Young Reporters

[Instrumental music]

Young reporter: “We’ve learned about animation.”

Young reporter: “Making podcasts about the transformation of the IWM London.”

Young reporter: “I think my favourite part was that when we started looking at the insects.”

Anna Lotinga: “Young reporters is a two-year project involving young people from Archbishop Sumner School and Oasis Academy Johanna, investigating as reporters about how the museum is changing. And we've worked with their Year Five students for two years.”

Sarah Ballard: “The first year, year one, term one, was making postcards."

Anna Lotinga: "Bringing that whole experience of what they found out to life for other people to see, and we created large scale posters and one went up in the Imperial War Museums’ foyer.”

Sarah Ballard: “The second term was creating podcasts. So, we worked with Lambeth College who have a radio department.”

Young reporter: “Yeah, it's really exciting.”

Anna Lotinga: “So we have a series of podcasts where our young reporters interviewed the curators, the conservators, designers, all types of people whose job is involved with this major transformation project. Afterwards they learned how to edit some of the material they'd collected, and they had a full day of producing these podcasts.”

“Yeah, well done, a clap for Ezra.”

Anna Lotinga: “Then we went on to look at conservation, and our young reporters had opportunities in small groups to come and work specifically with different types of conservators.”

Rachel Weatherall: “Today, the young reporters have been in conservation projects specifically related to conservation work that we do on a day-to-day basis in the museum. What the children are doing is identifying different insect species that we find in the museum and some of which damage objects.”

Young reporter: “We’ve been using microscopes to find out about insects.”

Rachel Weatherall: “And they're learning about object conservation, and so assessing the condition of an object and also trying out a few different types of treatments.”

Young reporter: “Protecting the suitcase with this special glue called consolidant and we’ve been cleaning them and seeing what parts do we have to glue and make it look perfect.”

Rachel Weatherall: “The children looked like they were really enjoying the work that we were doing today and I quite liked being able to explain to them what I do on a day-to-day basis.”

Sarah Ballard: “One of the highlights of the project for me was going behind the scenes into the whole history spies exhibition with the young reporters. We were able to preview the exhibition before it opened to the public.”

Young reporter: “The spies skills that I picked up in the exhibition was how to camouflage and how to keep your secret identity safe.”

Young reporter: “My favourite part of the exhibition was when I was, I was cycling and it was powering the radio for someone to listen.”

Anna Lotinga: “Year two is all about involving young reporters in the First World War Galleries and they researched some of the objects that have been chosen to be part of our family trail.”

Sarah Ballard: “They made films, which were animating the objects and interviewing them as if the objects were alive and thinking about the stories that they have.”

Young reporter: “My group is to interpret the pig. It was a pig that was found on a German boat at the end of the war.”

Anna Lotinga: “So imagining the British Periscope, imagine actually what its experience was like.”

Young reporter: “Just talking to old objects and just imagine what the objects would say.”

Anna Lotinga: “They produced films where they brought these objects to life, and the young reporters interviewed the objects.”

Young reporter: “My favourite thing I enjoyed was, was make, was getting to make the films. It's not just about being in the films, it's about, it’s about teamwork.”

Young reporter: “So we was making the script, writing it and I really enjoyed that part because I got to be the reporter and I was really confident.”
Young reporter: “My favourite bit of the project is saying my lines and saying it in a different accent. What does it feel like to have your feet in a sweaty human ear? Uh, it's disgusting. I feel like my legs are unhygienic liquid. Have a nice day, bye.”

Sarah Ballard: “I think because we've worked with the young people over a sustained amount of time, they've got to know the museum staff and the museum. Some of them I know have come in in the school holidays and when the museum has been open with their families, they've talked about the museum at home.”

Anna Lotinga: “I could talk to you about what the young people have learned but actually, all of the staff involved in these projects, all the learning staff for instance, we've learned how to make podcasts, we've learned how to make animated films and to facilitate that. So, it's been tremendous, like from our learning perspective as well. It's been fantastic working with local primary schools in this way and we're planning to continue to foster those, those close relationships and to work with those schools and looking at new ways to continue to have projects that evolve with, with how the museum's changing.”