Foxton Locks offers an excellent learning environment that extends beyond the classroom and helps schools deliver learning opportunities to inspire in a creative and authentic way.
Learning
The DT curriculum requires students use a range of stimuli as a starting point for creating a solution to a problem. Whether its looking at the work of others, design styles or engineering possibilities, the museum can offer a variety of projects and objects to help with creating unique and relevant briefs.
The engineer Gordon Thomas created a solution to the problem of time and waste here at Foxton by the invention of his boat lift. The 10 locks take 45 minutes navigate and the water is never pumped back up the hill. His boat lift could move 4 boats in eighteen minutes and reused the water in the tanks making it a quicker, better solution. This mechanical device used gears, pulleys and steam to move the 250 ton tanks.
.jpeg)
At Foxton we can explore the following themes under the Design and Technology curriculum:
Students can develop Design and Technology skills by conducting a variety of processes in the museum alongside the local history and engineering marvels at Foxton.
Investigating products past and present:
Students have over 200 years of design to investigate here at the museum and can compare the changes in shapes, styles and how advancements in technology have changed the way we live and work. From the world of coal to diesel, towards modern eco technologies such as wind and solar.
To find out more about Design and Technology on the waterways and explore what workshops we can provide please contact Foxton Canal Museum: learning@foxtoncanalmuseum.org
