History
Welcome to our History Curriculum
At Cuddington Croft, we aim to inspire our children to be keen historians who ask inquisitive and thought-provoking questions. We equip our children to understand historical events within their place in time. We consider the change and continuity that has occured up to and surpassing the present day. We want our children to have confidence to use their key vocabulary, skills and knowledge to be able to make detailed comparisons between different time periods as well as an understanding of significant people who have shaped the world.
Our History Intent
In History, our intent is to provide children with an understanding of how the world was formed and how it has evolved over time. Through the key historical skills that we use to drive each of our lessons, children are provided with the opportunities to make sense of the present as well as the past, developing an appreciation of how varied and complex the development of human societies is and has been.
We aim to inspire our children to ask interesting questions and equip them with the ability to discover answers to their own through engaging History lessons which allow our children to study a wide range of topics from the history of Britain and the wider world. We also aim to develop chronological knowledge of broad developments and historical periods by supporting them with creating and building their ‘mental timeline’ of the past. Whilst ensuring we draw and build upon children’s prior learning, where appropriate, we then encourage them to make comparisons between these developments and periods in order to make links in their learning within and across Key Stages.
Implementation – how do we plan and teach History?
At Cuddington, we teach History using the PKC History curriculum which has been designed to be both knowledge-rich and coherently sequenced. Through the history units we teach, we provide the children with the opportunity to recap key vocabulary and knowledge from previously taught units at the beginning of each lesson. This supports them with making links between different significant time periods and significant people of the past. We sequence our learning into small steps whilst also ensuring that we provide opportunities to deepen our children’s thinking. Our History curriculum allows children to develop a chronologically secure knowledge and understanding of local, British and world history. The substantive knowledge taught in the curriculum has been carefully chosen and sequenced using a largely chronological approach.
Our curriculum looks at one British history, one world history and one ancient history topic per year except in Year 5/6. Each year group teaches at least one British history unit, usually within the autumn term. All teaching and learning is sequenced chronologically across the whole school. This is done so that children have a better understanding of the chronology of History, with the skills remaining the same from Year 1 to Year 6 so that the children can develop on these as their History knowledge develops.
The curriculum aims to help children understand how the past is constructed and contested. Children begin by learning about what a historian does, looking at basic sources and simplified perspectives to develop an appreciation and understanding of what it means to be a Historian. As their substantive knowledge grows, children will be able to ask perceptive questions, analyse more complex sources and begin to use their knowledge to develop perspective. Disciplinary concepts, such as continuity and change, cause and consequence and similarity, difference and significance, are explored in every unit, and children are supported to think outside of their current unit of work and apply these concepts across the curriculum.
Children will be encouraged to view these units as a chapter in the story of the history of Britain and the wider world. In this sense, the chronological approach provides a solid framework, anchoring each unit within a wider narrative. Understanding in history requires an understanding of causation. As a result, the children will understand the causes of significant national and global events, (such as World War I), when they have some background knowledge of what happened before (such as the origins and growth of European empires, including the British Empire). Knowledge of substantive concepts and disciplinary concepts have been interleaved across the curriculum, allowing children to encounter and apply these in different contexts. From year to year, unit to unit, lesson to lesson, our curriculum supports our children in making connections and building upon prior substantive and disciplinary knowledge.
Impact - how is progress shown?
By the end of Key Stage 1, our children will have an excitement and curiosity about the past as well as an understanding of personal history and the histories of significant events and individuals in their lifetime and beyond living memory. They will have a solid understanding of their own story including knowledge about the past of people in their family. The children will have embedded this knowledge of early historical events and through building a strong foundation of historical skills the children will be ready to build upon these in KS2. The basis of knowledge and skills children gained in Key Stage 1 will enable our children to transition to KS2 ready to deepen their knowledge and extend their skills as historians.
By the end of Key Stage 2, our children will have a secure overview of a time period. They will develop historical knowledge and historical skills using a similar learning journey to Key Stage 1 but building on previous knowledge and developing their understanding in more depth. Our children will look at sources such as images and artefacts, when developing their historical enquiry skills as well as question the effectiveness and usefulness of it, source bias, making comparisons and judging significance by encouraging debates by looking at how different evidence can lead to different conclusions about the same event.
Our history curriculum aims to ignite children’s love for history, preparing them with essential knowledge as they prepare for the learning journey in Key Stage 3 and beyond. We aspire for our children to be curious and knowledgeable young people, who hold a deep understanding and appreciation of history and can sift and weigh evidence to begin to formulate their own viewpoints and perspectives of the world.
When our children leave Cuddington Croft, a good learner in History will...
Have developed a ‘mental timeline’ for the broad developments and periods of time studied throughout their time here.
Have an understanding of how Britain has changed over time due to invasions from significant groups of people in history.
Have an understanding of some ancient civilisations, including ones from the wider world, and what they discovered.
Be able to make comparisons between the present, including their own lives and localities, and significant cultures, events and people in history.
Be able to accurately sequence significant events on a timeline for a range of history units.
Be able to ask their own questions about history based on sources of information.
