Ragged School Museum

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Both adults and children are inevitably charmed by this combination of mock Victorian schoolroom (with hard wooden benches and desks, slates, chalk, inkwells and abacuses), re-created East End kitchen and social-history museum. The school closed in 1908, but you can experience what it would have been like during its Sunday openings, when you can take part in a lesson. As a pupil you'll be taught reading, writing and 'rithmetic by a strict school ma’am in full Victorian regalia.

The museum celebrates the legacy of Dr Thomas Barnardo, who founded this school for destitute East End children in 1877. ‘Ragged’ refers to the pupils’ usually torn, dirty and dishevelled clothes. Sunday lessons take place at 2.15pm and 3.30pm (donations requested).

Transportation

  • underground: Mile End

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