr Alex Hren, Head Teacher at Saint Paul's. "A lot of time and effort went into these projects and a big thank you must go to all pupils and parents in Year 7 for their enthusiasm and commitment to making such fantastic projects."

LINKS

The Ofsted report can be seen at: https://reports.ofsted.gov.uk/provider/23/139456

Saint Paul's Catholic High School: www.st-paulshigh.net