HIstory SEQUENCE OVERVIEW

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history Vision

At Chesswood children will develop an enthusiasm and interest in the past and how it is relevant to their own lives. They will have an appreciation and understanding of our local history and wider. Children naturally enquire and at Chesswood this will be encouraged through a wide range of topics. Children will enter high school and be able to engage in meaningful discussion to shape and form their perception of events and characters in history.

Chronology, careers, amazing thinkers and doers and women in history form this curriculum that aspires to be real, relevant and engaging. Children will develop skills such as empathy, understanding chronology, reviewing evidence, research and organisation to help them be independent enquirers. Common concepts like settlement, invasion, rule, crime and punishment and legacy will help the children to make links between past events and compare to how we live now. Children will see history as a wide sphere with many career opportunities so will be ready and well-equipped to engage at the next level.

history principles

In line with the whole school curriculum policy, the following drivers and principles underpin everything we do in History:

CURRICULUM DRIVERS

Life Opportunities      Creativity, Confidence, Competence

CURRICULUM PRINCIPLES

Balanced       Coherent      Real & Relevant

Knowledge Rich       Cognitively Challenging       Inclusive

history strategy

Life Opportunities 

Frequent opportunities are found to explore careers. Children will see museum curators, experts at workshops, archaeologists, historical researchers for film and other exciting careers that handle the exploration of history. These opportunities will also place an emphasis on women in the field of history to encourage girls to aspire to careers that have previously male dominated. Celebrating women in history also enables boys to engage with the fair representation within the careers sector and celebrate a variety of have shaped the world.

Creativity Confidence Competence

Teachers are guided to deliver a high-quality curriculum which is complimented by professional expertise in the form of workshops on trips, historians from places such as Worthing Museum and specialists who study particular groups in time.

Children are encouraged to develop their history skills outside of the classroom through take-away tasks and competitions.

Conversations within class value justified varied opinions, celebrating different interpretations of history.

Each topic uses and repeats the same or similar skills. Children revisit previous learning frequently to draw on and compare to new knowledge/skills gained. As topics are based on a skeleton of key information this enables delivery to be more open to allow for discussion, exploration of a variety of evidence and to draw on the real and relevant contexts.

The key knowledge is kept to the most important and relevant information.

Balanced

The curriculum promotes intellectual (KSCV), moral, spiritual, aesthetic, creative, emotional and physical development as equally important. This is promoted through exploring art; empathising with groups and individuals in different periods; exploring different belief systems and how they have changed over time or come to be; debating different decisions and actions that have taken place to establish how they fit in to a child’s own sense of morality and our community sense; understanding how our world is shaped today based on previous events. Each topic uses and repeats the same or similar skills. Children revisit previous learning frequently to draw on and compare to new knowledge/skills gained. As topics are based on a skeleton of key information this enables delivery to be more open to allow for discussion, exploration of a variety of evidence and to draw on the real and relevant contexts.

Coherent

The spiral curriculum allows for children to progress within a subject. For example, the use of timelines to reflect what they have already learned and to situate new knowledge amongst that. Frequent mini assessments allow children to identify knowledge they may have missed and give them the opportunity to assess their own learning. Children are clearly guided to understand the different history skills and peers with well-developed skills are given the opportunities to model.

There are strong links to writing and history through the use of activities such as recording fictional accounts from real events in diaries or narratives; writing reports to apply their knowledge; and guides to inform others. History makes exciting foundation links and previous examples have included Greek theatre masks, Scherenschnitte art to depict scenes from the Blitz and Roman catapults in design technology.

Real and Relevant

The local community is explored to help children gain a sense of heritage. The local flint mines are discussed through the topic of the Saxons and then recapped during Ancient Egyptians to show civilisations that existed at the same time. Children also get to explore Worthing from the context of the Georgian to Victorian era and identify the changes that have been changed to present day.

The explicit sharing of past and modern-day careers gives the children greater context and the ability to see opportunities open to them. The celebration of women in history makes the learning relatable to young girls to see the impact that can be made on the world.

Knowledge Rich

The History curriculum  seeks to sequence knowledge effectively, ensuring that children have a good understanding of core knowledge to enable them to progress from unit to unit. Core knowledge and skills (such as skills for empathy, chronology and enquiry) are specified in detail and laid out in knowledge organisers for the key strands within History. 

Cognitively Challenging

The History curriculum seeks to introduce children to the best of what has been done, thought and said, linking to key individuals historically and currently. Units are chosen specifically to stretch children’s knowledge and skills development with a key focus on core historical terminology and understanding.

Inclusive

The History curriculum seeks to include all children through the use of high quality discussion and  debate. A key aspect of inclusion in History is developing empathy. Empathy is an important skill that we are developing in individuals through the use of discussion. Children (particularly disadvantaged children) who do not have access to texts at home; are unable to visit places of interest; or who are managing family struggles do not often have the opportunities to have rich conversations that help develop this skill. Teachers help to model how we empathise with aspects in the past to help children those important connections.

Another key development in the history curriculum is the explicit sharing of past and modern-day careers. This gives the children greater context and the ability to see opportunities open to them. The celebration of women in history makes the learning relatable to young girls to see the impact that can be made on the world.