Bell Homestead National Historic Site takes its educational programs overseas

BRANTFORD, ON – The Bell Homestead National Historic Site is pleased to announce its curriculum-based educational programs have successfully gone virtual. With a great deal of planning, creativity, and the technology that Alexander Graham Bell initiated in Brantford 147 years ago, Bell Homestead staff have adapted to continue to offer exceptional learning opportunities to students.

“To say the least, this past year has been a time like no other for the Bell Homestead,” says Brian Wood, Curator of the Bell Homestead National Historic Site. “The museum has adapted successfully and my team and I are delighted to be able to continue connecting with students and teachers locally and now internationally. Alexander Graham Bell would be so gratified to know that his early work has helped us to achieve this.”

Since March 2020, the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic resulted in cancellations of all in-person school field trips but staff at Bell Homestead found a way to adapt. Beginning in early 2021, over 2,000 students from Brantford, County of Brant, Six Nations of the Grand River and Hamilton have virtually learned about Alexander Graham Bell, his family, work, discoveries and inventions through stories, demonstrations and hands-on activities.

In early May, Mrs. Lizzy Nesbitt, the principal of Emmanuel Christian School in Oxford, U.K., approached the Bell Homestead about providing a virtual workshop for her students who are currently learning about Alexander Graham Bell. On Friday, May 28 at 8:30 a.m., the Bell Homestead will be conducting its first international virtual educational workshop to the school’s students, ages 6 to 11. The museum’s education coordinator and curator will take them on a tour through Dr. Bell’s life, highlighting his family’s emigration to Brantford, his work as a teacher of the deaf, the invention of the telephone and his later work in flight at his home on Cape Breton Island. Through artifacts and photographs, the workshop will highlight how the Bell family lived in Canada and how Brantford became known as “The Telephone City”.

For more information about the Bell Homestead’s virtual programs and how to book, visit Brantford.ca/BellHomestead or call 519-756-6220.

- 30 -

Media Contact:
Sharon Sayles | Communications Specialist, Communications and Community Engagement
City of Brantford | 519-757-2840 | ssayles@brantford.ca