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Object Handling Boxes

Bring history to life with our hands-on handling boxes, designed for schools, home educators and community groups to explore together.

Step back in time and discover what play was like for children growing up in Victorian Witney. Our Victorian Toy Handling Box is packed with replica toys, hands-on activities and teaching resources designed to encourage curiosity, observation and discussion.

Perfect for schools, home educators and community groups, the box allows learners to explore history through touch, play and investigation. Children can compare their own experiences with those of Victorian children while developing historical enquiry skills.

Inside the box you’ll find replica Victorian toys including spinning tops, yo-yos, marbles, cup and ball, pick-up sticks, skittles and skipping ropes, alongside classroom resources such as slate boards, chalk and an abacus.

What’s included?

  • Replica Victorian toys for hands-on exploration
  • Discovery bags for sensory investigations
  • “I See, I Think, I Wonder” object enquiry activity
  • Museum labelling activity
  • Victorian toy information sheets
  • Traditional skipping rhymes
  • Witney schools timeline
  • Peg doll making activity inspired by Victorian occupations
  • Teacher guidance and handling instructions

Booking Information

Availability
If you would like to book a handling box please email us or call us on01993 775 915 to discuss availability and we will do our best to accommodate your request.

Duration: up to 4 weeks

Price: £40 per hire

 

Learning Objectives

  • Develop an understanding of Victorian childhood by exploring the toys, games and classroom objects used by children in the past.
  • Explore how children in Victorian Witney learned, played and spent their free time by investigating replica objects and historical sources.
  • Use hands-on object handling and enquiry techniques to build observation skills, ask historical questions and interpret evidence from the past.

National Curriculum Links:

Key Stage 1 History:
  • Pupils should develop an awareness of the past, using common words and phrases relating to the passing of time.
  • Pupils should identify similarities and differences between ways of life in different periods.
  • The lives of significant individuals in the past and events beyond living memory that have shaped national life, through exploring Victorian childhood and everyday life.
  • A local history study: learning about childhood, education and play in Victorian Witney.

 

Key Stage 2 History:
  • A local history study: exploring childhood, schools and leisure in Victorian Witney.
  • A study of an aspect or theme in British history beyond 1066, considering education, childhood and everyday life during the Victorian period.
  • Understand how evidence from objects can be used to ask questions, make deductions and interpret the past through hands-on historical enquiry.