History

Intent

At Sandhills we aim for our pupils to be able to investigate, understand, and reflect on key stories and events in their local community and beyond. We aim that our pupils develop a deep understanding of local, national and international events, along with an understanding of significant individuals and cultures throughout history. 

The study of history is important for our pupil's conceptual development at Sandhills School. We want our pupils to begin to understand that the past has many different facets and that each era is different from the next, as well as being different from our own. The study of history helps to build our pupil’s understanding of society.

We aim to provide an inclusive history curriculum that is carefully planned to develop our pupils’ understanding; a curriculum that will inspire our pupils; and a curriculum that will help our pupils to recognise our values in action, helping them to feel prepared for the next stage of their education and life beyond.

Implementation

Our history curriculum introduces our pupils to the key concepts of cause and consequence, similarity and difference, change and continuity and handling evidence. These concepts continue to be explored as children progress through the school through an enquiry approach by asking a 'key question' to be answered by the end of each unit of work. Our history curriculum will build on concepts of history by teaching and applying the following skills:

• Enquiry

• Interpreting and understanding evidence

• Chronological understanding

• Communicating and presenting information and ideas

Teachers will promote thinking and inspire pupils’ curiosity at Sandhills by planning challenging and stimulating lessons. Pupils will develop their knowledge and skills through small step learning, where lessons are carefully sequenced to build on knowledge and understanding in an exciting and engaging way. History lessons will be taught weekly.

All staff have high expectations of our pupils and where necessary, scaffolding is used to ensure all children have access to learning. We use ‘flashback’ as a retrieval technique to help children to remember more from previous lessons and topics. Artefacts and photographs are used in appropriate units of work, allowing children to have first-hand experiences in the classroom. Where appropriate, educational visits, WOW days and visitors are organised to enrich teaching and learning in history.

History in EYFS

In EYFS, children develop their historical understanding throughout the school year through Understanding of the World. Children learn about the concept of past and present and about the lives of significant individuals through storytelling and by drawing on real world experiences.