History

Intent

At Staincliffe CE Junior School, we offer a high-quality, fully inclusive History curriculum through rich and imaginative learning that will inspire pupils’ curiosity to know about the past, whilst developing independence and a desire to be courageous in their learning. Our curriculum will help pupils understand chronology, gain a coherent knowledge and understanding of Britain’s past and that of the wider world. Our History curriculum will help pupils to understand the complexity of people’s lives, the process of change, the diversity of societies and to respect relationships between different groups. Local History focus will also help children gain a sense of trust in their own identity within a social, political, cultural and economic background. Through our joy of learning, children will have the opportunity to present their findings in a creative way, which will allow them fully to embed their knowledge, skills and understanding and inspire their desire for future study.

Implementation

To ensure high standards of teaching and learning in history, we implement a curriculum that is progressive throughout the whole school. Three History units are taught in each year group over the academic year, focusing on knowledge and skills stated in the National Curriculum and in areas specific to the need of our children. Our History curriculum is delivered through a sequence of engaging ‘big questions’ as the hook that starts each learning journey. Alongside classroom based learning, a variety of opportunities for trips and visitors enhance our children’s independent learning skills through real-life experiences.

Our curriculum provides:

• Chronological understanding
• Knowledge and understanding of past events, people and changes in the past
• Historical interpretation
• Historical enquiry
• Organisation and communication

To track the progress of our historians, we:

• Create Knowledge Organisers which outline knowledge including vocabulary all children must master and apply in lessons.
• Provide low stakes quizzes regularly to support learner’s ability to retain learning and increase space in the working memory.
• ‘Challenge Questions’ for pupils to apply learning in a philosophical / open manner.
• Capture ‘Pupil Voice’ at regular intervals.  
  
  

Impact

By the time they leave us, as historians, our children will have:

• An excellent knowledge and understanding of people, events, and contexts from a range of historical periods and of historical concepts and processes.
• The ability to consistently support, evaluate and challenge their own and others’ views using detailed, appropriate and accurate historical evidence derived from a range of sources.
• The ability to think critically, reflect, debate, discuss and evaluate the past, formulating and refining questions and lines of enquiry, communicating ideas confidently in styles appropriate to a range of audiences.
• A passion for history and an enthusiastic engagement in learning, which develops their sense of curiosity about the past and their understanding of how and why people interpret the past in different ways. 
• A respect for historical evidence and the ability to make robust and critical use of it to support their explanations and judgments.
• A desire to embrace challenging activities, including opportunities to undertake high-quality research across a range of history topics.

Our History curriculum is high quality, well thought out and planned to demonstrate progression. If children are keeping up with our curriculum, they are deemed to be making good or better progress and support is put in place for those working towards the curriculum objectives.

Please click here for our History 'Progression of Knowledge and Skills' document.