What might you hope to find?
Census forms are a great source of information, but you must remember that the
information contained is only as reliable as the informants or the enumerator. You must be
certain that your class understands the nature of a census. It is only a snapshot of one
particular night taken every ten years. An understanding of the way in which the data was
gathered helps children to interpret some of the inconsistencies. For example: Why are
there different spellings of some names? (There is a family recorded as Perry in one year
and as Parry in another year.) Why are there inconsistencies of age? Why has one
man's age increased by about 15 years in successive census forms? (His wife's
too.) Is Robert Davey really still working as a gardener at the age of 87? Incidentally
there are variants of his name too. Why was J Clement's mother-in-law also called
Clement?
You may be able to make suppositions. For example, children recorded on one form but
not on the next may have died, but equally they may be staying with relatives for one
reason or another. You must also bear in mind that values have changed, and what is quite
acceptable now may have been very shameful one hundred years ago, and for this reason
informants may have lied to the enumerator.
Some activities using census data
Although these activities were designed to be used with the Greenfield Road census data
many of them can be used with any census file. You may find that not all of these searches
will be valid, depending upon the piece of software available to you. There are about 850
records on the Greenfield Road data file, and so you may wish to subdivide it into several
smaller files, to concentrate only on specific dates, for example. It will certainly be
beneficial to have a print out of the data; many interesting facts, or relationships come
to light only when seen in conjunction with others which may not be highlighted by
computer searches. After all a computer does not say "I wonder why...?" or
"I wonder if...?" The computer provides you with statistical data, but history
is more than that. Look at copies of the original forms if you can. Try to imagine the
reality of the scene.
It is also worth considering what questions cannot be answered with ease. (What is the
commonest name? Who was born abroad? to name but two.) Is there a way that the database
could have been structured to allow for questions such as these? This does highlight the
need to know the information you are looking for before you set up the database.
The following activities fall broadly into two categories, those which are principally
IT based and those which, in addition, support history teaching.
Simple sort activities
Who is the oldest person? Which household has the most people in it?
Who is the youngest person? Whose name would come last?
Simple search activities
Is your first name on the census returns? What about your surname?
How many people were called Bramich? Who lived alone?
Where was the school? How many people worked with metal?
Who was the farmer? Who was the screw nicker?
Who worked with stone? Who lit lamps?
Which houses were empty? How many professionals were there?
How many clerical workers were there? How old were the governesses?
How many people were lodging in G. Road? How many people were visiting G. Road?
Who had grandchildren sharing their house? How many servants were nurses?
More complex tasks involving searching and/or sorting two or more fields
How many adult (over 21) males were there ? How many adult women were there ?
How many females lived in G. Road in 1871? Which was the largest household in 1871?
How many children lived in G. Road in 1851? How many boys were there in 1881?
How many girls were there in 1861? How many babies (<1) were there in 1871?
How many agricultural workers in 1861? How many clerical/office workers in 1881?
How many servants in each census? How many agricultural workers in each census?
How many agricultural workers were women? What were occupations of skilled female
workers?
Which man in trade was 36 years old? Where was the oldest employee born?
Who was the youngest person born in Scotland? What were occupations of female manual
workers?
How many professionals were born in Staffs? How many males were born in London?
Occupation of the youngest working female? Occupation of the youngest working male?
Occupation of the oldest working female? Were there any male teachers?
Were there any female professionals? Who had a parent living with them?
How many people who were not working and were not scholars had an
"occupation"?
Which agricultural worker was born in Northfield in about 1867 ?
What was the occupation of the man called William born in Worcester?
How many of the people on the 1841 census were born in the 18th Century?
Which servant lived in Greenfield Road for more than ten years?
The following searches may throw up points worthy of discussion which cast more
light on life in Victorian times.
How many women were heads of households? How many of these women were married?
Who was the youngest servant born in Harborne? How many adult males were not working?
Using data to support hypotheses
The information contained in data files can help formulate, support or refute
hypotheses. A word of warning, however, do not try to read too much into the data
available here. There are not enough records to be statistically significant, although the
evidence may suggest trends, or support information from other sources.
Which of the following statements may be true
(based on the evidence in the files)?
Women live longer than men.
Married men live longer than single men.
There were no one parent families in Victorian times.
There was no official retirement age in Victorian times.
Families were larger in Victorian times.
Children left school at a younger age in Victorian times.
Population grew rapidly in the second half of the century.
There was street lighting in the last century.
The West Midlands became increasingly industrialised during the last century.
Jewellery work and gun making were important industries in Birmingham.
More families had servants in Victorian Harborne than now.
Richer families lived in higher numbered properties in Greenfield Road in 1881.
More people moved to Harborne from other parts of the country towards the end of the
century.
(Use a map of Britain to plot the birthplaces of the inhabitants of Greenfield Road).
Benjamin Rose was married twice and died in the 1860s.
Alfred Johnstone was married twice.
The Dawkins, Coleman and Reece families moved frequently.
These statements should provide plenty of scope for discussion!
Detective Work
Turn your children into detectives by setting up a spurious company in this case
Greenfield Genealogists a company which aims to supply information about inhabitants of
Greenfield Road in answer to requests.
Another idea would be to produce record cards with some parts obliterated. Ask your
children to create new record cards filling in the missing gaps from the information on
the database.
Reference
Smart Lez : Databases, History and Young Historians in J Lodge ed., Computer
Data Handling in the Primary School David Fulton Publishers Ltd. 1992
Resources
View the Greenfield
Road Census File
Download the Greenfield Road Census File as a CSV file (85K) or as a Zipped CSV file (13K)
Go to the Greenfield Road activity in KidsMAPE.
