Welcome to History at St Augustine’s
Intent
In St Augustine’s History is planned out progressively to cover the skills and concepts required in the National Curriculum. This aims to develop historical skills and concepts which are transferable to whatever period of history is being studied and will equip children for future learning. These key historical skills, which are revisited throughout different themes, are: chronological understanding, historical interpretations and using primary and secondary sources. Themes which are revisited are: travel and transport, the monarchy, homes and settlements and developing communities.
The coverage of recent history in KS1 enables children to acquire an understanding of time, events and people in their memory and their parents’ and grandparents’ memories. For KS1, themes allow a full opportunity for children to really grasp the difficult concept of the passing of time.
The intent in lower KS2 is that children can work on a variety of areas of History to develop and apply the skills listed above through a range of ancient, British and more recent History.
Upper KS2 continues and builds upon this with a wider selection of ancient history such as ‘The Aztec Kingdom’ and ‘Stone Age’ through to more modern history such as ‘World War 2’ and ‘Crime and Punishment’. The repeat of these themes allows for children to truly develop and embed a sense of time and how civilisations were interconnected. Children start to understand how some historical events occurred concurrently in different locations, e.g. Anglo-Saxons/Vikings and the Golden Age of Islam during the 10th Century.
Click here for: Primary National Curriculum – History
Click here for: History Substantive Knowledge
Implementation
In order for children to know more and remember more in each area of History studied, there will be a structure to the sessions whereby prior learning is always considered and opportunities for revision of facts and historical understanding are built into the learning. This allows for revision to become part of good practice and ultimately helps build a depth to children’s historical understanding. Through revisiting and consolidating skills, History sessions will enable children to build on prior knowledge alongside introducing new skills and challenge. Revision and introduction of key vocabulary is also built into each session. This vocabulary is then included in Knowledge Organisers and displays to ensure that children are allowed opportunities to repeat and revise this knowledge.
Here at St Augustine’s we intend to inspire pupils and practitioners to develop a love of history and see how it has shaped the world they live in.
Impact
We want to ensure a love of History by teachers and pupils across school, therefore encouraging them to want to continue building on this wealth of historical knowledge and understanding, now and in the future. It is evident from pupils’ work and classroom discussion that History is a subject that excites the pupils at St. Augustine’s. History displays in each class will directly improve the impact of History across the school, these displays will be more consistent with historical technical vocabulary enabling it to be spoken and used by all learners.
