EXPLORING THE VANISHING VILLA – TEACHERS GUIDE
Introduction
This activity it designed to help children understand what a Roman villa was, and what went on
there.
The activity has cross-curricula potential: maths will be required to measure out the villa on the
ground; coastal erosion is a linked geography topic and the activity also requires map reading
skills.
It is designed to be used with a single class.
Key stage: 2
Preparation
Before doing the activity it may be useful to have covered, in class:
 What a Roman villa was like, who lived there and what daily life was like there
 Investigate what the different rooms in Roman villas were used for.
 Consider how we know about villas – what evidence is there?
You will find these resources useful:
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Pages 14-19 of the Folkestone villa CAT curriculum pack
Other Canterbury Archaeological Trust learning resources
BBC History website - Romans
To carry out the activity you will need:
 An open space large enough to mark the outline of the villa on the ground; you will need
about 60m x 40m; if you don’t have enough space, just halve all the dimensions.
 String or tape to mark out the villa on the ground, and some means of holding it down on
the ground (you could use a ball of string and some heavy books; if on the school field,
try tent pegs)
 Copies of the children’s version of the villa plan.
Conducting the activity
1. Hand out the children’s versions of the Roman villa plan. Explain that they are going to
recreate the villa by marking out this outline on the ground.
2. Start to measure and mark out the dimensions of the villa outline. The teachers’ version of the
villa plan has all dimensions marked on in metres.
3. Once you have marked out the villa, discuss its size and shape with the class – what does the
fact that it is so large tell us about the people who lived here?
4. Start putting children in the different rooms within the villa, as shown by the numbers of the
plan. As children take up their positions, explain what these rooms were used for (if its not
obvious) - refer to pages 16-19 of the Folkestone villa CAT curriculum pack. Children can pretend
they are Roman residents in these rooms and mime activities.
5. Carry on like this until all the children are in the villa. Discuss life in the villa – how many
people might have lived here. What would it have been like to live here? Pages 14 and 15 of the
CAT curriculum pack will be useful for this.
EXTRA ACTIVITY
If you want to you can also use the marked out plan to play out some key events in the villa’s
history:
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The villa was abandoned, probably in the 4 th century – everyone left and the building fell
into ruin.
The stone from the villa was probably ‘robbed out’ and used in other buildings.
Eventually the villa collapsed and become buried under soil.
In 1924 it was discovered and excavated (see pages 8 and 9 of the CAT curriculum pack).
In 1989 it was excavated again and it was discovered that some had been lost to erosion,
as shown on the teachers’ plan (you could remove that part of your building to illustrate
this).
Finally come forward to 2010 and 2011, the most recent dig. See pages 11 and 12 of the
CAT curriculum pack. A survey of the cliff edge found that it had eroded still further –
remove a bit more of the villa accordingly.
This table sets out the years corresponding to each ‘granny’ and suggests some important people,
events and objects for that lifetime:
Granny
number
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
Years in that lifetime
Suggested people, events and objects
0-80
80-160
160-240
240-320
320-400
400-480
480-560
560 -640
640-720
720-800
800-880
880-960
960-1040
1040-1120
1120-1200
1200-1280
1280-1360
1360-1440
1440-1520
1520-1600
1600-1680
1680-1760
1760-1840
1840-1920
1920-2000
AD60-80 Samian tableware (in ARK kit)
122 Emperor Hadrian orders construction of wall
Late 2nd or early 3rd century Roman hare brooch
272-337 Emperor Constantine
383 Roman Legions begin to evacuate Britain
449 Angles and Saxons arrive in Britain
495 Kingdom of Wessex founded
597 St Augustine arrives in Kent
7th century Saxon helmet
789 First recorded Viking attack, Dorset
849-899 Alfred the Great
939 Athelstan, first King of all England, dies
10th century Viking battleaxe
1066 Norman Conquest
1170 Thomas a Beckett murdered
1215 Magna Carta signed
1343 Geoffrey Chaucer born
1415 Battle of Agincourt
c1503-1506 Leonardo paints the Mona Lisa
1558-1603 Queen Elizabeth I
1666 Great Fire of London
1687 Isaac Newton’s ‘Principia’
1815 Battle of Waterloo
1837-1901 Queen Victoria
1939 Outbreak of WW2