A story creation game based on Moreton Corbet Castle in North Shropshire and funded by the MLA Learning Links programme.
This story creation game was made in 2010 by Mythstories’ staff working alongside a class of year 6 pupils from Holmer Lake Primary School in Telford. The project was funded by Museums, Libraries and Archives under their Learning Links strand and created two models, one for the museum and one for the school.
Follow the instructions on the comic strips below to see how the model was used to create a two-stage story; a murder tale from Tudor times and a ghostly encounter set in the modern day.
All the year 6 pupils were involved throughout the project; designing, testing and tweaking the story creation game as it evolved. One even worked out how many different stories could be created by the exhibit [alas, we cannot remember the answer to his computations, but it was in the millions.]
Pupils first visited Mythstories to explore its collection of storytelling artefacts. This was followed by a trip to the nearby ruined Tudor Mansion at Moreton Corbet to collect base data, think about vocabulary and to hear some castle stories and generally soak up the atmosphere.
The work then began in earnest with the pupils working with Mythstories curators to design the simplified model castle, and researching a likely room layout for the mansion. Later museum staff did the actual carpentry, painting, drawing and knitting and returned to the school to present the artefact to the pupil designers.
Pupils chose potential murder weapons from the Tudor period; chose the characters for the mansion’s Tudor inhabitants and decided who would be the modern day visitors to the castle.
Once all the playing pieces were completed, the pupils worked in groups to create their own stories. Finally the finished storytelling game was launched on unsuspecting parents at an after school event at the school. Children told the stories they had created and then their parents used the model to make their own original Tudor murder story.
The comic strip instructions were created by fifteen year old work experience student, Dylan Quinn, in 2011 during his tenure at Mythstories museum in Wem.
The museum model was a favourite within the Shropshire Gallery at Mythstories museum in The Morgan Library, Wem and also did sterling service in Museum Outreach visits to many schools in the Welsh Borders and the West Midlands. So much so that Mythstories Curator Ali got busy on her sewing machine and made a carry case for the game out of recycled material which intrigued many fellow passengers on trains and buses as we made our way to the schools.
The game is now part of the mini storytelling museum in Mount Pleasant Primary School in Shrewsbury.
You can find instructions on how to make this and other Story Creation Games elsewhere on this website at https://mythstories.com/educational_resources/make-and-use-story-creation-games/