History

Intent

History is all about people. The study of people of different types from different times and different places is the most important aspect of our work.

History fires pupils’ curiosity about the past in Britain and the wider world. Pupils consider how the past influences the present, what past societies were like, how these societies organised their politics, and what beliefs and cultures influenced people’s actions. As they do this, pupils develop a chronological framework for their knowledge of significant events and people and make links with other subjects. They see the diversity of human experience, and understand more about themselves as individuals and members of society. What they learn can influence their decisions about personal choices, attitudes and values.

Implementation

At Eastcourt, History is the process of enquiry

  • the search for evidence
  • the examination of evidence
  • the recording of evidence
  • the interpretation and weighing of different sorts of evidence.

It is the product of imaginative reconstruction because evidence is nearly always incomplete and fragmentary.

We imagine how it might have been and we fill in the gaps left by the evidence.

Finally it is describing and explaining the past – having synthesised the narrative, and arguments based on evidence. 

History should be fun and satisfyingly challenging. At Eastcourt we believe learning in history takes place most effectively when:

Pupils build on what they already know, making connections and developing their understanding.

The tasks set present achievable challengesto find out about the past building children’s skills and conceptual understanding.

Pupils can:

  • discuss their ideas.
  • reflect on their learning.

Teachers:

  • create the big picture and achievable steps
  • provide for multi-sensory input and exploratory learning
  • set challenging tasks

Questioning is varied and open. It encourages pupils’ questions allowing time for thought, expecting a more reasoned answer. 

Pupils are encouraged to take their own and others’ responses further and help each other developing or assisting reflection

Impact

The impact of our history curriculum is for pupils to be enquiring and challenging thinkers who appreciate that there is much we can learn from the past, and have the skills and the passion for doing so in the future.

We aim to:

  • enable pupils to understand how and why people behave as they do now;
  • enable them to understand themselves;
  • give them the confidence and ability to try to improve themselves and their world;
  • help them to develop a sense of responsibility for the world in which later generations will live;
  • enable them to ask and answer significant questions;
  • enable them to think for themselves and to reach fair and rational conclusions about complex human situations;
  • inspire in them a lasting interest in, and enjoyment of, learning about the past.

Enquiry – progression in finding out about the past using a range of sources and asking questions

Progression – KS1

  • Can find an answer to a question by looking at a simple picture, e.g. of a nursery rhyme – which of these lights did Wee Willie Winkie carry?
  • Can say whether a picture is of a baby or a toddler and explain why.
  • Can point to familiar images in pictures of themselves and their own family.
  • Can describe the main features of an artefact.
  • Can explain how we know what we were like when we were younger, e.g. photographs, video, parents or grandparents telling stories.
  • Can make deductions about artefacts, spotting clues to function and use and can talk about, for example: how obvious domestic items connected with washday would have been used, possibly through simple role play.
  • Can consult and use information from two simple sources to find information, e.g. ‘how can we tell this teddy is old? Because it looks like the one in the book’.
  • Can find answers to questions about objects by looking in books.
  • Realise that we find out about a person’s life by using a range of sources, such as letters, as well as books.
  • Can ask simple, but relevant, questions of the teacher in the role of, for example, Florence Nightingale or Grace Darling.
  • Can draw simple conclusions about their own lives and others around them by reference to clues in evidence, e.g. ‘I know this is a picture of me when I was three because there are three candles on the cake’, ‘I don’t play with that toy now’ or ‘My baby brother was just born’.
  • Children are able to gather ideas from a few simple sources when building up their understanding, e.g. why the Great Fire spread so quickly.
  • Children spot the differences between sources and come to a conclusion as to the most common view.
  • Able pupils make deductions from photographs, going beyond the literal and what can be seen.
  • Able pupils will realise that there are potential weaknesses in eyewitness accounts such as Pepys’.

Progression – KS2

  • Children extract simple information from text/pictures/objects showing basic comprehension
  • Children make simple deductions about what text means based on what is included e.g. the teacher in the photograph of Victorian school is holding a cane, they must be strict.
  • Children start combining information from more than one source e.g. CD-Rom, compared with video, oral evidence.
  • Children start cross-referencing information to see if other sources agree, rather than taking everything on face value.
  • Children see that some sources are more useful than others and can explain why.
  • Children start to raise questions about what the evidence tells us. They are aware of the need not to rush to conclusions based on flimsy evidence. Will use phrases such as, We cannot tell for sure. Most evidence suggests.
  • Children start to think of reasons why a source might be unreliable e.g. view of the Vikings may be partial because the evidence we have was written by people who suffered most at the hands of these raiders.
  • Can consider the worthiness of a source by reference to what is known about the topic. e.g. This does not fit in with the picture of the subject I know therefore….e.g. This portrait of Elizabeth makes her seem far younger than she would have looked aged 67. This piece of evidence must be handled carefully. We need to know who produced it and why. Who was the audience?
  • Other substantial reasons why some sources might be treated cautiously e.g. propaganda posters during World War Two. Show awareness of the need to think about why the source was produced without prompting. ‘How can we explain why so many children in these evacuation photographs are smiling when we learn from other sources that it was a miserable experience for many children?
Medium Term Plan
Long Term Plan