An Oxton St Saviour's Historian

History at St. Saviour’s

Intent

At Oxton St Saviour’s we are historians! We want them to have no limits to what their ambitions are and grow up enabled to become historians, teachers, researchers, archivists, museum curators, archaeologists or research analysts. We want our children to remember their History lessons in our school, to cherish these memories and embrace the historical opportunities they are presented with.

The History curriculum promotes curiosity and a love for learning. Children feel equipped and inspired to think critically, ask perceptive questions and study evidence provided in order to gain an understanding of society and change. Children feel empowered to make connections and note contrasts over time.

Implementation

To ensure high standards of teaching and learning in History, we implement a curriculum that is progressive throughout the whole school. History is taught over three half terms per year, focusing on knowledge and skills stated in the National Curriculum. This helps to ensure sufficient time is allocated to History and that subject matter can be revisited. We believe that by crafting our curriculum this way, we improve the potential for our children to retain what they have been taught, to alter their long-term memory and thus improve the rates of progress they make. History provides excellent opportunities to enhance the learning of more able pupils through the investigations, analysing sources and writing extended pieces.

We develop the following characteristics of historians:

• A knowledge and understanding of people, events, and contexts from a range of historical periods and of historical concepts and processes.

• The ability to think critically about history and communicate ideas confidently in styles appropriate to a range of audiences.

• The ability to consistently support, evaluate and challenge their own and others’ views using detailed, appropriate and accurate historical evidence derived from a range of sources.

• The ability to think, reflect, debate, discuss and evaluate the past, formulating 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 judgments.

Impact

The assessment activities and frameworks will help demonstrate that teaching has resulted in clear and appropriate outcomes.

Outcomes in the children’s books evidence a broad and balanced history curriculum and demonstrate children’s acquisition of identified key knowledge relating to each of the identified national curriculum strands.