Teaching about Elizabeth

So far through my blog postings I have only briefly explored ways of teaching elements of Elizabeth, so in this entry I am going to try to expand on that. First lets look at some of the early ideas I have had and expand on them.

One of the first ideas I put forward was teaching about the Spanish Armada using paper boats and classroom floor space to demonstrate the differing formations and tactic of the Spanish and English fleets. I still think this could work as a highly visual and participative lesson. I would look to expand on it using maps to get students to chart the progress of the two fleets and explore the ultimate dispersal of the Spanish fleet. Additionally, when looking at reasons for the defeat of the Armada I would work with the class to explore the whole variety of reasons and then get the class, working in small groups, to prioritise these reasons. Depending on the age group, critical enquiry can be made into the impact of the English fleet on the defeat of the Armada.

The religious issue which faced Elizabeth at the start of her reign is a complex one, it has many strands, goes back to the early Tudors and beyond and is linked to other factors such as foreign affairs. In covering this, I think the first priority is to set out the key factors in simple and easy to follow terms. By this I mean lets look at what happened, so the acts of Supremacy and Uniformity, the struggle to get these through parliament and what the acts meant for religion in England. Then I would start to look at why this was such a contentious issue. At this point exploring the main themes, including looking back at what occurred prior to 1559, would be crucial. I would do this by exploring a different theme, either each lesson or each section of a lesson. I would then back this up through a summary activity using lists of causes and factors and a spider diagram to draw the links between them. I see this as something that can be prepared as a partially completed handout for the students to complete in groups or individually or as a Wipe Board exercise where the diagram is on the board and the whole class contributes to completing it. One thing I think it is very important to do here is to explore the cause and effect of decision making. I have commented on this before, circumstances are made up of numerous complex and interlinked factors involving not just religion but foreign affairs and legacies from the past. Therefore making decisions cannot be done in isolation, all these factors must be understood and taking into account. This makes the process of decision making more complex and fraught with danger. This is an important aspect to reflect in the teaching of much of Elizabeth's reign but especially the religious and foreign affairs themes. I think this can be explored through activities that allow students to look at a series of choices that Elizabeth could make, for instance the religious settlement of 1559, and then to allow students to examine the possible consequences of each choice. This can be done in small groups and then reflected back to the entire class. I am also looking at devising a card sort game that could demonstrate this (more of that later).

One of the factors in play with the religious issues at the start of Elizabeth's reign is the question of her own religious views. There is not much evidence to support this, but there are some sources, such as the New Years Gift incident of 1561. This source and the other pieces of evidence can be used in class to enable students to work at piecing together what they think Elizabeth's religious views were. This would be a good exercise in the use of evidence.

When covering the issue of Foreign affairs in Elizabeth's reign, it will be important to link back to the religious issues as these had a very strong bearing on foreign affairs. It will also be important to link back to events and trends stretching back some 200 to 500 years to help students understand the issues, fears and perceptions during Elizabeth's time. One exercise I would consider is to get a timeline to explore how Elizabeth's foreign policy changed over time and get the students to populate it. I would then get the students to provide the evidence for the changes by citing the events that demonstrate them. This would be a good way to establish the key facts. A further development of the decision making game idea could be used to explore why England and Elizabeth made the foreign policy choices they did. This could be cross referenced by looking at why both Spain and France made their choices. Again a series of spider diagrams to show how the foreign policies of all three countries were linked in a complex balance would be a very useful and visual way of showing this. I would also use maps of Western Europe to show the positions and strengths of the main protagonists. This would highlight the dangers to England of a hostile power controlling the Channel ports and also show the foundation of French fears of Habsburg encirclement.

One key aspect of foreign affairs I would wish to draw out is the issue of Elizabeth's marriage and who she used suitors to further foreign policy or to stave off problems. For example, getting the class to compare the suitors of Phillip II and Duke of Anjou/Alencon and asking them to compare the results of these in terms of what it meant to England in foreign affairs. A good exercise here would be to get the students to imagine what it must have been like to put aside your own feelings for someone in order to achieve a higher purpose.

The third main theme I have looked at covers Power, Control and Rebellion. Once again, covering this in a lesson would require backtracking over the previous 200 years to look at the power and control of the nobility and the monarch to see how this developed through to Elizabeth's reign. I would start by looking at the two main rebellions of Elizabeth's reign, the 1569 Revolt of the Northern Earls and the Revolt of Essex in 1601. I would also include the shenanigans of Norfolk and his consequent execution in 1572. So the lesson scheme would start with an exploration of the facts of these rebellions. This would then expand to a look at the causes of the rebellions and comparing them. Finally I would look at why they failed. For both the look at the causes and the reasons for failure I would look at comparable rebellions in the previous 200 years, as I discussed during my blog entries on the theme.

Overall, I would present a broad coverage of the facts and time lines of Elizabeth's reign. I think a useful exercise would be to get students to try to group the facts and events of her reign into different categories, Religion, Foreign Affairs, Government and Society. This would show how difficult it is to separate many of the events and facts out and categories them so absolutely. It would show how complex and interlinked all these events and facts were.