Lunar New Year Session Information

This session can be taught: 

• at the Oriental Museum
• as outreach in your school 
• as an online session 

The content of these sessions does vary as we have the galleries to use at the museum, but we try to keep them as similar as possible.

Find out more about our online resources.

Visit to the Museum:

• Zodiac Story – the children will be able to help in the retelling of this story complete with costumes – who will win the great race? 
• Object Investigation – a circle time handling session where the children can see, hold and explore objects and their symbolism from our handling collection. Can they work out what they are and what they are used for? 
• Gallery Explore and Learn – explore our Chinese galleries and find out lots of information from them.
• Dragon Dancing – enjoy helping one of our Chinese dragons to dance. 

Need to know:

• The day at the museum runs from 10am – 2.15pm approximately and is entirely taught by members of our Learning and Engagement Team. 
• The maximum number of children we can take on one day is approximately 60 children. 
• The cost of the visit is £6 per pupil, and free for all accompanying adults.
• Lunch can be eaten in our classroom spaces, or if the weather is good, and you would like to, we do have a small grassy area where you can sit and have a picnic.

Directions to the Museum

Outreach Day at School: 

• Zodiac Story – the children will be able to help in the retelling of this story complete with costumes – who will win the great race?  
• Object Investigation – a circle time handling session where the children can see, hold and explore objects and their symbolism from our handling collection. Can they work out what they are and what they are used for?
• Shadow Puppets – find out about how shadow puppets are used for traditional storytelling before making your own. 
• Dragon Dancing – enjoy helping one of our Chinese dragons dance.

Need to know:

• For an outreach day, we aim to arrive at school to begin teaching at 9.30am, fitting in around the established school breaks of your school, until approximately 20 minutes before the end of your school day.
• We can teach up to three classes on the same day on outreach, but early bookings are essential so we can allocate the required number of staff to make it possible.
• The cost for the above outreach is £5 per pupil, with an additional flat rate charge of £20 towards transport costs.
• Alternatively, we can teach your whole school, spending about an hour with each class in turn.  Please contact us to discuss costs and how we would organise the day. 

Online Session:

• Object Investigation – explore some of the objects from our collection and try to form a theory about what they are. 
• Animal Symbolism Game – the Museum’s Chinese collection is covered in animals. Explore their significance in this interactive game.  
• Meaning of the Dragon – Discover what animal parts make up a Chinese dragon, see our dancing dragon and play an action game. 

Need to know:

• An online session is one hour in length.  
• Session times are 9.30am – 10.30am, 11am – 12noon, and 1.30pm – 2.30pm, but we can accommodate slightly different timings. Please ask at the point of booking if this is something that would be helpful for you.  
• You will need to book a short test call with us to check that you can see and hear us on the whiteboard in your classroom. These are available at 3.30pm, 3.45pm and 4pm. 
• We ask that you book separate sessions for each of your classes so we can keep them as interactive as possible.
• You will be sent an email with resources to print out before your session. 
• The cost of the sessions is £35 per class. 

Session costs