Author: jameswatsongdes2014
Backgrounds
Above is the final background design for Captain James Cook’s double page spread. I wanted it to appear to be on the hull of the ship and to see the sea and I’m quite happy with how it turned out.
Above is the final rendition of Alan Turing’s background. I wanted it to reflect a war time office but also the office of a mathematician and I’m happy with the result. I implemented the use of a black chalk board in order to present one of the activities that I’ve prepared.
Above is Noor Inayat Khan’s background, I wanted it to reflect a french village and I think it achieves that. It’s simplistic in its design and is generic enough to be either France or England and also gives enough space for the rest of the page to be displayed.
Fonts
Above is a selection of 12 fonts that I found that could be suitable for this brief as they’re either stylised to match with the people covered in the book, or are easy enough for the target audience to read.
I’ve decided to go with Atlantic Cruise as it meets both criteria of relating to the historical figures referenced in the book and will be easy enough to read.
Character Designs
Below you’ll find a scan of my 8 initial styles for which I would base my character designs off. I wanted to use a child like cartoon style, for the target audience that the project is aimed at would be able to relate to.
I then decided to choose two of the styles (specifically Style C and Style F) and render it in photoshop to see what it would look like when finished.
“Style C” “Style F”
After going through each design, I’ve decided to go with Style C, since it’s more simplistic in design and looks more friendly than the otherwise more complicated look in Style F.
James Cook
Noor Inayat Khan
Alan Turing
Target Audience
As the target demographic for this brief is aged at Key Stage 1 students (Between the ages of 5 and 7 as defined by the National Curriculum). I’ve decided to look into the curriculum to get a contextual sense of what the students are learning about alongside ‘the lives of significant individuals in the past who have contributed to national and international achievements.’ which is set to be implemented into the National Curriculum.
The National Curriculum outlines that the following is what Key Stage 1 students should be taught in regards to the subject of History.
“Pupils should be taught about:
- Changes within living memory. Where appropriate, these should be used to reveal aspects of change in national life
- Events beyond living memory that are significant nationally or globally [for example, the Great Fire of London, the first aeroplane flight or events commemorated through festivals or anniversaries]
- The lives of significant individuals in the past who have contributed to national and international achievements. Some should be used to compare aspects of life in different periods [for example, Elizabeth I and Queen Victoria, Christopher Columbus and Neil Armstrong, William Caxton and Tim Berners-Lee, Pieter Bruegel the Elder and LS Lowry, Rosa Parks and Emily Davison, Mary Seacole and/or Florence Nightingale and Edith Cavell]
- Significant historical events, people and places in their own locality.”
The curriculum emphasizes the presence of difference. For example “changes within living memory” gives Students a modern example of change, outlining how things are different now because of the change.
So implementing this direct sense of difference between my three chosen people will fit well into the curriculum whilst also meeting the requirements, this can be done in a variety of ways from colours used, backgrounds, fonts and even different designs for each historical figure.
Bibliography,
Crown, 2016. History programmes of study. Key stages 1 and 2 National curriculum in England, [Online]. 1, 5. Available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/national-curriculum-in-england-history-programmes-of-study [Accessed 30 October 2016].
James Cook Research
“James Cook was born on 27 October 1728 in a small village near Middlesbrough in Yorkshire. His father was a farm worker. At the age of 17, Cook moved to the coast, settling in Whitby and finding work with a coal merchant. In 1755, Cook enlisted in the Royal Navy, serving in North America where he learnt to survey and chart coastal waters”
Endeavour arrived in Tahiti in April 1769 where Green was able to observe the transit of Venus. Endeavour continued on to New Zealand, and then sailed along the length of Australia’s eastern coast, which had never before been seen by Europeans. Cook claimed it for Britain and named it New South Wales. Cook and his crew then returned home, arriving in July 1771.
In 1772, not satisfied by his previous exploits, Cook set out on a second voyage to look for the southern continent. His two ships sailed close to the Antarctic coast but were forced to turn back by the cold. They then visited New Zealand and Tahiti, returning to England in 1775.
Cook’s third voyage was to find the North-West Passage that was believed to link the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. Unable to find the fabled route, Cook took his two ships south and explored the island of Hawaii. Relations with the islanders were soured after the theft of a ship’s boat. On 14 February Cook tried to take the local leader hostage. There was a scuffle and Cook was stabbed and killed.”
BBC. 2014. Captain James Cook (1728 – 1779). [ONLINE] Available at: http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/historic_figures/cook_captain_james.shtml. [Accessed 29 October 2016].
Noor Inayat Khan
Noor Inayat Khan
Noor Inayat Khan was born in Russia on 1 January 1914 , shortly after her birth in Moscow the family moved to England and later settled in France.
After studying music and medicine Kh
an became a writer. Her children’s stories were published in Figaro and a collection of traditional Indian stories, Twenty Jataka Tales, appeared in 1939.
On the outbreak of the War she trained as a nurse with the Red Cross.
In May 1940 France was invaded by Germany, and just before the French government surrendered she escaped to England with her mother and sister.
Given the codename “Madeleine”, she was flown to Le Mans with Diana Rowden and Cecily Lefort on 16 June 1943 and was the first woman to be infiltrated into enemy occupied France.
Khan was arrested in October and taken to Gestapo Headquarters.
Khan was taken to Germany and imprisoned at Karlsruhe. Later, with three other SOE agents (Yolande Beekman, Eliane Plewman and Madeleine Damerment), she was moved to Dachau. The four women were murdered in September 1944.
In 1949 Noor Inayat Khan was posthumously awarded the George Cross.
The National Archives, HS 9/836/5
Alan Turing
Alan Turing
“Alan Turing (1912-54) was the leading mathematician at Bletchley Park. He’d been recruited from Cambridge University where he had created the pioneering Turing Machine, a forerunner of the modern computer able to perform calculations at astonishing speed.
Turing and Gordon Welchman, a fellow Cambridge mathematician, set to work improving a Polish machine, Bomba, which was built before the war to crack earlier versions of Enigma. The new Turing-Welchman Bombe was perfected in 1940 and they began deciphering Luftwaffe communications. Once set in motion, it would search through all possible Enigma rotor variations until the right combination was found. The complex Enigma methods used in German Naval communications were cracked in 1941, then again in 1943 (after the Navy had introduced extra components to the system).” – National Archives
Biography.com
“English scientist Alan Turing was born Alan Mathison Turing on June 23, 1912, in Maida Vale, London, England. At a young age, he displayed signs of high intelligence, which some of his teachers recognized, but did not necessarily respect. When Turing attended the well-known independent Sherborne School at the age of 13, he became particularly interested in math and science.
After Sherborne, Turing enrolled at King’s College (University of Cambridge) in Cambridge, England, studying there from 1931 to 1934. As a result of his dissertation, in which he proved the central limit theorem, Turing was elected a fellow at the school upon his graduation.
During World War II, Turing was a leading participant in wartime code-breaking, particularly that of German ciphers. He worked at Bletchley Park, the GCCS wartime station, where he made five major advances in the field of cryptanalysis, including specifying the bombe, an electromechanical device used to help decipher German Enigma encrypted signals.
Turing died on June 7, 1954. Following a postmortem exam, it was determined that the cause of death was cyanide poisoning. The remains of an apple were found next to the body, though no apple parts were found in his stomach. The autopsy reported that “four ounces of fluid which smelled strongly of bitter almonds, as does a solution of cyanide” was found in the stomach. Trace smell of bitter almonds was also reported in vital organs. The autopsy concluded that the cause of death was asphyxia due to cyanide poisoning and ruled a suicide.” – Biography.com
Bibliography
Office, P.R. (no date) The national archives – exhibitions & learning online – exhibitions & treasures – secrets & spies. Available at: http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/spies/ciphers/enigma/en1.htm (Accessed: 28 October 2016).
Biography.com Editors (2016) Alan Turing Biography. Available at: http://www.biography.com/people/alan-turing-9512017#synopsis (Accessed: 28 October 2016).
Cartoons in the Classroom
On TargetStudy.com I found an interesting article discussing the importance in using cartoons when teaching. It goes over the different ways in which children can benefit from learning through something interactive as a comic strip or cartoon, but also gives some informed reasoning as to why the cartoon style also resonates with children and can help improve their education.
“Kids always want to enjoy each and every moment. They want to sense fun and humour all the time around them. And it is human nature to correlate cartoons with fun and humour. Therefore, it can be said that in search for entertainment the first entity around them which will seek student’s attention will be cartoons or comic strips. Not only children, even adults do the same. Whenever we open a book we first look at the images printed on it and then the text. Similarly, the students will first read the comic strip and then the text. So in order to gain student’s attention toward a subject, the use of cartoons will be a great idea”
Targetstudy.com. 2015. Importance of cartoons in Teaching. [ONLINE] Available at: https://targetstudy.com/articles/importance-of-cartoons-in-teaching.html. [Accessed 25 October 2016].
Signteach, an educational resource centre for sign language teacher wrote an article explaining the different ways in which cartoons can be used in helping students. It goes over how even the friendly style is associated with humour and is genuinely perceived to be friendly, and as such the pupils will act in kind and not be intimidated by the information being presented to them.
“Kids and adults alike like cartoons. They usually associate cartoons with fun and humour. Concept cartoons thus provide an appealing and non-threatening way to represent ideas. Pupils are more likely to be enthusiastic towards the activity to come and will then be more focused and receptive to learning. In cartoons, the ideas have to be presented succinctly. These ideas can be so thought-provoking that pupils are drawn into “participating” in the dialogue by “becoming” one of the characters, giving rise to vibrant class discussions. The lesson thus becomes more interactive and student-centred as pupils are actively involved in their learning.”
Sign Teach. 2009. Cartoons in the Classroom. [ONLINE] Available at:http://singteach.nie.edu.sg/issue18-scienceed/. [Accessed 25 October 2016].
National Archive Trip
Today we visited the National Archive in Kew, London. The trip was really insightful and gave us context to the brief we have been set, as well as a fresh perspective on the task at hand. The trip was useful as we were able to view historical documents that are usually shut off from the public, and were allowed to observe them with our own hands. Documents included public records of various important historical figures, from Captain James Cook, Queen Elizabeth II to lesser known figures like Noor Inayat Khan.
The brief as set out, involves choosing three historical figures from a set list based off the governments teaching requirements for Key Stage 1 (KS1), researching them and then producing an interactive activity for KS1 students aged 5 – 7. This brief will involve a lot of accurate information for practical and ethical considerations. To start this brief, I had to choose three historical figures from the following list.
James Watson GDES2014 