History

We follow a two year rolling programme in history. Please follow the links below to see an overview of our history curriculum and progression in this subject:

Year A overview Year B Overview History progression History sequencing

INTENT

We believe that a high-quality history education will help pupils gain a coherent knowledge and understanding of Britain’s past and that of the wider world. It should inspire pupils’ curiosity to know more about the past. Teaching should equip pupils with the skills and understanding to ask perceptive questions, think critically, weigh evidence, sift arguments, and develop perspective and judgement.

History helps pupils to understand the complexity of people’s lives, the process of change, the diversity of societies and relationships between different groups, as well as their own identity and the challenges of their time.

Our curriculum has been carefully constructed with the knowledge, skills, vocabulary and abstract terms to be taught, clearly mapped out for each unit of work. By ensuring the building blocks of our history curriculum are effectively sequenced, we equip our pupils with the essential knowledge they need to make sense of new material.

We place a strong emphasis on developing pupils' chronological knowledge and helping them to develop a 'mental timeline' of the past. This knowledge enables pupils to place their learning in context both in history and in subjects across the curriculum.

All of the children's learning in history is focused around the following key concepts:

Continuity and Change
Cause, Consequence and Motivation
Similarities, Differences and Significance
Interpretation of History
Chronological Understanding

In addition, we have identified a number of abstract terms which come up frequently in history, which can be difficult for children to grasp.

For example: society, legacy, trade, civilisation, power, achievement, government.

Each unit of work provides a valuable opportunity for children to be explicitly taught these abstract terms within a context that makes sense to them. This helps our pupils to build a secure and deep understanding of the concepts that are fundamental to being an effective historian.

IMPLEMENTATION

History is taught discreetly each term in 6 week blocks. This ensures that pupils have the opportunity to learn history every term without long gaps between one unit of work and the next.

Meaningful links with other subjects are made to strengthen connections and understanding for pupils.

All learning starts by revisiting prior knowledge. This is scaffolded to support children to recall previous learning and make connections. Pupils create a 'mind map' at the start of each unit of work as a retrieval exercise and as an assessment of what knowledge has been retained. The mind maps are then added to at the end of the unit of work as an assessment of what children have learnt.

Learning is supported through the use of 'learning overviews' which are stuck into the children's books at the start of a new unit of work. These capture what prior learning is needed for the unit of work and what new learning is to be gained This helps pupils to make links with previous learning.

Each lesson begins with a 'learning question' which the children answer at the end of the lesson. This provides useful assessment information for the teacher.

Pupils also take quizzes throughout a unit of work as a fun way to practice knowledge retrieval and to help the teacher assess what knowledge pupils have secured in their long term memory.

At the end of each term the teachers use all the assessment information that has been gathered, including pupils' work in books to assess pupils against the objectives for that unit of work. Each child is recorded as either working 'below', 'at' or 'above' age related expectations. This assessment information is used to inform future planning.

History teaching throughout the school is enriched by the use of external visitors and visits. These include trips to Escot, Tiverton Museum and Taunton Museum where the children take part in practical workshops and use role play to bring the history to life.

IMPACT

Pupil voice shows that pupils are confident and able to talk about what they have learnt in history using subject specific vocabulary. Our pupils enjoy history and are able to recall their learning over time.

Pupils' work demonstrates that history is taught at an age appropriate standard across each year group with opportunities planned in for pupils working at greater depth. Work is of good quality and demonstrates pupils are acquiring knowledge, skills and vocabulary in an appropriate sequence.