This section explores changes which have taken place in the urban and in the rural environment over the past 100 years. It is divided into two parts.
Part 1: The City Then & Now
The pupils are asked to complete three missions and it is envisioned that these would be undertaken in one sitting with the third mission completed later possibly as homework.
The first mission (What has changed?) is based on two photographs of O'Connell St. Dublin, one taken about 100 years ago and one taken recently. The pupils are asked to click on the old photograph on the things that they think have changed. The pupils are notified when they select correct answers. The correct answers are e.g. for clicking on pedestrians, transport, Nelson's Pillar. The computer will emit a negative noise for clicking on buildings, bridge, or Daniel O'Connell.
The second mission (Odd One Out) is based on the same old picture of O'Connell St. but four modern things have been added: the Spire of Light, a crane, a modern car and a modern advertisement on the side of the trambus. These have been added in black and white and in plausible locations. The pupils are asked to click on the new things which have crept into the picture.
The third mission (Draw it!) asks the pupils to think about their own built environments and to identify something old and something new: a road, a building, a monument or a wall. It is suggested that they record their ideas in their SESE copybooks. They might divide a page down the middle and for example they might draw an old stone wall on one side and a new red brick one on the other side.
Part 2: The Country Then and Now
This part explores changes that have taken place in farming patterns over the past 100 years and then encourages the pupils to take a closer look at their own homes and to display pictures of them in order of date of construction. Again this part is divided into three missions (4 ,5 and 6) and it may be practical to undertake these in one sitting.
The fourth mission (Making Hay) is a multiple choice type task .The pupils are asked to look at a picture of hay being saved and at a picture of silage being harvested and then they are challenged to collect gold tickets by correctly answering questions based on the two pictures. The pupils are notified when they select correct and incorrect answers, in effect The computer does not accept incorrect answers so in effect it will teaching the pupils the correct answers. (The correct answers are 1. grass, 2. hay, 3. less people, 4. silage, 5. to feed animals in Winter and 6. silage.)
The fifth mission (Which is the oldest?) is to place inidentify in chronological order images of a thatched cottage, an artisan's dwelling and a modern house.
The sixth mission (Sketch it) is to sketch their own homes and to find out when they were constructed. These could later be displayed in chronological order. A bar chart could be drawn from the data with the categories being 10 years old, 20 years old, 30 years old etc or other as appropriate to the data. As the children will have their addresses on the pictures, conclusions may be drawn in relation to location and age of building. Other explorations might be 'homes which are older than the school/newer than the school' or it might be possible to identify a style typical of the older or of the newer homes. Again this activity will be completed at home and later discussed in the classroom