I'm working on a summary lesson to a scheme of work on the Tudors, and I'm hoping that this can feed into my MA coursework too.
I've got a lesson on 'How did ordinary people's lives change under the Tudors' - we will have already covered the effect of the religious changes. I'm really struggling for material on this though. Does anyone have anything that might help? I'm looking for anything that might show changes - fashion, language, lifestyle, anything really!
I'll be really grateful if anyone has anything they'd be able to pass on, and of course I'll share the materials if I (or my MA tutor!) think it went well.
How about poverty and attitudes to the poor? The Tudor period was a time of great inflation and you have many problems of poverty but there's also a change in attitudes towards the poor and new developments in poor relief - you could find that in GCSE Crime & Punishment books / worksheets.
Then there's cultural changes - fantastic opportunity to study the changes in portraiture from Henry VII through to Holbein's H VIII and then the imagery of Elizabeth's later portraits; poetry and drama; the effect of the printing press; the music of Tallis, Byrd and Dowland - and of course H VIII himself.
Changing role in Europe - a relatively minor power in the reign of H VII, the Field of the Cloth of Gold & H VIII's wars, Elizabeth's involvement in the Netherlands & the Armada - was there a greater sense of national identity? did the people at the time feel that England's prestige had risen? Or a focus on changes in Britain - the war in Ireland, wars against Scotland, extension of the English legal systemt to Wales.
Hope some of this is useful