Year 8 Medieval Incursion

On Friday, 6th of September, Year 8 History students participated in a Medieval weaponry and defence incursion, then later completed their castle building assessment task.

For the first half of the day, we experienced a very fun and interesting incursion where an instructor came in to show all the different types of medieval armoury and weapons.

We had a fun time dressing up classmates as different kinds of knights over the 500 year medieval time span. From Vikings to Goths, Normans to Crusaders and finally high-medieval knights. A large expanse of weapons were shown to penetrate each different type of armour. It was really interesting to see how they evolved. We were shown origins of all the different heraldry and crests. Some audience members were singled out and informed of their clan, their surname’s meaning, or their coat of arms, much to their entertainment.

We were allowed to hold some of the weapons, experiencing what it was like to be a knight in the middle ages, and it was really fun seeing people demonstrate torture and punishment devices, such as hanging and the pillory, similar to the stocks. Others were subjected to the scold’s bridle, a device that stopped nagging women from talking. The instructor also demonstrated some crossbows and longbows that were used.

After recess, we started to assemble our castle. Between all the groups, we used materials such as cardboard, glue, paint, styrofoam, Lego figures, toothpicks, clay, paper, tape, etc. Out of all this, we made many different castles that were all unique. It was really fun to construct them and also view other groups’ castles too.

Written by Olivia Nguyen, Jennifer Duong, Emma Wang and Jennifer Chuah.