History

History curriculum intent statement 

Intent

At Mareham, our History curriculum ensures that knowledge and key skills are taught in a systematic, well-planned and progressive manner.

At Mareham, our whole curriculum is driven by:

• creating a sense of awe and wonder – curiosity, excitement, getting children to think and enquire more
• our place in our world - respect for living things, local, national and global knowledge and beyond, cultures, traditions, diversity
• vocabulary – refines and enriches communication, better understanding and language

We aim to develop our children – physically, socially, mentally, culturally and spiritually – to embrace lifelong learning with a sense of awe and wonder in order to make a positive contribution to the local and wider community. We intend to equip children with the skills to develop their knowledge through researching and studying places and people from different time periods. As historians, pupils are exposed to a wide and rich curriculum that allows them to apply new vocabulary and knowledge.

Our Christian values shape how we behave, what we say, how we build relationships and how we learn. Our History curriculum is designed to help each child to be able to think and speak like a historian; developing  independence for learning whilst achieving academically and meeting age-related expectations by the end of their primary education.

We are friendly, inclusive to all and build resilience; encouraging a positive mindset amongst our children as it is often through mistakes that we learn the most. Everyone thrives through feeling safe, confident and valued and the well-being of each and every individual is a priority.

'Live life to the full and create a better future for all.'

Implementation

At Mareham, children are expected to work hard and demonstrate positive learning behaviours to maximise their own individual learning potential. We are committed to working in partnership with parents as we believe that when home and school work closely together we get the best outcomes. Lessons follow clear objectives and teachers check pupils’ understanding and knowledge, identify misconceptions accurately and provide clear, direct feedback, responding and adapting their teaching as necessary. Open discussions and questioning are used effectively throughout the curriculum.

History is carefully planned over the long term so that pupils acquire and build on the knowledge and cultural capital they need to broaden their horizons, become aspirational citizens and succeed in life.

Key vocabulary is carefully chosen. This is displayed in classrooms and shared at the start of all lessons. Children are encouraged to use the key vocabulary to talk ‘like a historian’.

Impact

 As a Year 6 Historian transitioning into secondary school, we aspire that pupils not only achieve the age-appropriate standard at the end of Key Stage 2, but they have begun to know their place in the world and how it came to be through events that happened previously; they retain and apply knowledge that is pertinent to history, allowing children’s enjoyment of history lessons to develop their curiosity about the past. Children will know more, remember more and understand more. Children will retain prior-learning and explicitly make connections between what they have previously learned and what they are currently learning.

They are also enabled to:

• Ensure that children have a sense of awe and wonder about and understand Britain’s past and that of the wider world.
• Enable children to research further, to question what they've learnt and the reliance of historical sources
• Develop an awareness of their place in the wider world, making comparisons between their lives today and other civilisations
• Develop an understanding of different historical periods, with a chronological knowledge of the past.
• Be able to apply an extensive base of historical vocabulary.