my name's Amanda Clarke and I'm the
director of the new archaeology field
school located in the Vale of Pewsey. This
is a an extension or a continuation of
the archeology field school that we
developed at Silchester, which ran for
18 years and researched a Roman town. Single honours students attend for four weeks;
a compulsory part of their undergraduate
degree, and joint honours come along for
two weeks. During their time on the field
school they are rota'd through a wide
number of tasks the idea is that they
learn not just how to dig but also how
to record what they're digging take a
bit of responsibility for the areas that
they're working within. But they also get
the opportunity to work in the finds hut,
so processing, washing, packaging,
understanding, interpreting finds.
Similarly the flotation tank so they get
the chance to work with samples our
different samples, understand the kind of
evidence that you can get from the
excavation through environmental
sampling. They also work with the
visitors team; this is something that's
proved extremely popular at Silchester
over its 18 years whereby our students
meet and greet visitors to the
excavation, show them what they're doing, talk them about the life of the student
archaeologist. Hi my name is Jenny Austin
and I graduated with my masters at
Reading Uni in December 2012. I've come
back to Silchester on the open day to visit  old
friends, and
I have dug here previously, in 2009 for 3
years.
I'm currently now working down at
Portsmouth the the National Museum of
the Royal Navy on HMS Victory, which
is a fantastic job. I'm Dan Gillett, I
graduated in 2012, after three years; 9 weeks here and
using the skills I learnt and today I'm dressed as a Roman
soldier because whilst I was studying
for a degree I joined the Ermin Street Gurads, so
that I could learn about the Roman
military the Roman military equipment.
I've been doing it ever since.
I'm Maisie and a second student. Hi
I'm Harry, I'm a first year student and
this is my first field school. I'm on
placement here this year so I had to
apply for it through the University and
with the experience that I got from the field
school last year at Silchester I'm able to
teach while still learning and support the
trainees and my supervisor. My name is Catherine Fleckney and
I'm doing a UROP placement this year
which is a visitors placement and it's
looking at the impact of archeology on
students but also visitors so we're just
checking to see how the research affects
them and whether it's changed the
perception of the landscape and of the
archaeology that's taking place.
Hi I'm Henry, I'm an archaeology
student here at Reading and during my
first ever field school I was lucky enough to be offered a placement shooting
footage of the whole project for Digging For Britain, and for the University and at
the same time I was able to dig which is
just like a dream for me I love both
activities and currently I'm now editing
one of the videos I shot and so yeah
the field skills open up a whole
range of opportunities for me to take
part in and I just absolutely loved it. Hi
my name is Danae, I'm trench placement so
I'm in second year I'm about to do into my
third year. It's day one of week three
and we are in trench D on the south side
of the excavation and at the moment I'm
helping a first-year who is learning how
to do a section drawing I've been here
for two weeks and I'll be here for
another four weeks so I went to Silchester last year for four weeks and enjoyed
it very much so enjoy archaeology and
like to go into hopefully commercial and
fieldwork experience but I'm also
enjoying helping out with Digging for
Britain and helping out filming so I'm 
 normally on the other side of the camera.
 
I just found this. I know it's iron. Yeah oh my word!
Hello I'm Su, I've been privileged
enough to be involved with the
excavation of this individual and to say
it's exciting is a total under
statement. Working so close to somebody
that is over like four thousand
years old is a true, true privilege. I
want to pursue my passion; archaeology
and well I've obtained this opportunity
and it's been the greatest experience
that I've ever experienced. The dig is
as much about you all that take part, as
it is about the archaeology and the
contribution the dig makes to understanding our past. I'm
really excited about archaeology now
definitely gonna go full-on in it I
highly suggest it to everyone. They should at least
try it. Get a dig in!
you
