Lesson video

Hello, everybody.

I'm Molly.

Lovely to meet you.

Welcome to Living History through Drama.

Lots of things happened before we were born that were very, very important.

Some people write things in books.

Some people make songs about them and some people act them out.

That's what we're going to do today.

Okay.

So are you ready? Brilliant.

Let's go.

In today's session, you are going to need quite a bit of space, so make sure that you can spread your arms out nice and wide.

Make sure that there is nothing above your head.

You don't want to bump your head on anything.

Make sure that there's no toys on the floor that you might stand on.

Here is how today's lesson is going to look.

So we're going to start off with a warmup to really get ourselves ready for today's session.

Then, I'm going to tell you a little bit about the fire of London.

Then using all of our knowledge we've learned from the Great Fire of London, we are going to bring some objects to life.

Do you remember when we gave the lamp for the tools was a voice, when we learned about Florence Nightingale, well we're going to do something similar today but with different objects.

And then to finish off today's session, I am going to ask you a question to see what you've learned today.

Okay? Let's go.

Here are your star words for today.

Improvise.

When you use your imagination to make things up on the spot.

When you make up a new story, or you make up a new game, making something up on the spot do you remember making the air or the I making something up on the spot? Excellent.

We have our next word is role.

This is when you pretend to be someone else.

It's the part you play.

Maybe you are performing the Three Little Pigs and you are asked to play the Wolf.

That is then your role.

And our next star word is perform to act it out for yourself.

Or maybe sometimes for an audience.

Before we start, please make sure that you have a nice, safe clear space to do your drama lesson today.

Please pause the video now if you need to do that.

Now let's warm up.

I love breakfast.

Breakfast is my favourite and most important meal of the day.

Can you imagine if your breakfast could talk to you? What exciting would that be? If my cereal could talk, I think it would tell me about the shape of the little pieces of cereal.

And tell me a fact about its shape.

I eat cereal in the morning.

So if my cereal were to talk, I think they would say, "Good morning, it's your cereal speaking.

Have you seen that I made a little squares, squares have four sides.

" What do you think your cereal would say to you? Don't forget to start the sentence with "Good morning".

Pause the video so that you can have a go.

Whoa, what a selection of cereal we all eat.

Another thing we might eat for breakfast is toast.

I love toast.

Toast is my favourite thing.

I like putting lots of different things on top of my toast.

I like all sorts of jams and spreads.

Next.

I would like us to give a voice to the spread or jam that we might put on our toast.

I love marmalade on my toast.

So my toast might say something like this, "Good morning, it's your marmalade speaking.

Did you know that marmalade has oranges in it and Paddington bear has you in his sandwiches?" What do you think your spread or jam would say if it could talk.

Remember to start your sentence with "Good morning".

Pause the video now so that you can have a go.

Oh, all this talk of toast is making me very, very hungry.

We've just brought all of our breakfast boosts to life.

How exciting.

Maybe when you're having breakfast tomorrow morning, you can give a voice to something else that you're having.

We are now going to move on to the main session of our drama lesson today.

So in a moment we are going to meet a survivor of the Great Fire of London.

I have put a couple of images on the screen, just so it helps you imagine what it might have looked like in 1666.

This is what people think the Great Fire of London may have looked like.

Look at all those flames, completely covering that house.

Here is another image from the Museum of London.

You can see here, that a huge amount of houses and buildings in London are on fire.

Now we are going to meet somebody who survived the Great Fire of London.

When you see me wearing my red cardigan sat in this chair and with this knitting, that means that I am in role.

I will be playing the part of a survivor the Great Fire of London.

Hello I'm going to tell you about the most frightening experience that I've ever had, that went on for four days.

I still have nightmares about it now.

I wonder if you've ever heard about the Great Fire of London? Well it was where London was on fire.

I lived through the most terrifying experience and I want to tell you about it.

I am a survivor of the Great Fire of London and it started on September 2nd, 1666 in London at one o'clock in the morning.

In 1666 fires in London were quite common.

Our homes didn't have electricity, so real flames were used for lighting, cooking, and heating our homes.

Also buildings had wooden timbers and were built very close together.

So once the fire had started it was pretty easy for it to spread.

Now, before I tell you about the story of the Great Fire of London I think it would be very helpful if we were to imagine what London was like at the time.

So you and I, we're going to go on a little walk.

Okay.

We're walking along a couple of street, it's quite dirty.

The houses are so close together.

I remember my friend and I, I made some really nice cake and my friend wanted to try some.

So I handed it to her from my bedroom window to hers.

That's how close our houses were.

It was very, very warm as well.

September we hadn't had much rain, so it was very, very hot.

So would you like to go on a walk with me? Okay.

So we're going to really imagine all of those things, the warmth, the floor, the dirt how close the houses were.

Okay.

So please pause this video so that you and I can go on a little walk.

Thank you for taking that as a walk with me I think that's going to really help you imagine what it was like in 1666.

No fire has ever grown as big as the Great Fire of London before.

The summer of 1666 like I said was very, very warm and very, very dry.

I remember day after day, we just wanted it to rain.

But with it being so dry, it made it a lot more likely that the fires would spread and spread very, very quickly.

So how did the fire stopped? I remember the fire started in a Baker's shop early in the morning around 1:00 AM, the shop belonged to the King's Baker.

I would also buy my bread from him.

Oh, it was delicious.

He had been making fresh bread for the morning.

His name was Thomas Foreigner and he lived on Pudding Lane.

We think that he was a little bit careless and didn't put the fire out well enough.

And a spark came out of the oven, and started a fire.

With strong winds, the fire spread very quickly down Pudding Lane where I lived, towards the River Thames and London bridge.

I would just like us to take a little moment to imagine that we are a tiny little spark.

So we start very, very small.

Then we get bigger and bigger and bigger just like in the Great Fire of London.

So I'd like you to take a moment to start as a very very small spark with your body and your legs and your arms. Very, very small.

And how big can you get? Can you get as big as possible to show how much the fire can grow? Please pause the video so that we can see your huge fire.

What did the fire burn down? The fire destroyed most of the city in just one night.

Many of my friend's houses that live close by, they say that only 16 people died.

That is very sad, of course, but it's a miracle not more people were killed.

Because the fire was so big, famous buildings, including St.

Paul's cathedral were completely burned down, as well as over 13,000 houses and 87 churches.

How did they stop the fire? Firefighting was much more basic in 1666.

And people didn't know nearly as much about stopping fires as we do today.

Fire brigades often used leather buckets access and water to try and stop the fire.

But unsurprisingly, they didn't work very well.

There were also some fire engines, but they were no more than wooden barrels on wheels.

The firefighting equipment was often kept in the local church.

So we all knew where to find them in an emergency.

But as we know, lots of those churches burned down, 87 to be precised.

So instead, a plan was suggested to blow up houses in the path of the fire.

This is called a firebreak, so that they could break the fire.

The Navy used gunpowder to destroy the buildings.

And by the next morning, the fire had been stopped from spreading.

It was truly terrifying.

Great listening.

I have a question here for you.

So how did the Great Fire of London start? Was it option one? Somebody didn't put out the candle properly, option two,a dragon.

Option three,by a stick of dynamite.

Option four, a baker didn't put out the fire in the oven properly.

Have a little think, okay, the answers are coming up.

Correct! A baker didn't put the fire out in the oven properly.

Well done.

How did the fire start? Well, we already know the answer to that question because we got it right.

And it is because a baker didn't put the fire in the oven out properly, and a spark came out and set fire to the bakery.

So to help us understand what it must've been like for everybody during the fire, we're going to get up and start acting it out.

So you're going to have to help me.

Can you remember when we were bringing objects to life? Like in our warmup, we gave our breakfast to voice.

We're going to do the same with something in the bakery.

Now we can't be the bread because it will have burned to dust during the fire.

But something metal that the Baker might've used, might've survived the fire.

Oh, I know, a frying pan.

A frying pan with a super long handle.

So you can put it into the oven without burning your hands.

You can put it out easily.

So who best to talk to about what went on late that evening than the frying pan that was in the bakers that saw where the fire all started.

So we are going to give the frying pan a voice.

What did they say? Did they see the little spark of fire jump out of the oven? Did they see the bakery catch fire? How did they feel? So like we always do when bringing something to life, we introduce it.

So we'll start it with "Hello, I'm the Baker's frying pan from Pudding Lane." And then you tell us a little bit about what you saw.

How did you feel? What was it like? Was the flames big? Was it hot? Okay, so please pause the video so that you can have a go.

Our next question is what did the fire burn down? Now, you can have a moment.

Okay.

To have a little think about what the answer might be.

Can you remember when we spoke to the survivor? What the survivor told us about the fire and what burnt down.

Please pause the video just so you can have a little think.

So during the Great Fire of London, 13,000 houses burnt down.

That's a lot.

St.

Paul's cathedral burnt down and 87 churches.

With all the houses that burnt down, so did everyone's belongings inside.

All of the clothes the furniture, everything.

But some things were metal, therefore it didn't burn.

Something similar to this is a small, child's tin, sort of survived the fire.

It's a small metal, tin with a lid was very rusty.

About that big.

What do you think the child may have kept inside that box? So if this box belongs to a child, what do you think they might've kept in that box? Okay.

Do you think it was a toy? Or some food? Or something secret? In a moment, I would like you to become the small box found during the Great Fire of London, belonging to a child.

And tell me what you think might have been kept inside.

Remember to start your improvisation with "Hello! My name is the small metal tin found during the Great Fire of London." That's " Hello, my name is the small metal tin found during the great fire of London." Please pause the video while you have a go.

Next question is how did they stop the fire? Can you remember how they stopped the fire? Have a little thing back to what our survivor told us.

They struggled to do something at the beginning, then they had to do something else.

Have a little think, pause the video so that you can cast your mind back.

That's right, they try to put it out with water, but the fire was too big.

So they had to do a fire break.

That is when they could see where the fire was going.

They had to explode some of the houses before the fire reached it so that the fire wouldn't spread.

The firefighters will have had to work very hard that evening.

What did firefighters wear on their heads? Ah, that's right.

Helmets, to stay safe.

So that's what we are going to be today.

So you are going to imagine you are a helmet on a firefighters head.

It's very high up there.

And also you're very close to the fires.

So I would like you to have a little think.

Is it hot or cold against the helmet? What can you hear? Can you hear people shouting? What can you see from high up? Remember to start the improvisation with "Hello? I am a firefighters helmet." That's "Hello? I am a firefighters helmet." Please pause the video while you have a go.

Well done everybody.

We've really explored the objects that would have been there during the Great Fire of London.

Great work.

One last question before we finish.

In what year did the Great Fire of London happen? Is it option one 1888, option two 1777, option three 1666, or option four 1999.

What date did I say before? That is correct.

It is option three 1666.

Well done.

Well done today.

You have worked incredibly hard.

Now as you know this is only part one of the Great Fire of London.

There is a part two as well.

So I will see you then.

Please share your work with Oak National.

If you'd like to please ask your parents or carer to share your work on Twitter, tagging @OakNational and #LearnwithOak.