Intent

History is all around us - in our families with their unique backgrounds, cultures and traditions and in our local and wider communities.

At Marsh Green Primary School, the study of history ignites children’s curiosity about the past in Britain and the wider world. Through finding out about how and why the world, our country, culture and local community have developed over time, children can understand how the past influences the present.

History enables children to develop a context for their growing sense of identity and a chronological framework for their knowledge of significant events and people. What they learn through history can influence their decisions about personal choices, attitudes and values.

At Marsh Green Primary School, our intent, when teaching history, is to stimulate the children’s curiosity, so that they can develop their historical knowledge, skills and understanding.

Implementation

At Marsh Green Primary School, our history curriculum aims to enable all children, regardless of background, ability or additional needs, to flourish to become the very best version of themselves that they can possibly be.

The teaching and learning of history is underpinned by clear knowledge progression. Historical knowledge is built on, year on year, and history units of work are sequenced appropriately, in order to maximise learning for all children.

We also recognise that, in order to become effective historians, our children need to be provided with a range of increasingly progressive and challenging opportunities to analyse and interpret evidence, using primary and secondary sources, and to formulate their own conclusions. By helping children to develop this ability to review evidence and put across their point of view, we are providing them with skills which will help them in their adult life.

We also provide a variety of curriculum enrichment experiences through educational visits, trips and workshops linked to the topics covered, for each year group. This enables our children to experience a rich variety of 'hands-on' learning, as well as access to heritage sites and expert historians.

Impact

During their time at Marsh Green Primary School, all children will have developed:

• A secure knowledge and understanding of people, events and contexts from the historical periods covered.
• The ability to think critically about history and communicate confidently in styles appropriate to a range of audiences.
• The ability to consistently support, evaluate and challenge their own and others’ views using detail, appropriate and accurate historical evidence derived from a range of sources.
• The ability to think, reflect, debate, discuss and evaluate the past, forming and refining questions and lines of enquiry.
• A passion for history and an enthusiastic engagement in learning, which develops their sense of curiosity about the past and their understanding of how and why people interpret the past in different ways.
• A respect for historical evidence and the ability to make robust and critical use of it to support their explanations and judgements.
• A desire to embrace challenging activities, including opportunities to undertake high-quality research across a range of topics.