Change and continuity

Consideration of change and continuity tends to be a feature of period and thematic studies. The latter, in particular, make it possible for students to examine trends and turning points over time, looking at those dimensions which remain stable while others alter, and examining the varying pace, direction and nature of those alterations.  Another aspect of change and continuity – one that can also be explored within shorter depth studies – is the lived experience of change: how particular developments were experienced and understood by those who lived through them.  These materials provide important insights into common student misconceptions and illustrate a range of strategies for planning and teaching (including the choice of worthwhile historical questions) that will support the development of more effective analytical descriptions of change and continuity. Read more

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  • Teaching history's big pictures: including continuity as well as change

    Article

    Please note: this article pre-dates the 2014 National Curriculum and some content may be outdated. School history teachers are not the only ones wrestling with the challenges of building ‘big pictures' that do justice to complexity. In this article, social and cultural historian Penelope Corfield puts our interest in long-term...

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  • Year 9 use a 'road map' to problematise change and continuity

    Article

    Please note: this article pre-dates the 2014 National Curriculum and some content may be outdated. Rachel Foster, a trainee teacher on teaching placement in November of her PGCE year, wanted her Year 9 pupils to understand the complexity of historical change. She also wanted them to find the difficult challenge...

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  • How did changing conceptions of place lead to conflict in the American West? Reflecting on revision methods for GCSE

    Article

    Mary Woolley decided to make four revision sheets for her lower-band Year 11 set. Each was to help them view their American West study through a different lens. She was rather uncertain, however (and so were the pupils) about her fourth sheet on places. Her reflections on the revision sheet...

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  • Placing history: territory, story, identity - and historical consciousness

    Article

    How do we relate to the past? Does it tell us who we are? Is it a source of examples to follow and mistakes to avoid? Or can we go beyond that to something genuinely historical? Arthur Chapman and Jane Facey argue that as history teachers we have a responsibility...

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  • Past Foward: Continuity and progression

    Article

    I recently had the pleasure of teaching a class about a Victorian “inventor” (although we eventually agreed that ‘innovator” may be a more appropriate term). The man in question was Joseph Lister. I told the class the story of how he came to use carbolic acid as an antiseptic. I...

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  • Have we got the question right? Engaging future citizens in local history enquiry

    Article

    Gary Clemitshaw describes a five-lesson sequence integrating history, citizenship and ICT. He examines the varied rationales and problems underlying a citizenship-history link and then argues for the role of the local dimension in securing a connection that preserves the integrity of the discipline of history. He focuses upon causation as...

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