Creating a digital heritage trail of our hometown – a history project for home education

Ayr heritage trail
Our home education history project

Silver

4

6 to 36

June 2021

How the project achieved the sections of the award

Plan

After completing a heritage trail at Chatelherault Park from global treasure trails the kids discovered there wasn’t a trail in our local area so they decided they would like to make one! So, they planned a route of local area and set to work!

Investigate

They planned a walking route round the town and then started researching each location. We discovered the history for each location on our walk! We used a variety of resources including the Internet, books, local knowledge, auld ayr groups and contacted the local library.

Engage

we spoke with a historian, interviewed a member of staff from a local brewery, we visited each location on our trail and also visited areas further afield that we discovered had connections to the history we were learning about. We looked at old photos, completed art projects and read books.

Inspire

we made a video slide show and our heritage trail is going to be added to the global treasure app and website so other people can complete our trail. The children had to come up with a multiple choice question at each location and provide correct answers and historic information at each location on our trail. There was a total of 22 questions.

Reflect

The kids loved learning about the local area and seeing pictures of the past.

Lessons Learned

We learned so much about our local town which is amazing as it gives us greater understanding of where we live.

Highlight(s)

we visited the spirit of Scotland statue after learning about William Wallace connection to Ayr. This is on the place of a battle and the kids loved trying to imagine what this would have been like all those years ago. Taking them to each location and letting them experience the history with their own senses was much more rewarding than just reading it to them. They can retell the history to other people in great detail which always really surprises people!

The benefit of using the Heritage Hero Awards

this was a great inspiration for us to actually document history we study. The kids loved it!

Quotes

Daniel 12 learning the history was really fun. I liked learning about the history of my town!
Callum 9 it’s good to learn history as knowledge from the past is important. I liked learning about the battles and William Wallace!
Bethany 6 I loved doing the heritage hero awards. My favourite story is tam o shanter and his horse Meg!

Case study compiled by

Melissa Rarity

More information on this project can be found at

Global treasure trail