Children at Victorian Times Ignasi Peralta Dorine Ngo Adrià Vicien Sílvia Carrión

Children at work

Rich and poor families In the Victorian times many families had 10 or more children. Rich children wear great clothes and shoes in their feet. They went to school or had lessons at home. Poor children looked thin and hungry and they had to work.

Why did children had to work? Many Victorian children were poor and worked to help their families. A lot of families haven’t got money unless they worked, so children had to work too.

When did children start to work? A lots of children started to work when they were 5. Lots of children worked on factories and others at home, sticking labels at bottles or washing things.

What jobs did children do? Children worked on farms, in homes as servants, and in factories. Children often did jobs that required short people and little fingers. they also pushed heavy coal trucks along tunnels in coal mines.

Children at factories Britain was the first country in the world to have lots of factories. Factory machines made all kinds of things.

The horrible coal mines

Coal at the mines The energy at the Victorian Times was from burned coal, horses and water-power. The coal was catched from the rocks and the ground.

What were coal mines like? They like dirty and the people don’t like to work there.  In the tunnels, they hacked at the coal with picks and shovels.

What jobs did children do in mines? Some children pushed trucks of coal along mine tunnels. Some children started work at 2 in the morning and stayed below ground for 18 hours

Children at school

Who went to school ? At the beginning of the 19th century only rich children went to school. Poor children worked to help their families.

Dame schools The woman who run the “Dame school” kept the children so their parents could work. The “dame” was only a child-minder, not a trained teacher, so the children didn’t learn much.

Ragged schools and Sunday schools Sunday schools were run by churches, to teach children about the Christian faith. Ragged Schools were schools for poor children, these schools were often in one room of a house or in an old barn.

School for all Reformers campaigned for new laws to improve working conditions for children and give children the opportunity for schooling.  By 1880, the law said that all children aged 5 to 10 must go to primary school, so every child would receive at least a basic education.