History
You can see details of the national curriculum for history here.
At St Anne’s, we believe that history helps children widen their horizons and understand how they came to be the people they are today. We know that the more children know about the past, the better prepared they will be for the future. Our history curriculum promotes curiosity and a love for exploring the past. Staff encourage our children to think and act as historians. Our curriculum ensures that children have a good understanding of British history and that of the wider world.
Our history teaching aims to enable children to:
- learn about key historical events
- understand the impact of key historical figures
- learn about other civilisations
- ask and answer perceptive questions
- research, explore primary and secondary sources and reach conclusions
We work closely with Dimensions Curriculum to offer children a broad, detailed and above all memorable experience of history, which touches upon different themes and key knowledge and skills.
High quality history lessons are taught regularly during each year group and are taught through themed units. Our history topics have been meticulously selected to support the teaching of chronology, alongside other historical concepts, so children are learning sequentially and are able to build their own timeline of history as they progress through the school. Children have the opportunity to show their knowledge and skills through both practical and written methods, as well as projects and with the use of technology. There is also a focus on historical vocabulary with this being focused upon throughout each topic.
Where appropriate, links will be made between key historical and geographical topics aiming to focus on these from each subject’s perspective, e.g. the Vikings, Greece, studies of Athens and Sparta to give a holistic understanding of these concepts.
EYFS: In Reception, children will explore key in their own lives and through the lives of people around them, e.g. family and community. Children will be given opportunities to look at sources linked to their lives and from the past.
Key Stage 1: Throughout Key Stage 1, children deepen their understanding of dividing the past into different periods of time, as well as developing the ability to place events in chronological order. The children will observe and explore a range of sources to find out about the past. Children develop their enquiry skills by asking and answering questions. They use this information to deepen their understanding of events beyond living memory and to make comparisons to their own experiences. The children also develop their understanding of multiple key figures in different periods of history, including Queen Victoria and Queen Elizabeth II, as well as the contributions they made.
Key Stage 2: During their time in Key Stage 2, children will begin to further develop their understanding that history can be divided into different periods of time. They will also begin to place events, people and changes onto a timeline, as well as using and recalling dates for key historic periods. Later in Key Stage 2, children will recognise and understand the broad chronology of major events in the wider world, from ancient civilisations to the present day, and locate within this the periods, events and changes they have already studied. Throughout Key Stage 2, children learn about key civilisations in history and their impact and interpretations on the world today. Children look at causes of certain historical events and use and select primary and secondary sources in order to develop an understanding of the past, make links and discuss the reliability of sources of information.
“We get to do fun activities and have lots of fun learning!” EYFS child.
“You get to learn about interesting people and we get to share our History learning with others in the school which is fun!” Key Stage 1 child.
“I love History at St Anne’s, because you get to learn new things about people that are great – like Nina Simone! I love that fact that every period I am taught about I get to learn new things.” Key Stage 2 child.
