History Curriculum Vision

“The more you know about the past, the better prepared you are for the future.” (Theodore Roosevelt)

Purpose and Intent

Through history we aim to stimulate children’s interest, understanding and curiosity about the past alongside providing a curriculum with appropriate knowledge and skills while meeting the needs of all backgrounds, cultures and abilities. We have carefully developed our curriculum to capitalise on our local history as a way of starting to build each child’s sense of identity and recognising where they fit in the world.

We strive to instil in all of our children a passion to make positive change, learning from all lessons in history – both the mistakes to avoid repeating and the wonderful successes to emanate. We encourage children at Radipole to be inquisitive and curious, teaching them to investigate these past events and, by so doing, to develop their skills of enquiry, analysis, interpretation and problem-solving.

Implementation and Realisation

In our teaching of history, Radipole strives to give our children high quality, meaningful and engaging learning opportunities. Our History curriculum emphasises the importance of our children developing a growing understanding of their place in the world, supporting and reflecting their cultural identity and protecting their sense of self. We aim to ensure that we address the diversity of not only our own community but also the wider communities (local, national and international).

Within a unit of history at Radipole you will see:

• interactive and immersive lessons and enriching opportunities, such as trips and use of artefacts, allowing all children to access rich experiences to support History and bring it to life;
• chronology that grows with each pupil as they move along their journey through Radipole;
• in all lessons, all pupils enabled to engage in the learning, with carefully considered resources and adult support or differentiated work to overcome difficulties from a special educational need or a disadvantaged background;
• diverse ways of learning and recording learning to allow all children to be able to engage fully with all lessons;
• teaching and learning which focuses on the skills;
• frequent reflection and connection across units.

Impact and Evaluation

Children at Radipole will be given, through their learning of history, a rich foundation of knowledge and understanding of their world and where they have come from, as well as where others have come from and, in turn, tolerance, acceptance and willingness to understand from others’ perspectives. Ultimately, they will be able to see the big picture, having built a deep sense of chronology, they will be able to make connections within and across different periods of time therefore making positive choices for their own futures.

The children’s learning is assessed against the learning objectives, which are taken from the National Curriculum.  In addition to this, children’s progress is monitored through regular questioning and discussion. Skills and knowledge are built upon through curriculum progression across the year groups and across sequences of lessons, to allow learning to be fully embedded.