Author: onebighistorydepartment

teaching and learning ideas

Using Living Graphs to support making supported judgements

We all face a challenge to help our students understand change over time and to make judgements about the most important factors contributing to change. I use Living Graphs a lot, especially with my A-level historians. Living graphs are a visual way to assess the relative importance of events or actions. Students create a line graph showing change over time in relation to specific criteria. … Continue reading Using Living Graphs to support making supported judgements

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CPD, curriculum and planning, disciplinary knowledge, GCSE and A level, historical scholarship, KS3, subject leadership, substantive knowledge, teacher knowledge, teaching and learning ideas, teaching and learning resources, websites and publications

Later Middle Ages: Teaching Fellowship Resources

Hopefully you have managed to find the free copy of Teaching Medieval History that has been sent to your school. The online expanded version is Here. This has been made available thanks to Agincourt600. In 2015, they also granted the HA funding to start the first of its Teaching Fellowship programmes. A group of teachers spent an intensive weekend updating their subject knowledge with academics. They then … Continue reading Later Middle Ages: Teaching Fellowship Resources

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teacher knowledge, teaching and learning resources, websites and publications

Exploring and Teaching Medieval History – an introduction by Ian Dawson

Exploring and Teaching Medieval History has just been published by the Historical Association. A copy of the shorter, 96 pages edition has been sent to every secondary school in England and Wales. The extended 140 pages edition is available open-access on the HA website – http://www.history.org.uk Where did this publication come from? In summer 2017 the Agincourt600 organisation gave the HA a sum of money … Continue reading Exploring and Teaching Medieval History – an introduction by Ian Dawson

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beginning teacher, curriculum and planning, GCSE and A level, historical enquiry, KS3, subject leadership, teaching and learning ideas

Enquiry questions – the back story!

Over the weekend @LeeDonaghy asked history teachers on @Twitter if ‘an enquiry-focused history curriculum is a bit overrated for KS3’. It’s a good question. History-subject specialists learn from their subject-specialist ITT training that being able to construct an effective enquiry is a breakthrough moment in becoming a history teacher. But why? And how can we explain why? In response to @LeeDonaghy there followed a lengthy … Continue reading Enquiry questions – the back story!

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diversity and inclusion, local networks, teaching and learning resources, websites and publications

Resources for history lessons that reflect diversity … and the HA conference

‘How far does the past talked about in your history classroom reflect the diversity of modern Britain?’ This was the question posed recently to PGCE History students at the University of York. Following the posing of this question, the students rolled up their sleeves and put together a short ‘Guide for busy teachers’ that you can find here: Whose histories? – diversity ideas and resources  The … Continue reading Resources for history lessons that reflect diversity … and the HA conference

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GCSE and A level, substantive knowledge, teaching and learning ideas

Making it stick is hard – try ‘Starter for ten’!

With the return to two year linear exams at GCSE and A Level, history teachers face even more of a challenge to help students to learn and retain knowledge and understanding so that they can perform well in the exam hall. This requires us to keep on finding engaging and memorable ways to teach content. Here is an idea developed for A Level, that could … Continue reading Making it stick is hard – try ‘Starter for ten’!

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GCSE and A level, KS3, local networks, speaking and listening, substantive knowledge, teaching and learning ideas, teaching and learning resources, websites and publications

Roleplay and recreation: sharing great Normans resources

Happy New Year to all of you! History teachers are a wonderful tribe and OneBigHistoryDepartment exists to connect history teachers not only to each other, but to the many years of great history teaching that have gone before. We are all too busy to reinvent wheels. We are all too clever to be gulled into thinking that the issues we face in the classroom are … Continue reading Roleplay and recreation: sharing great Normans resources

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GCSE and A level, teaching and learning ideas

Getting the kids to make their own revision guide!

My Problem: My A-Level class are about to begin revising for the brand new A-Level. They need a decent set of revision notes but I do not have time to make fancy pants knowledge organisers. My Solution: Get the students to make a fully stocked revision website. Here’s how I did it at no cost (well except a bit of my time). Step 1: Create … Continue reading Getting the kids to make their own revision guide!

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GCSE and A level, KS3, substantive knowledge, teaching and learning ideas

Substantive concepts: ‘Left-wing? Right-wing? Do you mean like in hockey, miss?’

This week a post to help teach tricky concepts at GCSE… Left-wing and right-wing are not easy concepts for GCSE students. Every year I make my students laugh by pacing from side-to-side of my classroom being the political positions on an imaginary political line from left to right. I am not good at impersonations, but I try to put politicians on the line in a … Continue reading Substantive concepts: ‘Left-wing? Right-wing? Do you mean like in hockey, miss?’

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GCSE and A level, speaking and listening, teaching and learning ideas

Building schema: Maps and Mnemonics

Practical advice from a colleague wrestling with how to ensure students learn and retain sense of place… I’ve been working hard with my Year 11s to make their knowledge secure. This is so that they can feel confident forming their arguments, both in discussion in class and ultimately for their written answers in the exam. The new Making of America unit on the OCR SHP … Continue reading Building schema: Maps and Mnemonics

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