Hermitage Primary School

History at Hermitage Primary School

Subject Leader Mr S Torrie

The National Curriculum tells us...

'A high quality history education will help pupils gain a coherent knowledge and understanding of Britain's past and that of the wider world. It should inspire pupils' curiosity to know more about the past. Teaching should equip pupils to ask perceptive questions, think critically, weigh evidence, sift arguments and develop perspective and judgement. History helps pupils to understand the complexity of people's lives, the process of change, the diversity of societies and relationships between different groups, as well as their own identity and the challenges of their time.'

The national curriculum for history aims to ensure that all pupils:

• know and understand the history of these islands as a coherent, chronological narrative, from the earliest times to the present day: how people’s lives have shaped this nation and how Britain has influenced and been influenced by the wider world
• know and understand significant aspects of the history of the wider world: the nature of ancient civilisations; the expansion and dissolution of empires; characteristic features of past non-European societies; achievements and follies of mankind
• gain and deploy a historically grounded understanding of abstract terms such as ‘empire’, ‘civilisation’, ‘parliament’ and ‘peasantry’
• understand historical concepts such as continuity and change, cause and consequence, similarity, difference and significance, and use them to make connections, draw contrasts, analyse trends, frame historically-valid questions and create their own structured accounts, including written narratives and analyses
• understand the methods of historical enquiry, including how evidence is used rigorously to make historical claims, and discern how and why contrasting arguments and interpretations of the past have been constructed
• gain historical perspective by placing their growing knowledge into different contexts, understanding the connections between local, regional, national and international history; between cultural, economic, military, political, religious and social history; and between short- and long-term timescales.

Click here to view the National Curriculum for History 

When studying history, we encourage children to raise questions and seek information from a variety of sources including books, artefacts and documents and recommended websites on the internet. We also encourage visitors to school including grand-parents of pupils to talk about life when they were young and to answer the many questions our pupils have. We take our classes to museums and Living History days; for example at Tatton Old Hall and the Grosvenor Museum in Chester.

Whenever possible, historical skills are reinforced through links with other subjects. For example, making ancient Greek style vases with clay in art or writing a recount of an event from the viewpoint of a significant person, E.g. Samuel Pepys and The Great Fire of London.

Our History study units can be found on our History Long Term Plan Overview document below.