Pudding Lane: The Spark and SpreadActivities & Teaching Strategies
Active learning brings the Great Fire of London to life by letting students see and feel the forces at work. When children model streets, role-play that night, and trace the path of flames, they move beyond textbook facts to grasp how materials, wind, and human choices interacted in real time.
Learning Objectives
- 1Identify the specific location and initial cause of the Great Fire of London in Thomas Farriner's bakery.
- 2Explain at least three contributing factors that caused the Great Fire of London to spread rapidly.
- 3Compare and contrast the living conditions in 1666 London that facilitated fire spread with modern urban environments.
- 4Propose a course of action a child living near Pudding Lane in 1666 might have taken during the fire.
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Model Building: Pudding Lane Streets
Provide card, straws, and red tissue for small groups to construct model wooden houses and thatched roofs in tight rows. Introduce a 'spark' with tissue paper and simulate wind using a hairdryer on low. Groups record how flames 'jump' between structures and discuss prevention ideas.
Prepare & details
Where and how did the Great Fire of London start?
Facilitation Tip: During Model Building, circulate with a small candle to demonstrate how embers can jump between closely spaced houses, guiding students to test safe distances.
Setup: Flexible space for group stations
Materials: Role cards with goals/resources, Game currency or tokens, Round tracker
Role-Play: Night of the Fire
Assign whole class roles such as baker, family members, or watchmen. Narrate the fire starting at 1am; children decide in character what to grab first and escape routes. Debrief with shares on challenges faced.
Prepare & details
Why did the fire spread so quickly through the streets of London?
Facilitation Tip: In Role-Play, hand out simple props like aprons or nightcaps so students step into 1666 roles, making choices that feel real and immediate.
Setup: Flexible space for group stations
Materials: Role cards with goals/resources, Game currency or tokens, Round tracker
Sequencing: Spark to Spread
Pairs receive jumbled picture cards showing oven spark, house ignition, wind push, and street blaze. They sequence events on a timeline strip, then explain choices to another pair.
Prepare & details
What would you have done if you lived near Pudding Lane in 1666?
Facilitation Tip: For Sequencing, provide mixed-up picture cards so groups must agree on order before gluing, encouraging debate and peer correction.
Setup: Flexible space for group stations
Materials: Role cards with goals/resources, Game currency or tokens, Round tracker
Map Activity: Tracing the Path
Small groups mark the fire's initial spread on a labelled London map using yarn from Pudding Lane outward. Add arrows for wind direction and note wooden building zones. Compare to a modern fire map.
Prepare & details
Where and how did the Great Fire of London start?
Facilitation Tip: During Map Activity, have students mark the fire’s path with red yarn over a printed map, helping them see the city’s geography as a living danger zone.
Setup: Flexible space for group stations
Materials: Role cards with goals/resources, Game currency or tokens, Round tracker
Teaching This Topic
Teachers should anchor lessons in the senses and the tangible: the smell of baking bread, the crackle of thatch, the feel of parched timber. Research shows that when students manipulate materials and role-play in context, their recall of cause and effect improves. Avoid long lectures about the fire’s aftermath before students experience its origins firsthand, as this can overshadow the spark itself.
What to Expect
Successful learning shows when students connect the bakery spark to the spread of fire through evidence. They should explain how materials and weather created danger and describe human reactions with clear reasons, using what they observed and discussed.
These activities are a starting point. A full mission is the experience.
- Complete facilitation script with teacher dialogue
- Printable student materials, ready for class
- Differentiation strategies for every learner
Watch Out for These Misconceptions
Common MisconceptionDuring Role-Play: Night of the Fire, watch for students claiming the fire started on purpose.
What to Teach Instead
Use the role-play to shift focus to evidence. After acting out the night’s events, pause and ask groups to present either a rumour they heard or a fact they gathered, highlighting how rumours spread faster than the fire itself.
Common MisconceptionDuring Model Building: Pudding Lane Streets, watch for students assuming houses were mostly stone.
What to Teach Instead
Have students compare their timber-and-thatch models to images of real 1666 houses. Ask them to point out which parts would burn fastest, using the models to correct the misconception through direct observation.
Common MisconceptionDuring Map Activity: Tracing the Path, watch for students ignoring the wind’s role in spreading flames.
What to Teach Instead
Use the map’s layout and safe fan simulations to let students map both the fire’s path and the wind’s direction. Ask them to adjust routes on their maps based on wind speed, tying geography to meteorology.
Assessment Ideas
After Model Building: Pudding Lane Streets, provide students with a small card. Ask them to draw the bakery and write one sentence explaining how the fire started, then list one thing that made the fire spread fast based on their model.
During Role-Play: Night of the Fire, pose the question: 'Imagine you are a child on Pudding Lane. The fire has just started. What do you do first, and what do you take with you?' Facilitate a class discussion, encouraging students to justify choices using the conditions they observed in their models.
After Sequencing: Spark to Spread, show students images of closely packed wooden houses and narrow streets from historical illustrations. Ask: 'How do these pictures help explain why the fire spread so quickly?' Call on students to share their observations and connect them to their sequenced steps.
Extensions & Scaffolding
- Challenge early finishers to create a second model street using only stone, plaster, and tile materials, then compare how the fire behaves differently.
- Scaffolding for struggling students: provide sentence starters like, 'The fire spread fast because _____ was dry and _____ were close together.'
- Deeper exploration: have students research how modern London’s building codes reflect lessons from 1666, then present a short safety poster to the class.
Key Vocabulary
| Bakery | A place where bread and cakes are made and sold. Thomas Farriner's bakery was where the Great Fire of London began. |
| Pudding Lane | A real street in London where the Great Fire of London started in 1666. It is named after the practice of disposing of pudding from the nearby fish market. |
| Overheated oven | An oven that became too hot, which was the direct cause of the spark that started the fire in the bakery. |
| Hay and flour | Materials stored in the bakery that were highly flammable and quickly caught fire from the initial spark. |
| Wooden houses | Buildings made mostly of wood, common in 1666 London. Their close proximity and flammable materials helped the fire spread quickly. |
Suggested Methodologies
Planning templates for History
5E Model
The 5E Model structures lessons through five phases (Engage, Explore, Explain, Elaborate, and Evaluate), guiding students from curiosity to deep understanding through inquiry-based learning.
Unit PlannerThematic Unit
Organize a multi-week unit around a central theme or essential question that cuts across topics, texts, and disciplines, helping students see connections and build deeper understanding.
RubricSingle-Point Rubric
Build a single-point rubric that defines only the "meets standard" level, leaving space for teachers to document what exceeded and what fell short. Simple to create, easy for students to understand.
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The Aftermath: A City in Ruins
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Christopher Wren and Rebuilding London
Learning how the city was redesigned with wider streets and stone buildings under the guidance of Sir Christopher Wren.
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