The Learning Story - Mascots, Movies and Marvellous Learning!

It’s been a busy few months for the Learning Programme. We’ve been working on some fun additions to our online student sessions, making them even more engaging and useful.

We’ve created a short video for primary school children, to explain what an archive is and how it can be used. The video was produced with the help of an award‑winning production company, Squeaky Pedal, who were fantastic at bringing our vision to life and showcasing our service in a way that engages a younger audience. Cheshire Archives was transformed as strong rooms became film sets - we spent a full day filming, with archives colleagues getting involved and delivering some Oscar‑worthy performances!

We launched the video in October and it has already proved popular with students, helping them gain a greater understanding of the work we do. It was launched alongside our online learning sessions – these are free one hour sessions which give students the opportunity to explore a local history topic from the comfort of their classroom. We’ve worked with a range of key stage two classes, and we piloted our first key stage one session in November. During these sessions, students investigated census records to uncover the story of a local First World War hero and even practised writing like Victorian children. Thankfully, their penmanship was excellent — one student confidently announced that their handwriting was better than that of a Victorian child!

These online sessions have been a valuable new addition to the Learning Programme, and we’ve loved engaging with new schools across the county. With this new audience, we identified the need for a learning mascot, which led to the creation of our very own Cheshire‑cat‑inspired character, designed by local artist Carol Hanson. Carol created a fun, friendly cat who is always ready to learn and explore our collections. However, our mascot needed a name! We invited schools to vote for their favourite, and Marmalade was the clear winner.

We’d like to thank everyone who has supported the programme so far. We’re proud to work with such fantastic students and schools, and look forward to continuing this work in 2026. If you’d like to book a free online learning session for your school, please do get in touch!