Lesson video

Hello, my name is Mrs. Casey.

What's your name? Great! I'm really excited to join you for this history lesson Today.

Today's lesson is called A family portrait from 140 years ago.

It's part of the history unit, Photographs from history: what can they tell us about Britain's recent past? Let's get going.

By the end of this lesson, you'll be able to describe some of the things that we can learn from a family portrait photograph from 140 years ago.

We're going to be learning together.

Let's get started.

Here are our keywords.

They're words we're going to be using throughout our lesson.

Listen carefully and I'll read them to you.

Portraits, wealthy, fashionable, pastime.

Let's have a go at saying them together.

Are you ready? My turn, portrait, your turn.

Well done.

My turn, wealthy, your turn.

That's great.

My turn, fashionable, your turn.

Well done.

My turn, pastime, your turn.

Super.

Have you heard those words before, I wonder? Let's find out what they mean.

A portrait is a painting or photograph of a person or people.

People with of money or land are described as wealthy.

Something that is popular to wear can be described as fashionable.

Pastime, a pastime is a hobby that people enjoy doing outside of work or school.

Do you have a favourite pastime? Tell the person next to you about it.

Wow! Those all sound like lots of fun.

Here is our lesson outline, A family portrait from 140 years ago.

In this lesson, we are going to be looking at a family portrait from 140 years ago, and our second part of the lesson is clues in the photograph, where you can be a detective and search for those clues.

Let's start with our first section, A family portrait From 140 years ago.

A portrait is a painting or photograph of a person or people.

A family portrait is a painting or photograph of a family.

Can you see the portrait of Alex here? Have you ever had a portrait or a family portrait taken before? This is a family portrait that was taken a long time ago.

The photograph is of a family called the Lillywhite family.

It was taken over 140 years ago in the year 1887.

The Lillywhite family lived in Sussex, England.

They were famous for playing crickets.

James Lillywhite, known as Jim, played cricket for Sussex and England.

This photograph was taken during the Victorian Era.

The Victorian Era was a time when Queen Victoria was the queen of Britain.

Great listening, everyone.

Let's check what we've learned so far.

A painting or photograph of a person or group of people is called, A, a portrait, B, a sketch, C, a landscape.

Pause the video and decide which is the correct answer.

Well done, everyone.

It's A, a portrait.

A painting or photograph of a person or group of people is called a portrait.

The Victorian Era was a time when Queen Victoria was the queen in Britain.

Here is a portrait painting of Queen Victoria.

Queen Victoria reigned over 100 years ago.

Let's check what we've learned.

When was this family portrait taken? A, yesterday, B, last year, C, over 100 years ago.

Pause the video and decide which is the correct answer.

Well done, everyone.

It's C.

This family portrait was taken over 100 years ago.

In the past, photographs were all in black and white because the technology for coloured photographs had not yet been invented.

I wonder what colour their clothes were? What do you think? Pause the video and have a chat with the person next to you.

In the past, not everyone had a camera.

Wealthy people would hire a photographer to take a photograph.

So this family was probably wealthy.

Life during the Victorian times would've been very different for the wealthy and the poor.

Time for another check.

Write the missing word.

The family in the photograph were probably poor or wealthy as they had enough money to pay for a photographer.

Pause the video and decide which is the missing word.

Well done.

The missing word was wealthy.

The family in the photograph were probably wealthy as they had enough money to pay for a photographer.

And now it's time for our first task.

Which two of these pictures are portraits? Explain why.

A photograph of a family, a photograph of Big Ben.

Big Ben is a well-known building in London, the capital of England.

It's a clock tower.

There's a painting of Queen Victoria.

Pause the video and decide which two of these pictures are portraits and tell your partner why.

So the photograph of a family is a portrait.

The photograph of Big Ben is not a portrait.

The painting of Queen Victoria is a portrait.

This is because a portrait is a painting or photograph of a person or people.

In the family photograph, there are lots of people.

The photograph of Big Ben isn't a portrait because it's a building, not a person or people.

The painting of Queen Victoria has one person.

Well done, everyone.

You are doing so well in our lesson about a family portrait from 140 years ago.

Now, let's have a look for clues in the photograph.

Historians use photographs to find out about the past.

They can search for clues in a portrait to find out and learn about what life was like in the past.

Let's check what we've learned.

Historians look for clues in photographs.

True or false? True or false? What do you think? Well done.

That's true.

Is it true because they do this to find out about the past, or they do this to find out about the future? What do you think? It's A, historians look for clues in photographs to find out about the past.

How many people can you see in this portrait? Can you count them? Well done.

There is a man and a woman, and 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 children.

There are nine people in this family.

In the Victorian times, many people had large families like this.

Let's check what we've learned from the clues in the photograph.

Change one word to make the statement correct.

In the family portrait, there are seven children.

During the Victorian times, lots of people had small families.

Which word in this statement do we need to change to make it correct? Pause the video and talk about it with the person next to you.

The word we need to change is small.

In the Victorian times, lots of people had big families.

We changed the word small to big to make the statement correct.

Did you work it out? Well done.

What clothes were fashionable in the Victorian times? We can look for clues in the photograph about what people might have worn during the Victorian times.

A bowler hat.

This man is wearing a bowler hat.

They were fashionable during the Victorian times.

He's also wearing a smart suit and waistcoat.

This boy is wearing a buttoned jacket and a boater hat.

This lady has a long dress on.

It has a high collar with a frill and goes all the way down to the floor.

These types of dresses were typical during Victorian times.

Everyone in this photograph is wearing leather boots.

There was not as much choice of shoes during the Victorian times.

Let's check what we've learned.

Can we sort these fashionable items into from the past and from now? There's a bowler hat, a boater hat, and a cap, which are from the past and which are from now? Pause the video and have a go at sorting them.

The bowler hat is from the past.

The cap is from now.

Who has a cap? Do you like to wear a cap? We often wear caps at times when we are going outside to keep the sun from our head and from our eyes.

A boater hat, this is another type of hat that was popular in the past.

Can you remember the boy in the photograph was wearing one? Did you get all those right? Well done.

Let's look for clues about pastimes in the photograph.

Can you remember what a pastime is? It was one of our keywords.

A pastime is a hobby or something we enjoy doing when we're not at work or school.

What pastimes do you enjoy? So what pastimes did people have in the Victorian times? Can we spot anything in this photograph? Look really closely.

Have you spotted anything yet? In this photograph, I can see cricket bats.

Did you spot the cricket bats? Can you see where they are? That's right.

They're in the bottom corner of the photograph, propped up against the wall.

This shows us that in the Victorian times, people liked playing cricket.

Have you ever played cricket or watched it perhaps? Let's check what we've learned.

Draw a circle around the evidence of a popular pastime in the family portrait.

Well done.

There are the cricket bats propped up against the wall.

They show that cricket was a popular pastime.

And now it's time for our second task.

Tell a partner some of the things that we can learn from the family portrait photograph from 140 years ago.

Can you use these words to help you? Wealthy, big families, fashionable, pastime.

Pause the video and have a go at task B.

Well done, everyone.

Some great discussions.

Your answer might have included things like this.

The people were probably wealthy because they paid for a family portrait.

We can see people had big families in the Victorian times.

Can you remember, there are nine people in this family? We can see some of the fashionable clothes in the portrait, such as bowler hacks.

Can you remember any of the other fashionable items? Boater hats, long dresses, leather shoes.

We can see that cricket was a family pastime.

In the photograph, there were cricket bats, so we know that they liked to play cricket.

Well done, everyone.

You have worked so hard this lesson, spotting all those clues like a historian finding out about the past from this family portrait.

Let's summarise what we've learned.

Looking at photographs and family portraits can tell us a lot about the past.

We did find out a lot, didn't we? The number of children can tell us about the size of families.

The clothes they are wearing can tell us about what was fashionable at the time.

The objects in the photograph can tell us about their pastimes.

Excellent work today, everyone.

Well done.

Bye for now!.