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Chata in a Nutshell
Article
OK, so it's another acronym. What's it mean?
Concepts of History and Teaching Approaches at Key Stages 2 and 3. Chata tried to get a picture of 7 to 14 year-old kids' ideas about history (just over 400 of them in all). That's their ideas about the discipline and how...
Chata in a Nutshell
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Global Learning Programme
Global Learning Programme
The Global Learning Programme (GLP) is a ground-breaking new programme which will create a national network of like-minded schools, committed to equipping their students to make a positive contribution to a globalised world by helping their teachers to deliver effective teaching and learning about development and global issues at Key Stages 2...
Global Learning Programme
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Working with Boudicca texts - contemporary, juvenile and scholarly
Teaching History article
Please note: this article was written before the the 2014 National Curriculum and some content may now be outdated.
Robert Guyver describes a model for teaching Boudicca’s rebellion to pupils aged 7 to 13. Drawing on the tradition of critical source evaluation, he nonetheless shuns aspects of that tradition in favour of...
Working with Boudicca texts - contemporary, juvenile and scholarly
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Cunning Plan 155: interpreting WW1 events
Teaching History feature
Enquiry Question: What's worth knowing about the First World War?
At the end of our scheme of work on the First World War, I asked myself how I might encourage my Year 9 pupils to reflect on the historical significance of the events we had studied. I was particularly interested...
Cunning Plan 155: interpreting WW1 events
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Historical Enquiries and Interpretations
Transition Training Session 1
This is the first of 5 sessions arising from the 2005 KS2-KS3 History Transition Project:
Transition training session 1: Historical Enquiries & Interpretations
Transition training session 2: Using ICT in the teaching of history
Transition training session 3: Extended writing in history
Transition training session 4: Joan of Arc -...
Historical Enquiries and Interpretations
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Before 1066 & All That: Transition between KS2 & KS3
HA Guide
This e-cpd unit models how primary and secondary teachers of history might improve transition between KS2 and KS3 through collaboration on a transition unit aimed at Year 6 pupils on the Vikings.
It contains original teaching and training materials written by Andrew Wrenn, former Cambridgeshire Humanities Advisor and funded as...
Before 1066 & All That: Transition between KS2 & KS3
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Year 7 explore the story of a London street
Teaching History article
One street, twenty children and the experience of a changing town: Year 7 explore the story of a London street
Michael Wood and others have recently drawn attention to the ways in which big stories can be told through local histories. Hughes and De Silva report a teaching unit through...
Year 7 explore the story of a London street
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History in England’s primary schools: What do secondary history teachers need to know?
HA Update
What’s been happening in primary history lately? Invited to write an update on this, I decided to identify some themes that might be helpful to secondary teachers.
As a senior lecturer in primary education with responsibility for history and as a member of the HA Primary Committee, I was able...
History in England’s primary schools: What do secondary history teachers need to know?
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Time and chronology: conjoined twins or distant cousins?
Teaching History article
Weaknesses in pupils' grasp of historical chronology are a commonplace in popular discussion of the state of history education. However, as Blow, Lee and Shemilt argue, although undoubtedly necessary and fundamental, mastery of chronological conventions is not sufficient: the difficulties that pupils experience when learning history are conceptual, as much...
Time and chronology: conjoined twins or distant cousins?
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Joan of Arc - Saint, Witch or Warrior?
Transition Training Session 4
This is the 4th of 5 sessions arising from the 2005 KS2-KS3 History Transitions Project:
Transition training session 1: Historical Enquiries & Interpretations
Transition training session 2: Using ICT in the teaching of history
Transition training session 3: Extended writing in history
Transition training session 4: Joan of Arc - Saint,...
Joan of Arc - Saint, Witch or Warrior?
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The Evacuee Letter Exchange Project: using audience-centred writing to improve progression from Key Stage 2 to Key Stage 3
Teaching History article
Jenny Parsons' work in primary-secondary liaison in history is nationally acclaimed. She is often asked to share her department's practice at courses and conferences. Readers of Teaching History are already familiar with her work in another area: in the ‘Triumphs Show' of Teaching History 93 (the ICT edition in November...
The Evacuee Letter Exchange Project: using audience-centred writing to improve progression from Key Stage 2 to Key Stage 3
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It's like they've gone up a year!' Gauging the impact of a history transition unit on teachers of primary and secondary
Teaching History article
Year 7 history teachers frequently bemoan the lack of historical learning in the primary sector. Pupils may be well versed in suffixes and similes, but their study of history can be limited. This group of history teachers decided that things could be different. Not only did they bring enquiry methods...
It's like they've gone up a year!' Gauging the impact of a history transition unit on teachers of primary and secondary
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Bringing together students from Bradford and Peshawar
Article
Connecting Classrooms: bringing together Bradford and Peshawar, primary and secondary schools, history and English
In this article, Dianne Excell shares her experience of a crossphase, collaborative project funded by the British Council that brought together teachers and pupils from three schools in Bradford and five schools in Peshawar, Pakistan. Although...
Bringing together students from Bradford and Peshawar
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Using Folktales, Myths and Legends
Global Learning
This resource was commissioned by the Historical Association to offer teachers an entry point into the new primary History curriculum using stories: folktales, myths and legends from the civilisations, communities and cultures of the statutory programmes of study.
In this resource, pupils are encouraged to recall and retell stories orally,...
Using Folktales, Myths and Legends
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Progression & Assessment without Levels - Guide
Progression & Assessment
In the 2014 national curriculum for primary and secondary history one of the key differences is that, for the first time since 1991, there are no level descriptions against which you can assess pupils' progress. The new attainment target says simply that:
‘By the end of each key stage, pupils...
Progression & Assessment without Levels - Guide
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Key Stage 2-3 History Transition Project
Guide to KS2-KS3 Transition
Please note: these resources pre-date the 2014 National Curriculum. For more recent resources on Transition KS2-KS3 please see:
Transition KS2–KS3 (Primary History article, 2021)
Smooth Transitions: Key Stage 2 to 3 (Primary History article, 2020)
Transition Key Stage 2 and 3 (Primary History article, 2016)
Before 1066 & All That: Transition between...
Key Stage 2-3 History Transition Project
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Extended Writing in History
Transition Training Session 3
This is the third of 5 sessions arising from the 2005 KS2-KS3 History Transitions Project:
Transition training session 1: Historical Enquiries & Interpretations
Transition training session 2: Using ICT in the teaching of history
Transition training session 3: Extended writing in history
Transition training session 4: Joan of Arc - Saint, Witch...
Extended Writing in History
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Interpretation and poor Victorian Children
Year 6 Scheme of Work
Please note: this resource pre-dates the 2014 National Curriculum.
This unit centres on the portrayal of poor, Victorian children. While factual knowledge about conditions in workhouses is an essential component of the unit, the main focus is on contrasting portrayals of one fictional Victorian child, Charles Dicken's Oliver Twist. The...
Interpretation and poor Victorian Children
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Was Boudicca Britain's first hero?
Year 6 Scheme of Work
Please note: this resource pre-dates the 2014 National Curriculum.
This unit centres on Queen Boudicca.
While factual knowledge about her life and the Roman occupation are an essential component of the unit, the main focus is on contrasting interpretations of Boudicca over time and exploration of the reasons behind her...
Was Boudicca Britain's first hero?
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Of the many significant things that have ever happened, what should we teach?
Teaching History article
There are three basic strands to our lessons. How should we teach? What skills should we enable our students to build? What content should we use to deliver those skills?
In this article Tony McConnell, who has been re-designing the curriculum in his school in response to a changed examination regimen, considers the issue of subject...
Of the many significant things that have ever happened, what should we teach?
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Learning to love history: preparation of non-specialist primary teachers to teach history
Teaching History article
Rosie Turner-Bisset describes a systematic attempt to teach non-specialist trainee primary teachers to understand how the discipline of history works. She reports encouraging results. The training methods described here are based on a working assumption that teachers must be passionate and excited about a subject in order to teach it...
Learning to love history: preparation of non-specialist primary teachers to teach history
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Telling and suggesting in the Conwy Valley
Teaching History article
Thelma Wiltshire applies a ‘telling' and ‘suggesting' strategy to an enquiry involving an historical site. Getting beyond more simplistic approaches to ‘fact' and ‘opinion', she describes how a pack of curriculum materials was designed to give pupils a precise language to talk about layers of certainty and uncertainty in their...
Telling and suggesting in the Conwy Valley