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Using visual sources to generate conversation
Teaching History article
Jane Card has long been fascinated by the power of visual sources to stimulate pupil thought and discussion. In previous articles she has shared insights from her own expert practice, fusing deep subject knowledge with careful planning to generate highly skilful questioning. Here she presents another rich example of classroom...
Using visual sources to generate conversation
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Broadening Year 7’s British history horizons with Welsh medieval sources
Teaching History article
Hiscox wanted to broaden her students’ understanding of the complexity of the British past, and developed an enquiry into the Norman Conquest of Wales to help achieve that aim. Hiscox reports her enquiry design and its outcomes, sharing how she broadened both content and the types of sources that students...
Broadening Year 7’s British history horizons with Welsh medieval sources
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Cunning Plan 192: A suggested itinerary for visiting Berlin
Teaching History feature
The principles and approaches outlined in our article on Pages 59 to 64 of this edition can be applied to any site, although not necessarily all on the same trip! If you are visiting Berlin, and you want to examine it as a contested space, in what order might you...
Cunning Plan 192: A suggested itinerary for visiting Berlin
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Broadening horizons: using cross-curricular conversations to support historical understanding
Teaching History article
Bettney and Ridley focus on the context in which we teach and in which our students learn and on history in the context of the whole school curriculum and in relation to education about personal development. Taking the example of learning about parliament, they explore how the history curriculum and the...
Broadening horizons: using cross-curricular conversations to support historical understanding
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Arctic aspirations: Britain and Icelandic independence, 1917–18
Historian article
As it sought independence, Iceland gained a new significance for Britain during the latter stages of the First World War, writes Ben Markham.
At the turn of the twentieth century, Iceland was not an independent country. Isolated in the North Atlantic Ocean, it was nonetheless considered an integral part of...
Arctic aspirations: Britain and Icelandic independence, 1917–18
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Mini Scaffolds: Charts, Concept webs, Diagrams, Mini-Frames
Primary History article
The language of History develops subject content knowledge and associated vocabulary & phraseology, p. 30. Pupils can record, extend and develop their historical language through using a range of mini-scaffolds or frameworks that they flesh out with teacher guidance and support.
A class can build upon basic historical vocabulary through questioning,...
Mini Scaffolds: Charts, Concept webs, Diagrams, Mini-Frames
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Practical demonstration: powerful and rigorous history teaching for all
Teaching History article
In this article, Ian Luff returns to the theme of ‘practical demonstration’ which he developed in three articles twenty years ago. Luff restates his original rationale for the enduring power of the approach, advances some new reasons why history teachers should give serious attention to it and shares several practical examples...
Practical demonstration: powerful and rigorous history teaching for all
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My favourite place: Lyme Regis, Dorset
Primary History feature
Claire Bradshaw describes why Lyme Regis is a very special place not just for its stunning scenery but for its educational value. It probably has a history dating back to earlier than any other article in the ‘My Favourite Place’ series – this one running into millions of years. ...
My favourite place: Lyme Regis, Dorset
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Using public records to explore local history
Historian feature
Local history has the power to bring different groups within our communities together – learning about the history of your street, village, town or city is something that anyone can take an interest in, regardless of how long they have lived there.
Researching local records to find out about an area...
Using public records to explore local history
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Out and About in Washington DC
Historian feature
Not everyone loves the capital of the United States. To Ulysses S Grant, it was a ‘pestilential swamp’; to novelist Gore Vidal, a ‘city of the dead’. It is true that Washington still has its problems. The District of Columbia has the highest crime rate in the United States, and the...
Out and About in Washington DC
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Questions you have always wanted to ask about... Accessing Archive Sources
Primary History article
Mary Mills answers questions about accessing archive sources.
Please note: this article dates from 2003 and some of the sources and services referenced may no longer be available.
Questions you have always wanted to ask about... Accessing Archive Sources
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Developing effective collaboration between schools and universities
Teaching History article
Sarah Longair launched a collaborative project between school history teachers and university historians in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic. In this article, Longair and her teacher colleagues, Kerry Milligan and Emma McKenna, share how they used online collaboration to develop a flexible and practical approach to school–university collaboration, and...
Developing effective collaboration between schools and universities
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Using metaphor to highlight causal processes with Year 13
Article
Alarmed by his students’ random use of causal language in their essays, James Edward Carroll resolved to help his students improve their understanding of causal processes. Carroll decided to introduce his students to the metaphors that historians use to describe causation in the historiography of the Salem witch trials. By modelling...
Using metaphor to highlight causal processes with Year 13
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Short cuts to deep knowledge
Teaching History article
Sam Pullan explains how a chance encounter has helped him to improve his introduction to the modern themes and founding documents of US politics. Working with a professional historian whom he met, by chance, over dinner, he was able to produce lessons at the cutting edge of subject knowledge to...
Short cuts to deep knowledge
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Creating a progression model for teaching historical perspectives in Key Stage 3
Teaching History article
Jacob Olivey set out to design enquiries which would enable his pupils to reconstruct, using evidence, the perspectives of people in the past. In this article he shares in detail the planning and outcomes of two enquiries: one for Year 7 and one for Year 8. Olivey offers a example...
Creating a progression model for teaching historical perspectives in Key Stage 3
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Norman Barons
Classic Pamphlet
What I have done in preparing this lecture on the Norman Barons is to choose three or four important families, with one or two individuals. I shall try to describe their fortunes briefly to you, pick out what appear to be common characteristics and generalize them - not as conclusions,...
Norman Barons
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Where are we and where are we going?
Teaching History article
Richard Harris draws on their own and others’ research to take stock of where the history teaching community is in terms of curriculum thinking. Harris argues that despite a number of positive developments in recent years, certain issues continue to have undesirable effects on curriculum design. Such issues include inertia...
Where are we and where are we going?
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Research review series: History – July 2021
Primary History article
In this summary, Tim Lomas identifies key points presented in the history research review. Includes work of Ofsted Research and Evaluation Team.
1. More schools now seem to have adequate time for history. In primary, 1–2 hours a fortnight and in secondary, 2–4 hours. Provisional entries for 2021’s history GCSE...
Research review series: History – July 2021
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Real Lives: Commonwealth War Graves Commission memorial: Edward George Keeling
Historian feature
Trevor James introduces a victim of an earlier pandemic.
As we explore churchyards and appreciate the range of memorials that are revealed, they convey a variety of emotions and other messages. Sometimes they still contain quite unexpected surprises.
The single Commonwealth War Graves Commission memorial in the relatively remote rural Staffordshire village...
Real Lives: Commonwealth War Graves Commission memorial: Edward George Keeling
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Women’s friendship in late eighteenth-century America and its relevance to lockdown
Historian article
Rowan Cookson offers us the opportunity to compare our contemporary anxieties with a stressful era in American history.
Eighteenth-century women’s friendship is worth considering at this time. In my undergraduate dissertation, I concluded that white wealthy women’s friendship in eighteenth-century America equired long distance communication, involved labour and perpetuated race and class...
Women’s friendship in late eighteenth-century America and its relevance to lockdown
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Creating confident historical readers at A-level
Teaching History article
How can we help pupils learn to read historically? Gary Howells explores this question by explaining how he builds reading challenges into the course of his pupils' post-16 studies and by describing some of the tasks that pupils are set and the principles that underpin them. Howells argues that over...
Creating confident historical readers at A-level
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Using oral history to enhance a local history partnership
Teaching History article
Eliza West and Emily Toettcher explain how a partnership between school and museum has evolved into a four-year enquiry into local history. The article focuses on the successful introduction of an oral history element in the GCSE syllabus and how the investigation into ‘remembered’ history helps students to appreciate the complexities of truth...
Using oral history to enhance a local history partnership
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Move Me On 128: Assessment without Levels
Teaching History feature
This Issue's Problem: Meg Dawson is keen to find ways of recognising and recording students’ progress and achievements without resorting to ‘levels’.
Move Me On 128: Assessment without Levels
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Grave matters
Historian article
Diana Laffin considers what study of the styles, planning and planting of Brookwood cemetery reveals about nineteenth century mindsets.
Graves are serious sources for historians. There is nothing casual about the choices made at death: the size and design of the monument, the text on the stone, even the location...
Grave matters
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How can we teach about medieval Britain in primary schools?
Primary History article
There is no question that the medieval period (no matter what timespan it claims) offers plenty of fascination for the primary pupil. It also allows some continuity with the period up to 1066 which forms the bedrock of the Key Stage 2 history curriculum. With opportunities to cover the medieval...
How can we teach about medieval Britain in primary schools?
