Create a spider museum

Arachnophobes take a deep breath as Susan Humphries and Susan Rowe describe the children’s delight in setting up a spider museum...

As winter approaches and heavy dew or frost prevails, the beauty of spiders’ webs becomes apparent and we venture into the school grounds to hunt for prize specimens with the children. Looking at the bejewelled strands, we talk about their strength and the intricacy of the web’s construction, a conversation that leads to the focus of our topic: setting up a museum specialising in arachnids.

A commitment to museum education is fundamental to our educational philosophy and we regularly set up subject-specific exhibitions in our school hall. These offer a hands-on, sensory experience as well as the chance for children to take on the role of curator. Touching an object, even if its purpose is unknown, is important as it provides children with the opportunity to develop good reasoning and inference skills. Museums containing artefacts gathered by the school community also encourage family involvement and hold a lot of meaning for the children.

To fill the museum, we ask the children to go on spider hunts in and around their homes and to bring in their finds. The spiders are kept in transparent containers marked with labels that record the time, place and method of capture. Those few children not able to bring in a spider from home are helped to find one at school.

As a centre-piece, we constructed a floor-to-ceiling spiderweb in the school hall using white yarn and children step through the centre of this at the museum’s opening ceremony. We ask the children to be curators of their own spider exhibits and to give anecdotal information about their finds to visitors.

It takes a few days to set the museum up, but it is an intriguing exhibit that children and their families visit both before and after school – many of whom see spiders in a different light as a result.

Each class of children has at least two trips to the museum. We also invite a specialist in arachnids to bring in some of his collection (including a tarantula which sits peacefully on the children’s hands or shoulders). His enthusiasm for these creatures is infectious.

Another section of the museum is given over to spiders’ webs. It is quite easy for children to collect webs from the outdoor environment. To do this, the webs must first be lightly sprayed with brightly-coloured car spray paint. Then a piece of card of a contrasting colour is brought up gently behind the web to collect it – the wet paint helps the web to adhere to the card. Alternatively, the children can paint pieces of black card with clear PVA glue and bring the glued card carefully up to the back of the web. The web will adhere to the glue and then the card can be gently removed.

We explain in advance to the children that, although the collection of a web means that a spider has been deprived of its means of capturing prey, it can reconstruct a web within an hour or so. At this point we tell the story of Robert The Bruce who was inspired to continue his opposition to English forces when hiding from the enemy in a cave. He watched a spider persevere in constructing a web – “If at first you don’t succeed, try, try and try again!”

The spider theme runs through our curriculum work for a week or so. In mathematics we focus on the number eight and octagons; in language work we research words with the prefix “oct” (octopus, octet, octave); we dance to music with eight beats in the bar and we enjoy the wealth of literature that refers to spiders. E.B White’s story of Charlotte’s Web is always popular, as are the many myths and legends surrounding spiders. The most notable legend about the origin of spiders comes from the Greek myth of the weaving competition between the goddess Athena and the princess Arachne. In African (and West Indian) mythology, the spider is known as Anansi the trickster. There are also several nursery rhymes – Incy Wincy Spider, Little Miss Muffet, The Spider and the Fly – for the younger children to enjoy. The Marvel comic character of Spiderman is also a very popular figure.

When we close the museum, the children take their spider specimens home and release the creatures back into the environment from which they came.