Resources

Here you can find a selection of resources created during the course of our projects that can be used with your own community groups either as a resource or as inspiration for your own projects. These resources are intended to be used as provided or as inspiration for projects of your own.

Online resources
Case studies
Exhibitions
Useful blogs
Audio resources

Online resources

Colouring for Relaxation

Inspired by Arts in Care Homes’ National Day celebrating creativity and culture, we’ve prepared some colouring-in activities for you based upon photographs in our collections. This activity is for all to enjoy.

The photographs range from Lyme Regis and Ireland to Ghana and Delhi and we’ve included a few things to consider while you work on them.

Five Photos

Five Photos is an online resource designed to encourage people to engage creatively with our collections. It aims to provide a mindful, social or reminiscence-based activity for those shielding or in care home settings.

The five images you see here feature scenes from Britain, Africa and the Caribbean, taken between 1926 and 1965.

A group of young people sit around a table with pens and archival photographs in front of them.

Young people taking part in an education workshop looking at copies of records from The National Archives.

Remembering the past, growing the future

This project explored the history of Pakistani migration to Wakefield, West Yorkshire. Explore the original project. 

Monochrome photograph of eight Sikh men standing in a row and looking at the camera.

Photograph of Sikhs as ‘raw recruits’ for the army. Catalogue reference: CN 4/8

Loyalty and Dissent

As part of the First World War commemoration programme, this project worked with historians and playwrights to devise a series of short plays and accompanying education resources exploring the topic of South Asia and the First World War. Explore the original project. 

Caribbean through a lens

Detail of a monochrome photograph of children standing outside of a bus with the words 'Kingston & St. Andrew Parish Library Jamaica Library Service' on its side. The children are talking to adults standing inside the bus and two of the children hold books.

Jamaican Library Service. Catalogue ref: INF 10/147/6A

We worked with community groups to share and explore our collection of Caribbean images resulting in 35 different community projects regionally, from poetry to exhibitions, reminiscence to film. Explore the original project. 

Case studies

There Be Monsters mental health project

A sculpture consisting of a ceramic globe with a mosaic representing countries, continents, and the equator. Relief sculptures of creatures including an elephant and a mermaid are placed on the globe.

The globe sculpture that came out of the There Be Monsters project. It stands in the grounds of The National Archives.

This project used devices and imaginary creatures inscribed on some of our oldest maps. They inspired adults with experience of mental ill health to create a sculpture which now sits in our grounds. 

The case study describes our experience of working on the project, as well as the experiences of the participants involved. 

Read the case study 

Exhibitions

Memories from the Islands

Detail of a monochrome photograph of a group of Jamaican women sitting on chairs inside a room next to piles of raffia. They are all making handicrafts using the raffia.

Women making handicraft items with raffia in Jamaica, 1965. Catalogue ref: INF 10/144 (2)

This exhibition was co-curated by participants from Haringey U3A in partnership with Bruce Castle Museum, Tottenham. It features 28 images from our collection of Caribbean images from the Ministry of Information and the participants’ amusing and informative childhood reminiscences. It is available to loan. Please contact us for more information. 

Useful blogs

 

Three young people with afros smiling and looking to the side of the camera.

Fijian pupils of Adi Cakobau Girls’ School. From the blog post Files on follicles: five of the best. Catalogue reference: CO 1069/652/39

Diverse Histories

Collage of a park including leaves, drawings, and images of trees and flowers.

Group collage made by SHARE students whilst at The National Archives. From the blog post ‘This is our park’: A community well-being project.

Mental Health and Wellbeing

Monochrome photograph of the interior of a room with wooden foots, multiple chairs and tables, and decorated with draped fabric.

Interior of The Caravan Club, Endell Street, London 1934. From the blog post ‘London’s greatest bohemian rendezvous’: the Caravan Club. Catalogue reference: DPP 2/224

Queer Histories

Audio resources

Diverse Histories

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