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Subject criteria for GCSE and A Level History published
Guidance
The Department for Education today published subject criteria for both GCSE and A Level History. The new linear A Level History will be ready for first teaching from September 2015 and will retain a 20 percent personal study element. It is still unclear how the two year A Level course...
Subject criteria for GCSE and A Level History published
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Pilot GCSE Resources Spreadsheet
Article
The HA has compiled 3 spreadsheets that take you through the main History GCSE specifications World History, Schools History Project and the Pilot GCSE which has a compulsory examined element on Medieval England. Each spreadsheet takes you through each specification, topic by topic and is filled with links to all...
Pilot GCSE Resources Spreadsheet
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Schools History Project ICT Resources Spreadsheet
Article
The HA has compiled 3 spreadsheets that take you through the main History GCSE specifications World History, Schools History Project and the Pilot GCSE which has a compulsory examined element on Medieval England. Each spreadsheet takes you through each specification, topic by topic and is filled with links to all...
Schools History Project ICT Resources Spreadsheet
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Modern World History ICT Resources Spreadsheet
Article
The HA has compiled 3 spreadsheets that take you through the main History GCSE specifications World History, Schools History Project and the Pilot GCSE which has a compulsory examined element on Medieval England. Each spreadsheet takes you through each specification, topic by topic and is filled with links to all...
Modern World History ICT Resources Spreadsheet
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Past Forward: A vision for school history 2002-2012
Book
The Historical Association held a major conference on history education at the Cherwell School, Oxford on Saturday 28th September 2002. Entitled 'Past Forward: A Vision for School History 2002-2012', it was a celebration of recent trends in history teaching and a chance to reflect critically on where history education needs...
Past Forward: A vision for school history 2002-2012
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Past Forward: University history and school history
Article
Recent trends in university history University historians have little incentive to discover what goes on in school history classrooms and many disincentives, as pressures of work mount and the ogres of university management point to the overwhelming need to improve, or sustain, current Research Assessment Exercise grades. History is rarely...
Past Forward: University history and school history
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Past Forward: Print and electronic resources
Article
It does not need a prophet to see that a more dynamic relationship between print and electronic media is both a need and a possibility for the next ten years of school history. At the moment, however, history is a book-based subject. Books matter. Teachers use them and are keen...
Past Forward: Print and electronic resources
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Past Forward: History for all
Article
This paper takes four premises for granted: (i) that a coherent, motivating, demanding historical education is essential for all citizens in today’s society. This is not a luxury, it is a burning necessity in the interests of social inclusion, human rights and the preservation of democracy; (ii) that the present...
Past Forward: History for all
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Past Forward: GCSE History
Article
This summer was the thirtieth in which I have worked as an Examiner in History for 16- year- olds. This is a really sad confession, but I think it at least might allow me to offer an insider’s perspective. What follows is a consideration of the issues confronting GCSE history...
Past Forward: GCSE History
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AS & A2 History
Article
My complaints about the new AS/A2 specifications have been reported elsewhere,1 but below I outline my main concerns regarding the new examination system, which I see as a missed opportunity to introduce a 16-19 History curriculum that meets the needs of young people in the twenty-first century. The Curriculum 2000...
AS & A2 History
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Nurturing aspirations for Oxbridge
Teaching History article
An exploration of the impact of university preparation classes on sixth-form historians
Frustrated by the low numbers of students from her comprehensive state school who expressed any interest in applying to Oxford or Cambridge to study history, Lucy Hemsley set out to explore ways in which she might both inspire...
Nurturing aspirations for Oxbridge
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Low-stakes testing
Teaching History article
The emphasis on the power of secure substantive knowledge reflected in recent curriculum reforms has prompted considerable interest in strategies to help students retain and deploy such knowledge effectively. One strategy that has been strongly endorsed by some cognitive psychologists is regular testing; an idea that Nick Dennis set out...
Low-stakes testing
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Past Forward: Keynote address: fulfilling history's potential
Article
How much is it possible to love a subject? “I get so excited about my next history lesson” wrote Peter in December, “that I find myself dreaming about it before it happens”.1 How much is it possible for a teacher to love a subject? You love it so much that...
Past Forward: Keynote address: fulfilling history's potential
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Past Forward: History and ICT
Article
ICT in History has made tremendous leaps forward in recent years, although it needs to be said that these advances do not necessarily represent the day to day experience of every history department. Perhaps the most notable development is in the ICT skills of teachers. The great majority of teachers...
Past Forward: History and ICT
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Past Forward: Historical significance
Article
I recently came across the following in a Sunday newspaper: The Government is expected to announce a major overhaul of mathematics teaching in the next few days and it will be writing to employers and teaching bodies to ask how the subject can be ‘made more relevant to the twenty-first...
Past Forward: Historical significance
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Build it in, don't bolt it on: history's opportunity to support critical citizenship
Teaching History article
Andrew Wrenn offers a wide range of practical examples of the way in which National Curriculum History (and the continuation of its principles at GCSE) supports citizenship education. He focuses chiefly upon Key Element 3, ‘Interpretations', but also Key Element 4 ‘Enquiry'. He illustrates history teachers' long-established concern for the...
Build it in, don't bolt it on: history's opportunity to support critical citizenship
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Exceptional performance at GCSE:
Article
In the last edition of Teaching History (February 1999, Issue 94) Kate Hammond used her own planning and classroom practice to extract some principles for stretching the very able pupil at Key Stage 3. How should history teachers build on this at GCSE? One way of defining goals for such...
Exceptional performance at GCSE:
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Historical Association Secondary Survey 2021
Annual Survey Report on History in Secondary Schools
For the past 11 years we have been doing an annual survey into history teaching in secondary schools. This year our main focus was on the content of the history curriculum, examined with a particular focus on diversity.
It looks particularly at diversity understood in terms of race and ethnicity,...
Historical Association Secondary Survey 2021
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GCSE History
Introduction
There are a wide variety of changes happening in relation to GCSE. Current exam specifications (for students sitting exams in 2015) were subject to 'strengthening' measures. The extent of change varies from board to board and specification so you need to check with your own examination board that you are...
GCSE History
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Engaging with each other: how interactions between teachers inform professional practice
Teaching History article
Please note: this article pre-dates the 2014 National Curriculum and some content may be outdated.
What kinds of interaction take place in a history department? What might be their value? Between 1999 and 2003, Simon Letman, then history teacher and Director of Studies at The Royal Hospital School in Ipswich,...
Engaging with each other: how interactions between teachers inform professional practice
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Who wants to fight? Who wants to flee? Teaching history from a 'thinking skills' perspective
Article
Whatever shape the National Curriculum of the 21st century takes, history will have to show its relevance to major curricular areas and themes such as literacy, citizenship education and thinking skills. This ought to be easy: the critical, informed decision-making required by the modern citizen is practised in virtually every...
Who wants to fight? Who wants to flee? Teaching history from a 'thinking skills' perspective
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What is good citizenship education in history classrooms?
Teaching History article
Ian Davies, Geoff Hatch, Gary Martin and Tony Thorpe seek to theorise - and to support teachers in their own theorising - concerning the purpose of citizenship education and criteria for good citizenship education. They aim for a professional precision that will be helpful to teachers, getting us beyond the...
What is good citizenship education in history classrooms?
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HA Secondary History Survey 2010
HA Survey
The Historical Association publishes a major survey into the state of history teaching in English secondary schools today and reports some very worrying trends. A significant number of teachers report serious concerns that history is disappearing in their schools, with senior managers assuming that the study of the past has...
HA Secondary History Survey 2010
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History in Schools - Present and Future
Conference Report
History in Schools - Present and future: Event report This one day conference was organised by the sponsors to raise awareness of the changes in the 14-19 curriculum and initiate discussion on how history, taught from Key Stage 3 to HE level, could be best served and enhanced by the...
History in Schools - Present and Future
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Innovation, inspiration and diversification: new approaches to history at Key Stage 3
Teaching History article
Good history teaching should not be the responsibility of a single department working in isolation. The history subject community as a whole should work together to ensure that history teaching is of as high a quality as possible. This does not mean that every department, and every teacher, should do...
Innovation, inspiration and diversification: new approaches to history at Key Stage 3
