The Aftermath: A City in RuinsActivities & Teaching Strategies
Active learning helps Year 2 students grasp the human scale of the Great Fire’s destruction by moving beyond dates and facts. When children sort images, role-play experiences, and build models, they connect abstract numbers like 13,000 houses to real stories of loss and recovery.
Learning Objectives
- 1Classify objects as either destroyed or salvaged based on historical accounts of the Great Fire of London.
- 2Explain the immediate challenges faced by Londoners who lost their homes and belongings after the fire.
- 3Compare the living conditions in London before and immediately after the Great Fire using visual and written evidence.
- 4Identify key landmarks in London that were significantly damaged or destroyed by the Great Fire.
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Sorting Stations: Before and After
Prepare stations with images and descriptions of London landmarks, homes, and streets before and after the fire. In small groups, children sort items into 'destroyed' or 'survived' piles, then label changes. Groups share one key loss with the class.
Prepare & details
What happened to people's homes and belongings after the Great Fire?
Facilitation Tip: During Sorting Stations: Before and After, circulate and ask guiding questions like 'What do you notice about the church in both images?' to focus attention on key details.
Setup: Charts posted on walls with space for groups to stand
Materials: Large chart paper (one per prompt), Markers (different color per group), Timer
Role-Play: Homeless in 1666
Assign roles like families, bakers, or churchgoers who lost everything. In pairs, children improvise dialogues about missing homes and plans for tents by the river. Debrief with drawings of their feelings.
Prepare & details
How did the fire change the lives of people living in London?
Facilitation Tip: When running Role-Play: Homeless in 1666, provide simple props such as blankets or bowls to ground the scenario in sensory experience.
Setup: Charts posted on walls with space for groups to stand
Materials: Large chart paper (one per prompt), Markers (different color per group), Timer
Model City: Ruins and Recovery
Provide blocks or boxes for groups to build a mini-London, then 'fire' it by knocking parts down. Discuss hardest losses and sketch rebuild ideas. Display models for a class walk-through.
Prepare & details
What do you think was the hardest thing for people to deal with after the fire?
Facilitation Tip: For Model City: Ruins and Recovery, model how to layer materials to show depth and texture in the rubble, so students understand the physical scale of destruction.
Setup: Charts posted on walls with space for groups to stand
Materials: Large chart paper (one per prompt), Markers (different color per group), Timer
Empathy Discussion: What Was Hardest?
In a whole class circle, show source extracts on homelessness. Each child shares one hardest thing using a talking stick, then votes on top challenges. Record on a class chart.
Prepare & details
What happened to people's homes and belongings after the Great Fire?
Setup: Charts posted on walls with space for groups to stand
Materials: Large chart paper (one per prompt), Markers (different color per group), Timer
Teaching This Topic
Approach this topic through concrete, sensory experiences rather than abstract discussion. Start with the immediate physical environment—ask students to close their eyes and imagine the smell of smoke or the sound of collapsing beams. Research shows that emotional engagement strengthens memory, so use diary excerpts to anchor learning in real voices. Avoid overemphasizing heroic narratives of rebuilding, as this can overshadow the suffering experienced by ordinary people.
What to Expect
Successful learning looks like students using primary sources to explain how different people were affected, articulating specific challenges faced by the homeless, and sequencing the slow process of rebuilding with confidence.
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 Sorting Stations: Before and After, watch for students grouping images only by wealth or location.
What to Teach Instead
Guide them to sort images by type—houses, churches, shops—and then discuss how each type was destroyed regardless of wealth, using mixed examples from the station.
Common MisconceptionDuring Model City: Ruins and Recovery, watch for students rebuilding the city immediately, skipping the temporary camp phase.
What to Teach Instead
Remind them to include a labeled 'temporary camp' area on their model using materials like fabric or paper, connecting it to the timeline of events.
Common MisconceptionDuring Empathy Discussion: What Was Hardest?, watch for students assuming everyone recovered quickly.
What to Teach Instead
Use diary excerpts as conversation starters, asking students to read aloud one line that shows long-term hardship, such as 'We sleep in the fields, hungry and cold'.
Assessment Ideas
After Sorting Stations: Before and After, provide an image of a London street before the fire and one after. Ask students to write one sentence describing the change in buildings and one sentence explaining how people might have felt.
After Role-Play: Homeless in 1666, ask students to hold up a green card if they think a person would have had a home after the fire, and a red card if they think they would have been homeless. Discuss their choices, focusing on the scale of destruction.
During Empathy Discussion: What Was Hardest?, pose the question: 'What do you think was the hardest thing for people to deal with after the Great Fire?' Facilitate a class discussion, encouraging students to share ideas and justify them with reference to the loss of homes, belongings, and familiar places.
Extensions & Scaffolding
- Challenge: Students who finish early compare their model ruins to photographs of modern disaster sites, noting similarities in layout and materials.
- Scaffolding: Provide sentence starters for diary entries, such as 'I miss my home because...' to support reluctant writers.
- Deeper exploration: Invite students to research how fire safety changed in London after 1666, creating a class poster of new rules.
Key Vocabulary
| Homelessness | The state of having no home or place to live, often caused by disaster or displacement. |
| Rubble | Waste or fragments of stone, brick, and other building material, typically from a demolished or collapsed structure. |
| Evacuee | A person who has been evacuated or removed from a place of danger, such as a fire or war zone. |
| Landmark | A recognizable natural or man-made feature used for navigation or that holds historical significance, such as a famous building. |
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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Samuel Pepys: A Witness's Diary
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Fighting the Flames: 17th Century Methods
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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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