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Young children and chronology
Primary History article
Please note: this article pre-dates the 2014 National Curriculum and some content may be outdated.
"How did you stop yourself from getting the plague?"
This quotation from a child signals some of the challenges of teaching children about chronology in the primary school. Learning about chronology involves:
Knowing the conventions of...
Young children and chronology
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Think Bubble - Jumping stories: selective chronology
Primary History feature
I recently finished a most interesting commission with the educational publishers, Schofield and Sims. They asked me to help put together a comprehensive timeline of British History to cover as broad a chronological perspective as possible. They wanted this to be the complete Cavemen to Cybermen story all on one...
Think Bubble - Jumping stories: selective chronology
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Chronology and local history: Year 6
Primary History case study
Please note: this article pre-dates the 2014 National Curriculum and some content may be outdated.
Editorial note: This short paper introduces a highly creative, imaginative and enthralling case-study of a local history project for year 6 pupils. The teaching programme has a chronological spine that provides coherence and focus. Chronology is...
Chronology and local history: Year 6
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Constructivist chronology and Horrible Histories
Primary History case study
Please note: this article pre-dates the 2014 National Curriculum and some content may be outdated.
I chose Horrible Histories for this exploration of children's understanding of chronology because I thought it would be fun - and I approve of the Horrible Histories. They use sources, question sources, provide alternative interpretations and...
Constructivist chronology and Horrible Histories
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Chronology & Topics at Key Stage 2
Primary History article
Please note: this article pre-dates the 2014 National Curriculum and some content may be outdated.
The Nearly Complete History Of Almost Everything outlines the chronology of various aspects of our lives, and gives a flavour of the enormity at first glanceof ‘teaching chronology'. Topics, which are not tied to a particular...
Chronology & Topics at Key Stage 2
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Timelines and technology
Primary History article
Please note: this article pre-dates the 2014 National Curriculum and some content may be outdated.
Timelines are basic tools for developing knowledge and understandings about chronology, providing the frameworks and contexts for historical enquiry. Information and Communications Technology [ICT ] offers a range of tools for viewing [and creating timelines, ranging...
Timelines and technology
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Developing pupils' chronological understanding
Article
In its latest triennial history survey report, History for all, Ofsted concluded that, ‘history teaching was good or better in most primary schools' and, ‘most pupils reached the end of Key Stage 2 with detailed knowledge derived from well-taught studies of individual topics'. The report went on to note, though,...
Developing pupils' chronological understanding
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Teaching about racism, fairness and justice through key people
Primary History article
Please note: this article pre-dates the 2014 National Curriculum and some content may be outdated.
Our school has no uniform. You can’t predict what most children or teachers will wear from one day to the next. So the children were rather surprised one day in July 1996 when most of...
Teaching about racism, fairness and justice through key people
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Teaching possibilities: From Plato to Nato
Primary History article
Please note: this article pre-dates the 2014 National Curriculum and some content may be outdated.
The Olympics historical dimension opens up a plethora of possibilities for history, projects and integrated approaches that draw upon the themes and approaches that underpin the primary school curriculum. Our top ten are:
1. Home and...
Teaching possibilities: From Plato to Nato
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Lesson Planning Recipe
Primary History article
Learning objectives
What questions should the children be able to answer at the end of your teaching of the topic? Pare this down to 6 key questions, one for each lesson of a 6-week term. What sub-questions will the lesson address and open up for the next step in the...
Lesson Planning Recipe
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Monitoring, assessment, recording and reporting
Primary History article
Please note: this article pre-dates the 2014 National Curriculum and some content may be outdated.
Much of the recent guidance related to assessment, monitoring and recording in primary history has focused more on what does NOT have to be done rather than on practical advice on what might be done. Given...
Monitoring, assessment, recording and reporting
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Planning with literacy
Primary History article
Please note: this article pre-dates the 2014 National Curriculum and some content may be outdated.
History is a subject which of necessity makes extensive use of language in all its forms and so the links with literacy are many. Cooper (2000), Bage (1999), Hoodless (1998) and Nichol, in the Nuffield History...
Planning with literacy
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Pupils as apprentice historians (1) - History Detectives
Primary History article
Please note: this article pre-dates the 2014 National Curriculum and some content may be outdated.
The historian R.G. Collingwood inspired the Schools Council History Project [SC HP] that transformed the teaching of history in Britain from the early 1970s. The SC HP argued that pupils should be ‘apprentice' historians who developed the...
Pupils as apprentice historians (1) - History Detectives
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A classroom museum
Primary History article
Please note: this article pre-dates the 2014 National Curriculum and some content may be outdated
Museums are memory boxes. They contain artefacts that tell stories about people in the past. The creation of a class museum is a simple and effective way of bringing the past to life through investigation,...
A classroom museum
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Learning to engage with documents through role play
Primary History article
Please note: this article pre-dates the 2014 National Curriculum and some content may be outdated.
First let me say that I did not research the materials used or plan this lesson. For this I must acknowledge, with thanks, that this is the work of my colleague, Mike Huggins, and the senior...
Learning to engage with documents through role play
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Local history: young children using written, printed and multimodal sources
Primary History article
Please note: this article pre-dates the 2014 National Curriculum and some content may be outdated.
Editorial note: Jo Barkham shows how creative, challenging and stimulating teaching can engage even the youngest pupils in the reading of written and printed text and multi-modal sources. She continues her account in the next edition...
Local history: young children using written, printed and multimodal sources
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Saltaire: Planning for an effective learning experience on a living site
Primary History article
Please note: this article pre-dates the 2014 National Curriculum and some content may be outdated.
In the autumn of 2009 I agreed to contribute to a project looking at how Saltaire village, Bradford could be developed as an educational site. This is a very popular site visited by many local schools,...
Saltaire: Planning for an effective learning experience on a living site
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How can citizenship education contribute to effective local history?
Primary History article
Please note: This article pre-dates the current National Curriculum and some content and links may be outdated.
Citizenship education in primary schools asks children to dig deeply into issues, to gain skills to become advocates and champions for the views of themselves and others and to be confident to take action on...
How can citizenship education contribute to effective local history?
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Doing local history
Primary History article
Please note: this article pre-dates the 2014 National Curriculum and some content may be outdated.
Editorial comment: ‘Doing Local History' permeates John Fines' oeuvre on the teaching of history - it is both warp and weft. In introducing a Local History case study John outlined the nature and purposes of Local...
Doing local history
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What’s important about...? Sources and evidence
Primary History article
In this timely article, Ailsa Fidler and Chris Russell explore the use of sources and evidence in the teaching of primary history. Referring to Ofsted’s history subject report (July 2023), Ailsa and Chris explore how sources can be used effectively in the classroom and how children’s understanding of the role...
What’s important about...? Sources and evidence
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Is primary history thriving?
Article
The 2022 Historical Association survey of primary schools drew a good response. The results have been evaluated. The full report has been published on the website but this article summarises the main findings and suggested strategies to take the subject further. Its findings help direct the resources of the HA....
Is primary history thriving?
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Teaching local history in primary schools: learning about effective practice
Primary History article
Rachel Bruce and Susannah Russell were two of the six primary teachers on the recent Local History Teacher Fellowship. Here they outline the activities they were engaged in and how they produced two very different local history enquiries – one based in York and the other in Wrecclesham, Surrey. They...
Teaching local history in primary schools: learning about effective practice
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Significant anniversaries: Windrush 75
Primary History article
It is 75 years since the ship called the Empire Windrush brought people from the Caribbean to begin a new life in the United Kingdom. Those who also arrived in the years leading up to 1971 are often referred to as ‘the Windrush generation’. Their contribution to Britain socially, culturally...
Significant anniversaries: Windrush 75
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Teaching black British history through local archives
Primary History article
The huge benefits that local archives can bring to primary history are explored by Steven Kenyon. He illustrates this with a case study of Lancashire Archives. The central focus is on ways in which local history can support diversity in the curriculum by providing three examples – one for Key Stage...
Teaching black British history through local archives
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Dig for sustainability!
Primary History article
Paul Spear uses World War II government advertising strategies such as ‘Make do and Mend’ to consider how to promote modern campaigns related to sustainability. He investigates what the wartime government did to engage with the population as a whole and generate national action. By analysing how images were used...
Dig for sustainability!
