Leighton Hall
School Trips
Why book Leighton Hall for School Trips and Educational Visits?
Home to the Gillow Reynolds, Leighton is very much a "lived in" house, brought to life by the enthusiasm of the guides. Tours are informal and entertaining. There are no roped off areas and children are encouraged to sit on the furniture and really get involved.Perfect for their inquisitive minds, each of the 8 educational packages, opens up the world beyond the classroom window. Packed with cross curricular themes and activities, there's 2 indoor, 4 outdoor and 2 seasonal tailorable visits, with complementary Key Stage 1 and 2 supporting materials, already fully risk assessed for you.
Free and easy parking and only 10 min drive from M6 junction 35.
There are no roped off areas and children are encouraged to ask questions, explore, touch things and dress up. On the indoor packages, there's time to let off steam in the gardens and play area, and enjoy a birds of prey display (weather permitting / summer season only).
Teacher Checklist
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What activities are available during group visits?
Leighton Hall works in partnership with Larksfoot Forest School, to deliver KS1 & KS2 curriculum compatible Outdoor Learning Programmes.
• Survival Skills
• Wildlife Habitats
• Food for Thought
• Seasonal Art
For budding historians, guided tours of the Hall bring history to life, allowing children to explore this fascinating family home and discover what life was like in Victorian times.
• Upstairs (Gentry) / Downstairs (Servants)
• Houses & Homes – Compare Victorian Leighton with your own home
• Seasonal Specials: Victorian Christmas and Spring into Nature
SURVIVAL SKILLS
True breakout learning in a safe, natural environment
Ideal for Key Stages 1 and 2
Unique hands-on learning, with fully supervised sessions in bushcraft and survival skills and a role play rescue. Including shaping wood, making a shelter, lighting a fire and fire safety. Using play, exploration, and supported risk-taking, the activities are proven to develop confidence, social skills, team-work and self-esteem.
FOOD FOR THOUGHT
Sustainable skills to delicious discoveries
Ideal for Key Stages 1 & 2
Exploring the fruit and vegetables in Leighton’s kitchen garden. Learn where real food comes from, how we grow it, and changing tastes through time. Then branch out on a supervised foraging walk, discovering the delights of edibles / how to avoid non-edibles, before returning to Leighton’s outdoor kitchen to turn your bounty into a delicious meal.
WILDLIFE HABITATS
Discovering a world of wonderful wildlife
Ideal for Key Stages 1 & 2
Who do we share our environment with? Use your map to discover wildlife in the Leighton woods and garden, learn to recognise them by their tracks, eating and nesting habits. Work as a team to discover the relationship between the human and animal world and choose a selection of wildlife habitats to make and take home. Then share your findings while enjoying marshmallows over a supervised campfire.
SEASONAL ART
Creating crafts in partnership with the seasons
Ideal for Key Stages 1 & 2
Recognise the turning of the seasons in an immersive nature walk, experiencing the colours, textures and patterns of nature in a whole new light. Collect leaves to print, sticks to whittle, and nuts, berries and fungi to make natural dyes. Enjoy making leaf and charcoal art, conker animals and seasonal crafts then show off your work around the supervised campfire.
HOUSES AND HOMES
Bringing history to life
Ideal for Key Stages 1
A fascinating journey discovering how Victorian life, inventions, occupations and food evolved into 21st century family life. Explore Leighton Hall and compare it with your own home. History is brought to life through role play and the tales told by Leighton’s child friendly guides.
UPSTAIRS DOWNSTAIRS
Discover what life was like for Victorian children
Ideal for Key Stage 2
Explore what life was like for Victorian children living either as part of the Gillow family (upstairs), or the families who worked as staff below stairs. Try on the different clothes they wore, discuss the food they ate, and enjoy the games they played. Handle antique gadgets and create your own family tree.
All visits include free time to enjoy the maze and children’s play area.
Outdoor clothing and suitable footwear are essential.
SPRING INTO NATURE
Be inspired by nature at Springtime
From 1st February
Experience nature and new beginnings away from the classroom by enjoying Leighton’s gardens and woodland walk. Go on an adventure to collect natural art materials, identify trees, learn about our woodland wildlife and bees, then decorate eggs, make rabbit crowns, and enjoy other spring crafts. Lunch can be taken inside, or outdoors in the woodland circle.
VICTORIAN CHRISTMAS
Experience a Victorian Christmas
From November
Experience a true Victorian Christmas and find out how the festive season has changed throughout the years. During your tour of the house, listen to stories by the tree. Compare your Christmas with that of the Victorian squire’s children and the servants who lived in the hall. Make paper chains, decorations and Christmas crafts to take home.
• Survival Skills
• Wildlife Habitats
• Food for Thought
• Seasonal Art
For budding historians, guided tours of the Hall bring history to life, allowing children to explore this fascinating family home and discover what life was like in Victorian times.
• Upstairs (Gentry) / Downstairs (Servants)
• Houses & Homes – Compare Victorian Leighton with your own home
• Seasonal Specials: Victorian Christmas and Spring into Nature
SURVIVAL SKILLS
True breakout learning in a safe, natural environment
Ideal for Key Stages 1 and 2
Unique hands-on learning, with fully supervised sessions in bushcraft and survival skills and a role play rescue. Including shaping wood, making a shelter, lighting a fire and fire safety. Using play, exploration, and supported risk-taking, the activities are proven to develop confidence, social skills, team-work and self-esteem.
FOOD FOR THOUGHT
Sustainable skills to delicious discoveries
Ideal for Key Stages 1 & 2
Exploring the fruit and vegetables in Leighton’s kitchen garden. Learn where real food comes from, how we grow it, and changing tastes through time. Then branch out on a supervised foraging walk, discovering the delights of edibles / how to avoid non-edibles, before returning to Leighton’s outdoor kitchen to turn your bounty into a delicious meal.
WILDLIFE HABITATS
Discovering a world of wonderful wildlife
Ideal for Key Stages 1 & 2
Who do we share our environment with? Use your map to discover wildlife in the Leighton woods and garden, learn to recognise them by their tracks, eating and nesting habits. Work as a team to discover the relationship between the human and animal world and choose a selection of wildlife habitats to make and take home. Then share your findings while enjoying marshmallows over a supervised campfire.
SEASONAL ART
Creating crafts in partnership with the seasons
Ideal for Key Stages 1 & 2
Recognise the turning of the seasons in an immersive nature walk, experiencing the colours, textures and patterns of nature in a whole new light. Collect leaves to print, sticks to whittle, and nuts, berries and fungi to make natural dyes. Enjoy making leaf and charcoal art, conker animals and seasonal crafts then show off your work around the supervised campfire.
HOUSES AND HOMES
Bringing history to life
Ideal for Key Stages 1
A fascinating journey discovering how Victorian life, inventions, occupations and food evolved into 21st century family life. Explore Leighton Hall and compare it with your own home. History is brought to life through role play and the tales told by Leighton’s child friendly guides.
UPSTAIRS DOWNSTAIRS
Discover what life was like for Victorian children
Ideal for Key Stage 2
Explore what life was like for Victorian children living either as part of the Gillow family (upstairs), or the families who worked as staff below stairs. Try on the different clothes they wore, discuss the food they ate, and enjoy the games they played. Handle antique gadgets and create your own family tree.
All visits include free time to enjoy the maze and children’s play area.
Outdoor clothing and suitable footwear are essential.
SPRING INTO NATURE
Be inspired by nature at Springtime
From 1st February
Experience nature and new beginnings away from the classroom by enjoying Leighton’s gardens and woodland walk. Go on an adventure to collect natural art materials, identify trees, learn about our woodland wildlife and bees, then decorate eggs, make rabbit crowns, and enjoy other spring crafts. Lunch can be taken inside, or outdoors in the woodland circle.
VICTORIAN CHRISTMAS
Experience a Victorian Christmas
From November
Experience a true Victorian Christmas and find out how the festive season has changed throughout the years. During your tour of the house, listen to stories by the tree. Compare your Christmas with that of the Victorian squire’s children and the servants who lived in the hall. Make paper chains, decorations and Christmas crafts to take home.
Which Curriculum Subjects do you cater for?
Being a lived in family home and NOT a museum, children are easily able to compare and contrast the development of Houses, Homes and Families from Victorian times to the present day.
Curriculum topics available: Seasonal change.
Seasonal change, sound and light:The woodland walk with its deciduous and evergreen trees, bulbs, ferns, mosses and undergrowth, offers the chance to explore change throughout the seasons. Depending on the weather, time of year and tree canopy, light changes constantly, as does sound with the noise of birdsong, and rustling leaves the most prevalent.
Curriculum topics available: Plants, Living things and habitats, Life Cycles, Minibeasts, Animals including humans, Habitats.
Biology: Animals including humans:An estate like Leighton is a valuable local employer and contributor to the local economy, as well as teaching rural skills through apprenticeships and work experience schemes. Animals, both domestic and wild, play an important role on a farming estate such as this. See cows, sheep, possibly deer and domestic pets.
Living Things & Habitats:
A birds of prey demonstration is included in the price of every indoor school trip, with information given about life cycles and habitats of the various birds shown. (summer season only – weather permitting)
Different habitats can also be explored in the Woodland Walk.
Life Cycles:
Bee corner, the insect hotel and the wild flower border: Comprehensive interpretation boards explain the life cycle of bees and the vital role they play for our environment and economy.
Minibeasts:
Follow the woodland trail and find boards and logs to lift with mini beasts lurking underneath.
Pollinators:
Learn to identify key pollinators and grow your knowledge from hidden clues in the garden and Woodland Walk, before coming together to make bee houses.
Food:
Explore the fruit and vegetables in Leighton’s kitchen garden. Learn where real food comes from, how we grow it, and changing tastes through time. Then enjoy a supervised foraging walk.
Curriculum topics available: Settlement and land use, Natural resources.
Settlement & Land Use: Children can find out the reason for the original settlement at Leighton and how the garden and surrounding land are used to support the hall and estate.Curriculum topics available: Map and atlas, Environment, Fieldwork.
Maps & Atlas:Create a map of the gardens and woodland or learn to make an aboriginal mapstick and discover how ancient cultures used it. (Mapstick materials supplied).
Curriculum topics available: Sustainable living, Conservation.
Garden:As well as an ornamental garden, there is a well maintained vegetable garden that not only supplied the family with fruit and vegetables in Victorian times, but continues to do so today, enabling children to learn about growing fresh food and healthy eating. During the summer season and when weather permits, pupils are treated to a bird of prey flying display.
Curriculum topics available: Fairy tales Myths and Legends, Story telling, Comprehension, Vocabulary grammar and punctuation, Creative writing.
Story writing:A marvellous opportunity for children to write an account of their trip, including the journey to and from Leighton which teachers use as a project for a factual story on return to school.
Fairy Tales:
Trips to Leighton are also used to encourage children to imagine and write a fairy story based on a hero, heroine or even a “baddy”, they came across during the visit. Leighton Hall is a romantic, castellated house and lends itself to fictional stories.
Curriculum topics available: Painting, Craft, Drawing, Design.
Painting, Sculpture & Drawing:Examples of all manner of Art and artefacts are on display throughout the hall and are investigated during the children’s tour.
Craft: From November onwards, as part of their visit, school groups are offered the chance to make the sort of Christmas decorations typical of Victorian times. (Materials included)
Seasonal Art lets your pupils create crafts in partnership with the seasons. Activities include: making leaf and charcoal art, conker animals, collecting leaves to print, sticks to whittle, and nuts, berries and fungi to make natural dyes.
Curriculum topics available: Childhood and Schools.
Victorian:Children are always full of excitement about exploring this lived in house. Leighton Hall was altered architecturally in the 19th century to reflect the Victorian gothic style, and offers a fascinating insight into life at that time. Children can get up close, and interact with Victorian inventions, artefacts, pictures and the family who have lived here since Victorian times.
Wildlife: Children can discover wildlife in the Leighton woods and garden, learn to recognise them by their tracks, eating and nesting habits. They’ll choose a selection of wildlife habitats to make and take home. Then enjoy sharing their findings while enjoying marshmallows over a supervised campfire.
Bushcraft: Unique hands-on learning, with fully supervised sessions in bushcraft and survival skills and a role play “rescue”. Including shaping wood, making a shelter, lighting a fire and fire safety. Activities include: Building a camp fire, wood whittling, making a shelter and foraging.
Field Studies: Leighton Hall are working in partnership with Larksfoot Forest School practitioners to bring outdoor learning to key stage 1 and 2 pupils through 4 brand new outdoor learning packages. Taking place outside in the grounds of Leighton Hall, there's a yurt shelter, weatherproof woodland circle, fire pit, maze, playground and woodland trails for acres of exercise and fun.
Activities include: mapping, field studies, habitats, pond dipping and fieldwork and investigations
Activities include: mapping, field studies, habitats, pond dipping and fieldwork and investigations
Partnering with Larksfoot Outdoor practitioners the children learn about sustainability and the environment. Annually we run a community project where local schools and youth groups come to plant 20,000 bulbs and help in the garden. Activities for pupils include: Sustainability, conservation, environment studies, and habitats
Curriculum topics available: Where food comes from.
In the Food for Thought workshop, children explore the fruit and vegetables in Leighton’s kitchen garden. They'll learn where real food comes from, how we grow it, and changing tastes through time. Later there's a supervised foraging walk, discovering the delights of edibles / how to avoid non-edibles, before returning to Leighton’s outdoor kitchen to turn their bounty into a delicious meal.Leighton Hall is home to the famous Gillow furniture making family, all who lived and worked locally. Famous for its Objets d’art and stunning pieces of Gillow furniture there are no roped off areas. Children can climb the “Flying Staircase”, sit at the priceless telescopic Gillow dining table, and discover what “Tickling the Moose!” means.
What size groups do you cater for?
Educational visits are for groups of 20 to a maximum of 60
MATERIALS AND RESOURCES AVAILABLE:
Free: Teachers’ notes available for pre-visit planning
Free: Teacher's pack including kit list and itinerary
Free: Curriculum-linked worksheets for ongoing projects
Free: Worksheets to continue your learning back in the classroom
Free: Full risk assessments are completed ready for you
FACILITIES:
• Child friendly guides
• Approved by Lancashire County Council
• Comprehensive Teachers Pack with activity sheets
• Shop
• Purpose built classroom
• Woodland Log Circle and fire pit outdoor learning area
• Tearoom
• Indoor and outdoor picnic area
• Indoor and outdoor activities
• Toilets
• Gift shop
• Free birds of prey display (Open days only. Weather permitting. May – September)
• Ice cream, cakes and treats
• Places to leaves coats and dirty wellies
• Outdoor play area
• Caterpillar Maze
• Tree Face Trail
• Woodland walk
• Free and easy parking
• Risk assessments available
• Itinerary already done for you
PRICING INFORMATION
Outdoor Learning £12.50 inc Vat per pupil
Indoor Learning £10.50 inc Vat per pupil
Free teachers places (1 free adult per 10 children)
Familiarisation visits are free of charge.
Free parking.
DO NOT FOLLOW YOUR SAT NAV. Follow the brown tourism signs from Junction 35 of the M6
MATERIALS AND RESOURCES AVAILABLE:
Free: Teachers’ notes available for pre-visit planning
Free: Teacher's pack including kit list and itinerary
Free: Curriculum-linked worksheets for ongoing projects
Free: Worksheets to continue your learning back in the classroom
Free: Full risk assessments are completed ready for you
FACILITIES:
• Child friendly guides
• Approved by Lancashire County Council
• Comprehensive Teachers Pack with activity sheets
• Shop
• Purpose built classroom
• Woodland Log Circle and fire pit outdoor learning area
• Tearoom
• Indoor and outdoor picnic area
• Indoor and outdoor activities
• Toilets
• Gift shop
• Free birds of prey display (Open days only. Weather permitting. May – September)
• Ice cream, cakes and treats
• Places to leaves coats and dirty wellies
• Outdoor play area
• Caterpillar Maze
• Tree Face Trail
• Woodland walk
• Free and easy parking
• Risk assessments available
• Itinerary already done for you
PRICING INFORMATION
Outdoor Learning £12.50 inc Vat per pupil
Indoor Learning £10.50 inc Vat per pupil
Free teachers places (1 free adult per 10 children)
Familiarisation visits are free of charge.
Free parking.
DO NOT FOLLOW YOUR SAT NAV. Follow the brown tourism signs from Junction 35 of the M6
Do you offer on-site classroom facilities?
Yes.
The Studio
The Studio is a new, purpose built, warm and comfortable building situated near the tearoom garden, at the side of the main house. There’s a kitchen area, cloakroom and an indoor space which seats 30 in theatre style seating or up to 16 at desks.
Use of The Studio includes:
• Wifi
• Fibre optic B4RN broadband
• Overhead projector and screen
• Printer
• Tea and coffee making facilities
• Use of cooker, microwave and fridge
• Lockable cupboards
• Cool drinking water
The Studio
The Studio is a new, purpose built, warm and comfortable building situated near the tearoom garden, at the side of the main house. There’s a kitchen area, cloakroom and an indoor space which seats 30 in theatre style seating or up to 16 at desks.
Use of The Studio includes:
• Wifi
• Fibre optic B4RN broadband
• Overhead projector and screen
• Printer
• Tea and coffee making facilities
• Use of cooker, microwave and fridge
• Lockable cupboards
• Cool drinking water
Is there first aid on site?
Yes, we have a first aider and our staff are first aid trained, but we welcome teachers with first aid experience and always recommend that school bring someone with them that knows about pupil’s allergies and regular medicines.
Do you offer access for visitors with disabilities?
The Halls first floor is inaccessible for wheel chairs users. There are disabled toilet facilities, very few steps and ramps where needed.
Do you cater for visitors with Special Educational Needs (SEN)?
yes We certainly can. Please use the form below to let us know your group's specific SEN requirements and we will get back to you with more information on how we can tailor our learning experience for your children.
Anything else?
DO NOT FOLLOW YOUR SAT NAV. Follow the brown tourism signs from Junction 35 of the M6
MATERIALS AND RESOURCES AVAILABLE:
Free: Teachers’ notes available for pre-visit planning
Free: curriculum-linked worksheets for ongoing projects
Free: worksheets to continue your learning back in the classroom
Free: Full risk assessments are completed ready for you
FACILITIES:
• Child friendly guides
• Approved by Lancashire County Council
• Comprehensive Teachers Pack with activity sheets
• Shop
• Purpose built classroom
• Woodland Log Circle and fire pit outdoor learning area
• Tearoom
• Indoor and outdoor picnic area
• Indoor and outdoor activities
• Toilets
• Gift shop
• Free birds of prey display (Open days only. Weather permitting. May – September)
• Ice cream, cakes and treats
• Places to leaves coats and dirty wellies
• Outdoor play area
• Caterpillar Maze
• Tree Face Trail
• Woodland walk
• Free and easy parking
• Risk assessments available
• Itinerary already done for you
PRICING INFORMATION
Outdoor Learning £12.50 inc Vat per pupil
Indoor Learning £10.50 inc Vat per pupil
Free teachers places (1 free adult per 10 children)
Familiarisation visits are free of charge.
Free parking.
MATERIALS AND RESOURCES AVAILABLE:
Free: Teachers’ notes available for pre-visit planning
Free: curriculum-linked worksheets for ongoing projects
Free: worksheets to continue your learning back in the classroom
Free: Full risk assessments are completed ready for you
FACILITIES:
• Child friendly guides
• Approved by Lancashire County Council
• Comprehensive Teachers Pack with activity sheets
• Shop
• Purpose built classroom
• Woodland Log Circle and fire pit outdoor learning area
• Tearoom
• Indoor and outdoor picnic area
• Indoor and outdoor activities
• Toilets
• Gift shop
• Free birds of prey display (Open days only. Weather permitting. May – September)
• Ice cream, cakes and treats
• Places to leaves coats and dirty wellies
• Outdoor play area
• Caterpillar Maze
• Tree Face Trail
• Woodland walk
• Free and easy parking
• Risk assessments available
• Itinerary already done for you
PRICING INFORMATION
Outdoor Learning £12.50 inc Vat per pupil
Indoor Learning £10.50 inc Vat per pupil
Free teachers places (1 free adult per 10 children)
Familiarisation visits are free of charge.
Free parking.
Who are Leighton Hall?
Award winning Leighton Hall is the lived-in house of the famous furniture making Gillow dynasty. Children are invited to unravel the fascinating past of this ancient, Lancashire family and see how we used to live. As well as the house and grounds, Leighton has a new educational hub, comprising a purpose-built classroom, a pollinator friendly walled garden and shelter, The Hazel Tree Retreat, with yurt and log burner, and a weather proof woodland log circle with its own fire pit.
For golden time, children enjoy inspecting Bee Corner and the Insect Hotel as well as chasing around the caterpillar maze, play area, tree face trial and Woodland Walk.
Open all year round to pre booked school groups.
Teacher Checklist
Risk Assessments Inspection Visits Free Places for Teachers Resource Packs LOtC Quality Badge
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