History

The more you know about the past, the better prepared you are for the future.

Intent

At St Mark’s Primary School, we deliver a high-quality history education that enables pupils to gain coherent knowledge and understanding of Britain’s past and that of the wider world.

We aim to inspire pupils’ curiosity to know more and remember more about the past so that they are equipped to ask perceptive questions, think critically, evaluate the effectiveness of evidence, sift arguments and to develop perspective and judgement. Our pupils develop a well-rounded, empathetic view of the society and world in which they live.

History helps pupils to understand the complexity of people’s lives, the process of change, the diversity of societies and relationships between different groups, as well as their own identity and the challenges of their time.

Implementation

At St Mark’s, History is taught using an enquiry-based approach allowing the children to become fully immersed in the topic at hand. The knowledge and skills taught within each topic form part of a whole school progression of skills, ensuring that lessons are pitched appropriately and learning is built upon throughout and across years.

In Early Years Foundation Stage, the children begin to learn about change and the passing of time which is mainly taught through “Understanding the World”. The children have many opportunities for hands-on exploration and begin by looking at their own life story and their own family history. They also look at how things change over time thinking in simple terms of now and then which introduces them to the idea of chronology and timelines.

In Key Stage 1, History focuses on significant events and people who have shaped society, locally, nationally and globally. The children look at changes that have happened within living memory and encouraged to compare “now and then”.

Across Key Stage 2, History focuses on aspects of local history, British history and ancient history. The topics are mainly taught in chronological order so that children gain a good understanding of the order in which events/time periods happened.

As each topic is taught it is located on the timeline displayed in each class. This is to further develop children’s understanding of chronology and also to help them to make comparisons of key events that were happening in Britain and the world at the same time.

Children are given a knowledge organiser at the start of each topic which details some key information, dates and vocabulary. This is not used as part of an assessment, but to support children with their acquisition of knowledge to support children to know more and remember more.

Medium term planning for all units will cover key historical knowledge and concepts: Chronological understanding, Historical knowledge, Historical interpretation, Historical enquiry and Trips and events.

Children are given opportunities, where possible, to study artefacts leading to enquiry, investigation, analysis, interpretation, evaluation and presentation.

We plan for effective use of educational visits and visitors to enhance the children’s learning and help them to know more and remember more. Furthermore, we use a range of technology, including the use of VR and AR, to enable our pupils to gain first hand experiences of artefacts and periods within history wherever possible.

Impact

We use a range of strategies to assess whether the child know more and remember more and if they are able to apply their history knowledge and skills.

• The class teacher’s ongoing formative assessments
• Book Scrutinies
• Lesson observations and feedback
• Pupil voice surveys
• Skills based formative assessments
• Knowledge based summative assessments

Click here for progression of knowledge and skills in History

History in the Early Years