Lessons

Handicraft lessons were very important in school, providing pupils with many useful skills for everyday life while also teaching them to be orderly and diligent. The girls learned to sew and mend clothes, to weave, knit and crochet, while the boys learned to weave willow baskets and other useful things. The Sew on a Button! handicraft lesson also provides some useful knowledge on the basics of sewing.

Learning Objectives:

– Students learn to be neat, tidy, and precise,
– Students are introduced to sewing accessories,
– They sew on a button and take the product home.

The programme is tailored for young children to learn about the school of the past through play and conversation. While performing in a lesson from a century ago and exploring an old school bag, they get an insight into the everyday life of a pupil in a primary school in the countryside during the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy. They learn about the clothes children used to wear to school, the teaching aids hidden in the pupils’ wooden bag, how they learnt to “tell”, and how teachers punished tardiness, chatter, and other offences against the “school law”.

Learning Objectives:

– Pupils are introduced to the appearance of a classroom from the Austro-Hungarian period.
– They perform a short lesson scene,
– They learn about the content of a school bag with old school supplies.

From the early 19th century onwards, introductory and revision Sunday School courses were organised on Sundays and holidays, as many village children were unable to attend classes during the week due to their preoccupation with other work and their distance from school. In Sunday School, they learned to write, read, and do arithmetic and were also taught about manners, order, and discipline. Blaže and Nežica in Sunday School by Anton Martin Slomšek was an important textbook from the period.

Learning Objectives:

– Students count to ten and solve simple word problems,
– They learn the song Ljuba vigred by A. M. Slomšek.