Art in Newham: Stratford Library

Meeting the team

After a quick bus ride to Stratford, pupils met with Jess who works as part of the archives team at Stratford Library. She taught the pupils about what was available in the archives section of the library and how important the information was to learn about history. It was really interesting learning that anyone could access these to help with their research and that a session could be booked online (Click here for more information).

Accessing the archives

Once the pupils were taught how to access the archives, Jess and her team supported pupils in conducting their research. They found old maps of East Ham, spotting Hartley Primary School. Pupils noticed that roads that they knew weren’t on the map and a shopping mall was there instead.

Pupils accessed old newspapers, spotting that there were many furniture adverts in them! They liked watching an old silent movie on the tv about a paperboy and also found information about Madge Gill, who had been an artist that they had researched.

Enjoying the scenery

Stratford is a place that many of our pupils haven’t visited before so pupils also took the opportunity to look at the type of buildings that they could see around them. They loved  St John’s church and the detail of the building. They also really liked looking at the taller buildings, recognising that East Ham is starting to have similar buildings.

To view more of the pupil’s work, register here for free tickets for the exhibition at East Ham Library that is taking place in June.