Ruthless Romans

On Wednesday 2st February, Year 3 time travelled back to 41 CE when Emperor Claudius was in charge of the Roman Empire. Previously Julius Caesar had tried to invade Britain but was unsuccessful, now it was his turn to take control and expand the empire. It was his quick and clever thinking that took the Britons by surprise when the legions attacked from 2 different areas and they were able to take control of the land.

It was through the amazing story telling of our visitor that the children learnt this, they even had the opportunity to put Mr Barry in chains as a slave and throw food (foam balls) at him as he was led through the streets of the Roman city. Luckily, he was able to persuade the emperor to let him live, unfortunately Mrs Ray wasn’t so lucky.

After break time, the children were given the chance to handle many authentic and exciting artefacts which inspired lots of questions about how the Romans would have lived. They learnt about the bath houses and how olive oil was massaged onto the skin by slaves, some children even got to experience this. There was lots to see and all of the children were impressed by the different types of weapons that the Romans would have had.

Cometh the afternoon, it was time to become a Roman Gladiator which linked fantastically well to our previous English learning journey. All of the children learnt how to safely hold a sword, as well as finding out more about the shields and helmets soldiers would have worn to protect themselves. Once they had learnt about the armour, which was important for protecting the soldiers, they learnt how to throw javelins and march as an army before leading an attack on the adults in the room.

Finally, Empress Heine, got to decide who would live and who would die following the gladiator tournaments. Disappointingly (for many of the children), she was a very kind and gracious Empress who allowed all of the defeated gladiators to leave with their lives intact.

It was such a fabulous day, and we really hope the children will remember this experience for many years to come.

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