Excavation Mode[6]

2025
Worshop

Excavation Mode is an educational workshop that retraces the main steps of the archaeological process, as theorized by Jean-Paul Demoule, from excavation to interpretation. Designed in collaboration with Léa Buttard for the Albalat site, this workshop targets children aged 7 to 12 and was also conceived as a reusable kit for archaeologists during mediation activities, fairs, and exhibitions. Each child receives an archaeologist’s workbook that accompanies them throughout the workshop, completed step by step.

The activity begins with observing a board representing an engraved slab, followed by a pastel rubbing phase that reveals the motifs by impression. Children then collect graffiti modules, match them with information cards, record and classify the data, and finally create an imaginative scene of life at Albalat.

This final stage of extrapolation helps children understand that archaeology is a science of interpretation and projection, not just a collection of objects.