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Earth in vision: Enviromental Broadcasting
Historian article
Joe Smith, Kim Hammond and George Revill share some of the findings of their work examining what digital broadcast archives are available and which could be made available in future.
The BBC’s archives hold over a million hours of programmes, dating back to the 1930s (radio) and 1940s (television). It...
Earth in vision: Enviromental Broadcasting
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Using different sources to bring a topic to life: The Rebecca Riots
Primary History article
For primary school pupils a key aim of the National Curriculum for history is to understand the method of historical enquiry. Working with original sources is of course central to the whole process and provides a great way to inspire pupils’ experience of the subject. Young pupils, once they have...
Using different sources to bring a topic to life: The Rebecca Riots
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Thematic GCSE Content
GCSE Resources
The helpful guide below sets out links to a range of podcasts, articles and pamphlets that will provide subject knowledge guidance that you may find useful for all of the identified thematic topics of the GCSE specifications. In addition there are also links to helpful articles dealing with bigger picture...
Thematic GCSE Content
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History and the National Primary Strategy
Primary History article
The Historical Association poses a series of questions to the Director of the Primary National Strategy, Kevan Collins.
History and the National Primary Strategy
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Defying the ‘constrictive grip of typologies’
Journal article
History teachers have frequently made recourse to character cards as a device to help young people, each assigned specific roles, to understand how different kinds of people responded in different ways to particular situations in the past.
Edward FitzGerald builds on this tradition, demonstrating the value of using rich historical...
Defying the ‘constrictive grip of typologies’
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Who are we?
Information
There are many ways you can support our work to bring history to all:
Become a Member
Make a donation
Contribute an article
Other ways to support us
We are a registered charity incorporated by Royal Charter (charity no. 1120261). We support the teaching, learning and enjoyment of history at all...
Who are we?
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Film: Death in the Diaspora
British & Irish Gravestones
As British and Irish migrants sought new lives in the Caribbean, Asia, North America and Australasia, they left a trail of physical remains where settlement occurred. Between the 17th and 20th centuries, gravestones and elaborate epitaphs documented identity and attachment to both their old and new worlds.
In this Virtual...
Film: Death in the Diaspora
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When your parents were young…
Primary History article
This article is free to everyone. For access to hundreds of other high-quality resources by primary history experts along with free or discounted CPD and membership of a thriving community of teachers and subject leaders, join the Historical Association today
Susie Townsend explores the theme of life in the 1990s,...
When your parents were young…
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'A lot of guess work goes on': Children's understanding of historical accounts
Teaching History article
Please note: this article pre-dates the 2014 National Curriculum and some content may be outdated
The ESRC-funded Project Chata has collected evidence of children's ideas about the discipline of history and attempted to see if there is any progression in those ideas. Here, Peter Lee describes how Chata has tried...
'A lot of guess work goes on': Children's understanding of historical accounts
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Move Me On 91: work with historical sources lacks focus
The problem page for history mentors
Problem: Mike Jones, student history teacher, is half-way through his PGCE year. He is making unusually good progress in his knowledge, understanding and practice with regard to the use of sources in history. He also appears to have no difficulty with classroom management and relationships with pupils. He easily creates...
Move Me On 91: work with historical sources lacks focus
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Primary History 31: The Industrial Revolution
The primary education journal of the Historical Association
3 Editorial
4 Primary Noticeboard
6 In My View: Teaching for purpose: one dilemma? - Alan McCully
8 History co-ordinators’ dilemmas - Jayne Woodhouse and Alan Hodkinson
10 I have not seen a butterfly around here… - Penelope Harnett
12 Revising the English Reformation - Peter Fleming
15 Celebrating good practice;...
Primary History 31: The Industrial Revolution
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Managing the scope of study
Teaching History article
Anna Dickson and her department sought a solution to the challenges posed to their pupils by the expanded curricular scope of the new GCSE. In particular, they wanted to address the difficulties their pupils experienced in understanding the Cold War. Dickson outlines here how she drew on the work of...
Managing the scope of study
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Triumphs Show 171: preparatory reading for A-level essays
Teaching History feature: celebrating and sharing success
The first question my A-level students always used to ask when receiving back an essay was, ‘What mark did I get?’ The second question I used to hope they would ask was ‘How could I improve my work?’
I stress ‘used to’ because increasingly I do not give marks when...
Triumphs Show 171: preparatory reading for A-level essays
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The Great Debate: Sponsorship
Sponsor our Great Debate competition
The Great Debate is a bi-annual event that encourages schools and students to get involved in public speaking. It is a debating competition for students in the UK & Ireland aged between 16 and 18. Students have 5 minutes to produce a speech on the set question.
Why the...
The Great Debate: Sponsorship
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Means and Ends: History, Drama and Education for Life
Primary History article
Please note: this article pre-dates the 2014 National Curriculum and some content may be outdated.
John Fines, Raymond Verrier and I frequently taught as a team trying to discover where drama work and history meet. We were interested in helping children get a grasp of past events which have influenced their...
Means and Ends: History, Drama and Education for Life
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Creating Stories For Teaching Primary History
Primary History article
Please note: this article pre-dates the current National Curriculum and some content and references are outdated.
With primary history contributing to writing, some research by Sandra Dunsmuir and Peter Blatchford into pupils aged 4-7 has relevance to history teaching. The findings were published in the "British Journal of Educational Psychology", edition...
Creating Stories For Teaching Primary History
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Triumphs Show: The BeBold Network
Teaching History feature
In April 2019, I was in a bit of a rut. My enquiry questions and lesson sequences seemed stale. I felt like I had been at my school for too long. To mix things up, I secured a new role for September at a start-up school.
Full of excitement, I...
Triumphs Show: The BeBold Network
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The end of the Cold War with a personal perspective
Primary History article
This article is free to everyone. For access to hundreds of other high-quality resources by primary history experts along with free or discounted CPD and membership of a thriving community of teachers and subject leaders, join the Historical Association today
The beginning of the 1990s, just as this publication was...
The end of the Cold War with a personal perspective
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Teaching History 181: Out now
The HA's journal for secondary history teachers
Read Teaching History 181
Editorial: Handling Sources
While 2020 will go down in history as the year of the coronavirus pandemic, those who teach history may also remember this year for the impetus that it gave to calls for curriculum change. Petitions to the UK parliament demanding ‘compulsory teaching of Britain’s colonial past’ and greater inclusion of...
Teaching History 181: Out now
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Thomas Paine
Pamphlet
The radical writer Tom Paine (1737-1809) has become a neglected figure, but this work argues that he should be rightly regarded as an original thinker, whose publications contributed to revolutionary discourses in America, France and Britain in the late 18th Century. He deserves to be remembered in the United States...
Thomas Paine
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Using sites for insights
Teaching History article
Working alongside local history teachers to prepare for the new GCSE specifications Steve Illingworth and Emma Manners were struck that many teachers were concerned about two issues in particular: the breadth and depth of knowledge demanded and new forms of assessment, especially the historic environment paper. In this article they...
Using sites for insights
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Primary History 30: Discovering the past
The primary education journal of the Historical Association
3 Editorial – Penelope Harnett
3 Primary Noticeboard – Tim Lomas
4 How do we ensure really good local history in primary schools? – Tim Lomas (Read article)
7 Research the history of the fire service in the local community – Jayne Pascoe (Read article)
10 Children, the internet and...
Primary History 30: Discovering the past
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History through children’s voices
Primary History article
This article is free to everyone. For access to hundreds of other high-quality resources by primary history experts along with free or discounted CPD and membership of a thriving community of teachers and subject leaders, join the Historical Association today
In this article, we explore examples of children’s writing, from...
History through children’s voices
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What Have Historians Been Arguing About... medieval science and medicine?
Teaching History feature
The phrase ‘medieval science’ may seem nonsensical. ‘How can... a synonym for “backward”,’ the editors of The Cambridge History of Science Volume 2 ask rhetorically, ‘modify a noun that signifies the best available knowledge from the natural world?’ To answer their question, we must rethink our assumptions, both about the...
What Have Historians Been Arguing About... medieval science and medicine?
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Podcast: Richard Evans Medlicott -The Origins of the First World War
Medlicott Podcast
This year the Historical Association's Medlicott medal for services to history went to Professor Sir Richard Evans. Richard Evans is the Regius Professor of History at Cambridge and President of Wolfson College, Cambridge. He has written numerous highly respected and internationally best-selling books. Evans is bests known for his works on...
Podcast: Richard Evans Medlicott -The Origins of the First World War
