St. Helen's Primary School

History

Our History Vision

The history curriculum at St Helen’s Primary School is designed to give children knowledge of their rich, local heritage alongside teaching them about British and World history, so that they can use their knowledge and historical enquiry skills to influence their future.

At the heart of our curriculum is the substantive and disciplinary knowledge that children need to prepare them for success in their education journey and to prepare them for work in different industries.

Substantive history knowledge is the core leaning from the disciplines of topic knowledge, chronological knowledge and substantive concepts.

Disciplinary knowledge involves the second order concepts: sources and evidence, historical interpretations, cause and consequence, change and continuity, similarity and difference and historical significance. These concepts help children to understand how historians investigate the past, and how they construct historical claims, arguments and accounts.

Our curriculum is based on Development Matters and the National Curriculum.

History in EYFS

Our Early Years provision is language rich and has been carefully created to provide a range of opportunities both indoor and outdoor to help develop essential knowledge and skills.

By the end of Key Stage 1

Pupils should develop an awareness of the past, using common words and phrases relating to the passage of time. They should know where the people and events they study fit within a chronological framework and identify similarities and differences between ways of life in different periods. They should use a wide vocabulary of everyday historical terms. They should ask and answer question, choosing and using parts of stories and other sources to show that they know and understand key features of events. They should understand some of the ways in which we find out about the past and identify different ways in which it is represented.

By the end of Key Stage 2

Pupils should continue to develop a chronologically secure knowledge and understanding of British, local and World history, establishing clear narratives within and across the periods they study. They should note connections, contrasts, and trends over time and develop the appropriate use of historical terms. They should regularly address and sometimes devise historically valid questions about change, cause, similarity and difference and significance. They should construct informed responses that involve thoughtful selection and organisation of relevant historical information, They should understand how our knowledge of the past is constructed from a range of sources.

SEND Statement

St Helen's promotes a curriculum that puts all pupils, regardless of their needs, at the heart of what we do. By building mutual respect, we accept others for their differences believing that everyone is special and everyone has something to offer, Our inclusive and enriching curriculum, written for all children, provides pupils with meaningful and aspirational experiences as well as promoting personal growth for life-long learning. when the curriculum needs adapting to suit the needs of individual children, appropriate modifications are made by the class teacher with support of the SENDCo and the Curriculum Subject Lead.

History Mapping

Cultural Capital

Central to the teaching of history is the enrichment of the curriculum through trips and visits. It has an impact on pupil's leaning by creating memorable experiences both in the classroom and beyond. This could involve cross curricula approaches, visits, speakers, projects and learning with others. At St Helen's we seek to connect fully with our rich local heritage, such as significant local people who helped shape the town and the Bombardment in WW1 in our unique position on the Headland.

We promote a language rich history curriculum which is carefully planned in each topic. This is important to prepare our children for future successes.

Another significant area in history is the links to other areas of the curriculum. Our children have started to use historical vocabulary in class discussions. We want our children to feel excited and engaged by the past and draw upon this knowledge to help shape the future. We see links with other subjects and find our children do this naturally. Recent examples include creating maps to Ward Jackson park in geography and looking at how materials were used in the past linking to science.