History is designed to Build up and inform the character of students, through understanding how diverse societies have been treated in the past in order to understand today and predict our future. To create a living history, that identifies social justice issues and understands this in the context of local, British and international societies. Students will engage in making valid historical claims by critically reflecting on a variety of different enquires through asking questions about the validity of sources communicating this understanding in a variety of ways that shows academic rigour. Our Motif in History is – to question everything!History
The purpose of History is to engage young minds in the art of discernment and discrimination of evidence that encourages understanding of differing interpretations that exist about specific events.
KS3 History
Purpose of KS3
KS3 is designed to build upon the key skills and knowledge taught at KS2. To ensure a foundational grounding and understanding of key historical second order concepts, such as chronology, change and continuity, cause and consequence, significance, source inference and evaluation.
St Mary’s History team will ensure a broad and balanced range of history that is local, British, European and world focussed. Units will cover depth studies, thematic and developmental foci; thus reflecting how GCSE teaching is composed.
Our final unit in Year 7 is a combined unit with RS and Geography, thus showing the interconnectedness of Humanities as a discipline.
Year 7:
Students will understand the link between the politics and the church, grappling with the fragmented relationship from Medieval to Tudor England. They will focus on the big picture in this relationship and analyse how this changed.
Year 7 is the foundation year; therefore the year is designed specifically to build upon what has already been taught at primary level, ensuring that understanding is instilled and recounted whilst providing more complex reading and expectations of writing.
Students will be expected to arrive at St Marys with a basic understanding of the Norman Conquest. If your child’s primary school has not undertaken any work on this aspect of History, they can access the summer project HERE.
The concept of monarchy and its relationship with subjects and church sets the scene for the remainder of the year with an emphasis later in the year on how this relationship impacted society.
| Curriculum Content | Potential Assessment Opportunities | |
| Autumn Half Term 1 & 2
Spring Term 1 |
The Impact of the Norman invasion
William I’s methods of control inclusive of the: · Feudal system · Castle building · Fear and Terror · The Norman Church Power Relationships in the Later Middle Ages · The anarchy · Henry II and Thomas Becket · King John Impacts · The Crusades · The Black Death |
‘William controlled England through terror’ How far do you agree with this statement? |
| Spring Half Term 4 & Summer Term 1 | Power Relationships in the Early Modern Period:
· Henry VII and the barons · Henry VIII and the Church · Edward VI and Mary I · Elizabeth I Impacts · The reformation in Europe · The Spanish Armada |
Explain the causes of the Henrican reformation |
| Summer
Term 2 |
Independent Local Study
Significance of London Importance of Hertfordshire throughout History from Saxons to today Key historical events from the borough such as peasants revolt, black death and the impact of war. Key events in Cheshunt’s history |
What is the history of our locality?
Why has London and our locality changed over time? What key events shaped our local area? |
Year 8:
The concept of change continues into year 8, and students will examine the nature of significance, focussing on key turning points of revolutionary ideas and concepts that has arisen throughout history within Britain and the wider world. With the first revolutionary turning point focussing on the breakdown of the relationship between monarch and parliament during the Stuart reign there is a continuity of progression from year 7 highlighting how the nature of power has been challenged.
Since revolutionary moments are vital to understanding how History has moved forward, a range of different types of revolutions from political to industrial to social will be examined this year.
| Curriculum Content | Possible Assessment Opportunities | |
| Autumn Half Term 1 | The Stuarts
· Causes of the civil war · The protectorate · Restoration · Glorious revolution |
How useful are sources to understand the impact of the civil war on English society? “Nothing really changed in in England by 1688?” – Do you agree? |
| Autumn Half Term 2 | The Industrial Revolution
· How did Britain become an industrial country? · Problems of industrialisation? · Children and industrialisation · How did people react to industrialisation? |
How far did the treatment of children change between the years 1800-1900? |
| Spring
Half Term 3 |
The Industrial Revolution (continued)
· Political protest of the working classes · Peterloo massacre · Heroes of public health |
How useful are sources to understand the industrial revolution? |
| Spring
Half Term 4 |
Protest/social justice movements
· Suffragettes/ suffragists · Women’s liberation · Civil rights · Protests of British black communities · LGBT rights and Stonewall |
Why did the franchise change during the late 19th Century and early 20th Century?
How did women gain the vote? How did women gain equal work and social rights? How did Black people gain civil rights? How did the Stonewall riots lead to the improvement of LGBT rights? |
| Summer Term | Revolutions
· The French Revolution · The American revolution · The Russian revolution · The Cuban revolution |
What does social justice mean to you? Why do people revolt? What are the causes of revolutions What is the impact of revolutions? |
Year 9:
Change in year 9 will focus on the issue of diversity through the use of thematic studies that covers a range of ages and aspects of society. Linked to the thematic study is a historic environment that examines the relationship of an event to its relationship to developments of historical events.
Students will focus on examining how history is studied. Year 9 students are expected to leave the key stage grappling with the idea that history is not objective. Historiography is explicitly taught in order to understand how and why different histories are written and how historians provide different perspectives of the same historical event, concept or source.
| Curriculum Content | Potential Assessment Opportunities | |
| Autumn Half Term 1 | African History
1. African empires · Great African empires such as Benin, Kush and Aksum. · Mali and Mansa Musa · Great Zimbabwe 2. Conquest · Roman conquest of Northern Africa countries · Islamic conquest · European conquest and the impact of slavery. 3. Independence · African nationalism · Algerian independence · Apartheid |
· Why are African histories forgotten?
· What is the difference between the different types of conquest of the African continent? |
| Autumn Half Term 2 | Diversity and Immigration (1066-present)
· Jewish communities and the expulsion of them. · Huguenots · Egyptian act · Early African migration · Slave trade · The Irish migration · Italian and German immigration · 19th Century Jewish migration from Russia · Empire Windrush · Civil rights in the UK · Immigration today · Brexit |
· Explain why there is migration to the UK?
· Did all migrant groups have the same experience when they arrive in the UK? |
| Spring
Half Term 3 |
20th Century warfare
· The nature of warfare to 1945 · The impact of technology to 1945 · The battle of the Somme |
· Was Haig the butcher of the Somme? |
| Spring
Half Term 4 |
· The nature of warfare post 1945
· The Iraq war · The experiences of warfare in the 20th Century · Experiences of Black civilians and soldiers during wartime · The Vietnam war |
· Warfare has only changed over the 20th Century because of technology? |
| Summer Half Term 5 | Genocide
· Identifying features of genocide · The Holocaust – the road to the holocaust. · Impact on the holocaust on individual lives. · Rwanda |
· Was the holocaust inevitable?
· What is the impact of mass genocide? |
| Summer Half Term 6 | Year 10 Timetable
Students will begin their first GCSE unit – Anglo-Saxon Norman England · Types of groups In Anglo-Saxon society · Power of the king · Power of Earldoms · Local government · The legal system · Influence of the church · House of Godwin · Rising against earl Tostig |
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Skills Learnt
Students learn communication skills, working collaboratively as part of a group as well as engaging in paired tasks. Other skills taught include the ability to construct an argument and debate a point, as well as how to analyse a source, describing its content and making detailed inferences from the source. History also provides students with the opportunity to develop their literacy skills such as essay writing, writing in a persuasive manner and developing empathy skills.
Homework/Extended Learning
Students will be set fortnightly homework whereby activities will include written tasks, research, creative thinking and presentations. Literacy based homework will be set to complement the written tasks to widen reading and comprehension skills
