Learning Resources

Bring the Roman world to life with our Romans Discover Box, a hands on exploration of emperors, everyday objects and ancient creativity. Pupils investigate real and replica artefacts—from bronze needles and oil lamps to Roman coins featuring emperors like Claudius, Hadrian and Vespasian—to understand how power and identity were communicated across the empire. Pupils create their own emperor Top Trumps cards, design Roman style coins, and experiment with mosaic patterns inspired by tessellated pavements. Perfect for History, English and cross curricular learning, this box builds enquiry skills, sparks imagination and helps students connect Roman innovation with the world around them.

The Romans Discover Box includes the following items:

• Teacher materials (Caesaromagus: A history and description of Roman Chelmsford book, map and illustration of the mansio)

• Parts of box flue tile (two)

• Bone hair pin

• Bronze needle

• Glass shards (two)

• Glass cup with blue dots (replica)

• Samian bowl (repaired)

• Fragment of decorated Samian bowl

• Decorated Samian Cup (replica)

• Oil lamp

• Fragment of mortarium

• Mortarium (replica)

• Pottery fragments (eight)

• Tessellated pavement

• Roman coins (four)

• Wax tablets (two, replica)

• Wooden toy horse (replica)

Step inside a Victorian household with our Victorian Home Discover Box, designed to help pupils explore how daily life has changed over time. Through hands on investigation of real and replica objects—such as butter pats, carbolic soap, dolly pegs, chamber pots, stone hot water bottles and Sunday books—learners compare Victorian routines with modern home life. Stations covering kitchen work, laundry, bedrooms, bathrooms and leisure encourage rich discussion about hygiene, technology, comfort and family roles. Pupils build historical vocabulary, develop enquiry skills and create written responses, from object descriptions to diary entries, bringing Victorian domestic life vividly into focus.

The Victorian Home Discover Box includes the following items:

• Flat iron

• Box iron

• Candle snuffer (reproduction)

• Victorian penny (20)

• Butter pats

• Carbolic soap

• Wooden pegs (three, reproduction)

• Infant’s cap

• Infant’s gown

• Woman’s drawers

• Penny lick

• Chamber pot

• Stone hot water bottle

• Copy of ‘The Girl’s Own Paper’

• Sunday book

• ‘Old and New’ matching game

• Bag for object handling

• Folder of Victorian images with notes

Step back into the world of Victorian play with our Victorian Toys Discover Box, perfect for enriching English and History lessons through hands on exploration. Packed with traditional toys—from cup and ball and whizzers to skipping ropes, acrobat toys and early flipbooks—this box invites pupils to compare past and present, building descriptive vocabulary and speaking skills. Students handle real objects, explore their materials and mechanisms, and use them as creative prompts for character writing, instructions, or storytelling. A delightful way to inspire curiosity, ignite imagination, and bring Victorian childhood vividly into the classroom.

The Victorian Toys Discover Box includes the following items:

• Cup and ball

• Whizzer

• Diablo

• Happy Families card game

• Five stones

• Skipping rope

• Two acrobat toys

• Whipping top

• Two spinning tops

• Flick book

• Jacobs ladder

• ‘Old and New Toys’ matching game

• Folder of images of toys with notes

The contents of this box are all replicas as we intend children to use and play with them.

Bring the strict routines and discipline of a Victorian classroom to life with our Victorian School Discover Box. Packed with replica objects—including slates, chalks, copybooks, finger stocks and cane—this box helps pupils explore how Victorian values shaped learning, behaviour, and classroom culture. Learners try traditional handwriting, investigate historical punishments, and compare past expectations with modern schooling. Through hands on role play and object-based enquiry, pupils develop historical empathy, strengthen descriptive language, and deepen their understanding of how education has transformed over time. A vivid way to immerse classes in the sights, rules and routines of Victorian school life.

The Victorian School Discover Box includes the following items:

• Teacher resources: ‘The Victorian Schoolday’ book, ‘Children in Victorian Times’ book

• Sets of 19th Century style dip pens with steel nibs, ink, blotting paper, slates and slate pencils

• Copy books

• Framed picture of Queen Victoria

• Bamboo cane

• Two sets of finger stocks

• Victorian schoolboy outfit (shirt, collar, tie, waistcoat, trousers to fit approximately age five to six)

• Victorian schoolgirl outfit (dress, pinafore, sunbonnet to fit approximately age five to six)

• Two photographs of Victorian classes

• 24 illustrations of Victorian life with notes

• Victorian classroom ‘old and new’ matching game

The contents of this box are all replicas as we intend children to use them to recreate Victorian school life.

Explore the power of protest with our Suffragettes & Protest Discover Box, an inspiring resource linking the Votes for Women campaign to modern movements for LGBTQ+ rights and climate justice. Pupils investigate the contrasting tactics of Suffragists and Suffragettes, handle replica artefacts, debate methods of change, and create responses such as prison letters and persuasive arguments. By comparing historical activism with contemporary protest, learners develop critical thinking, empathy and citizenship skills. Perfect for History, English and Citizenship, this box helps students understand how ordinary people challenge injustice—and how protest continues to shape society today.

The Suffragettes Discover Box includes the following items:

• Portcullis brooch

• ‘Votes for Women’ sash

• Suffragette’s necklace

• Hammer

• Votes for Women newspaper

• Spoof membership card

• 1911 poster

• Jail letter

• Buckingham palace flyer

• Bail notice

• Hyde park programme

• Miscellaneous images

• Epsom rail ticket

• Song sheet

• Procession ticket

• Letter from Mrs Pankhurst

The contents of this box are all replicas or reproductions.

Enrich the study of War Poetry with our World War I Discover Box, designed to deepen students’ understanding of the objects that inspired war poets. Filled with authentic artefacts—including bullets, cap badges, a bugle, trench tools and personal items—this box helps students explore themes of sacrifice, patriotism and the harsh realities of trench life. English classes can use these objects as stimuli for close analysis, creative writing, and developing empathy, to craft poems directly from artefacts. A powerful way to connect poetry to the lived experience of WWI soldiers.

The World War One Discover Box includes the following items:

• German saw-edged bayonet

• German bullet

• German Iron Cross

• Trench shovel

• Barbed wire

• Trench periscope

• Essex Regiment Bugle

• Essex Regiment Cap Badge

• Sweetheart Brooch

• German Sniper Scope

• British Mills Bomb

• Shilling Coin

• British War Medal

• British Victory medal

• Artillery Shell Fuse

• Coronation and Peace Cups

• Wire Cutters

Find out what life was like on the Titanic through the eyes of ‘Polar, the Titanic Bear’ This delightful book was written by a mother to her son who were both on board the Titanic that fateful night. The box includes a copy of the book, a polar bear teddy, with lesson plans and objects to explore class, childhood and hygiene on board the Titanic. The Titanic disaster catapulted Marconi’s wireless inventions into the mainstream and changed the world. The Discover box includes a Morse Code tapper and circuit as well as activities designed to explore ways of communication.

The Titanic Discover Box includes the following items:

• The Polar the Titanic Bear

• Vinolia soap

• Carbolic soap

• Reproduction advertisement

• Reproduction telegram

• Morse code tapper and circuit

• Whipping top toy

• Cup and ball toy.

• Small spinning top x6

Explore the evolution of mass communication with this exciting Discover Box. Packed with real and replica objects. From early messengers and letters to telegrams, radios, walkie talkies and mobile phones, this box helps pupils investigate how communication technologies developed and why they changed. Learners discover Marconi’s pioneering radio work, practise sending Morse Code, and compare historical devices with modern equivalents. Through hands on exploration and creative activities, pupils examine how faster, clearer communication transformed daily life, emergency response and global connection.

The Communication Discover Box includes the following items:

• Marconiphone

• Headphones – old and new

• Microphone – old and new

• Candlestick phone

• WWII Field telephone

• Walkie talkies – 1960s and new

• Rotary Phone

• Ipod 2010

• 1996 Nokia 2110

• Selection of mobile phones from 2000 onwards

• Radio

• Morse code tapper and circuit

Bring prehistoric innovation to life with our Stone Age Discover Box. Designed to support creative thinking and design technology skills, this box invites pupils to explore how early humans identified challenges and developed ingenious solutions. Using real and replica artefacts, students investigate the evolution of tools—such as the axe—and experiment with their own prototypes through an iterative design process. With opportunities for teamwork, reflection and hands on making, this box encourages learners to think like prehistoric inventors, understand material choices, and discover how creativity shaped human survival.

The Stone Age Discover Box includes the following items:

• Paleolithic flint hand axe

• Paleolithic flint hand scraper

• Mesolithic tranchet axe head

• Neolithic polished axe head

• Bronze age flat head - replica

• Bronze age looped Palstave axe head – replica

Discover the Tudor stories hidden in the very landscape of Beaulieu Park with our Tudor Life Discover Box. Rooted in the history of Beaulieu Palace—Henry VIII’s grand “Beautiful Place,” later home to Princess Mary—this box connects pupils directly to Chelmsford’s past. Through handling real and replica artefacts such as trenchers, tygs, hornbooks, thimbles and the Great Seal, learners investigate how royals and servants lived at the palace. The detective activities bring local heritage to life, inspiring pride in the remarkable Tudor history on their doorstep and deepening pupils’ sense of place, identity and community.

The Tudors Life Discover Box includes the following items:

• Trencher (with wooden spoon)

• Tudor Hornbook

• Money Box

• Bellarmine Jug

• Costrel

• Two Handled Tyg

• Pewter Plate & Spoon

• Tudor Thimbles x 2

• Clay Pipes x 5

• Various Tudor Coins x5

• Pastry Stamp (piece)

• Great Seal (Replica)

• Oil Lamp

Discover the extraordinary geological story hidden beneath our feet!

This hands-on Discover Box helps pupils explore rocks, fossils and millions of years of change in Essex, using real samples, clear visual aids and practical activities. High-quality information posters are paired with related rock and fossil specimens, allowing children to observe closely, ask questions and develop geology skills by handling real material. 

A rock identification flow chart and local map support pupils in identifying rocks and tracing how they were formed and transported to Essex over time. Activities explore the different geological periods recorded in local rock layers, helping pupils understand how environments have changed from tropical seas to Ice Age landscapes.

The box includes engaging learning activities focused on animal adaptation during the Ice Age, linking past climate change to animals’ physical features and survival strategies.

Ideal for Year 3 learning about rocks and fossils and Year 4 learning about climate change, this Discover Box offers a memorable way for pupils to hold the rocks they are studying and uncover the vast history contained within a single pebble.

The Rocks and Fossils Discover Box includes the following items:

• Leaflets on Essex rocks and fossils x3

• ‘The Pebble in my Pocket’ by Meridith Hooper

• Samples of Rocks from Essex geology: flint, porphyry, chert, vein quartz, quartzite, Cornish rock, red crag.

• Samples of fossils from Essex: shark teeth, sea urchins, crabs, lobster, variety of shells, belemnite, ‘ship-worm’, shark vertebrae, sea sponges.

• Fossil rubbing plates x4

Step inside an Anglo-Saxon village and explore everyday life over 1,000 years ago.

This Discover Box centres on a wooden model of an Anglo-Saxon mead hall, the heart of the community. Pupils can use magnetic labels to identify key features of the hall and explore how it was used for feasting, storytelling, decision-making and daily life. Peg doll figures represent different members of the community, allowing children to investigate roles such as the warrior, weaver, potter, metalworker and scop, and to think about how everyone worked together.

The box also includes a range of handling objects and replicas to support enquiry-based learning, including a shield boss, drinking horn, iron lamp, bone needle and antler comb. Textile materials such as wool, flax and plant-dyed fibres help pupils understand Anglo-Saxon clothing and craft skills, while rune tiles, a decorative brooch and clay stamps introduce early writing, jewellery and pottery.

Designed for Key Stage 2, the box supports topics on Anglo-Saxon Britain and encourages observation, discussion and creative activities such as weaving, storytelling, pot design and shield decoration. Clear information cards and activity sheets are included to help teachers tailor sessions to their class.