History

Intent 

At Frenchwood we believe that the teaching of fun, engaging, interesting lessons will provide children with an excellent start on the road to becoming an Historian and a life-long learner. History is not only about finding out about the past but being part of the past, living as others would, developing empathy and asking questions, enquiring and reasoning. A variety of teaching styles are employed along with the use of visits to museums, castles, mills and local buildings in the surrounding area. Visitors and other ‘experts’ are encouraged, along with high quality resources. We aim to motivate pupils, use their developing historical skills and for them to learn about the world around them from past to present. 

Implementation 

At Frenchwood History is taught in phases (EYFS, KS1, LKS2, UKS2) through a two-year cycle. We follow the National Curriculum for History, taking opportunities to link areas of learning to the locality and local people of interest. Children will learn how to find out about the past, the value and usefulness of different sources of evidence and form conclusions and about life and events in different periods of History. Children will understand chronology, form links from different time periods, develop empathy and understand the impact of events and people on the local and national scene. Theme lessons are weekly and have either a History or a Geography focus. Units are linked to a visit/visitor to develop interest and provide opportunities for learning outside the classroom. All themes (where relevant) also a novel to run alongside learning, to read as a class for pleasure, to bring the different periods of History to life and to encourage empathy for the characters in those times. As well on acquiring knowledge and developing skills to be like an Historian, we also have themes that run through our learning – Movement – fairness – local heroes -   

Impact 

The expected impact of the History scheme of work is that children will. 

• Understand the chronological narrative, from the earliest times to the present day 

• Recognise how local people that we have connections with and share commonality with, have shaped the local area/nation 

• How Britain has influenced and been influenced by the wider world  

• know and understand significant aspects of the history of the wider world: the nature of ancient civilisations; the expansion and dissolution of empires; characteristic features of past non-European societies  

• Develop an  understanding of abstract terms such as ‘empire’, ‘civilisation’, ‘parliament’ and ‘peasantry’  

• Understand continuity and change, cause and consequence, similarity, difference and significance  

• Understand methods of historical enquiry, how evidence is used to make historical claims, and discern how and why contrasting arguments and interpretations of the past have been constructed