At Coltishall Primary School, we intend to develop both children’s wider understanding of their place in the world and the critical and analytical skills that are applied to History. We aim to give children a deeper understanding of British and global history alongside with the tools they need to explore for themselves. We base our history curriculum on inquiry based questions, using specific geographical and chronological points to explore  wider themes and concepts associated with a period. 

Aims

• To give children a deeper understanding and awareness of both British and global history.
• To provide children with the  critical and analytical skills that are required for both history and in a wider context in the curriculum
• To embed a diverse range of voices and perspectives into our history curriculum
• To enable children to ask and pursue significant questions in History
• To use specific and relevant examples to explore wider themes and concepts in History 
• To provide valuable experiences that build on children’s historical understanding

Coverage

History at Coltishall builds on children’s knowledge as well as their skills as they progress through the school. Beginning with concepts based on their own experiences  and understanding in History, we develop children’s knowledge along not only chronological lines, but also following themes of movement and migration, technological change and daily life. The skills involved move from allowing the children to use an enquiry question as a vehicle to explore history, to using this question to build on their prior knowledge, to eventually asking their own questions of historical importance. 

We achieve this through a range of strategies including:

• enquiry questions
• drama activities and role play
• open ended projects and presentations
• child-led and goal orientated research projects

The history curriculum is based on inquiry based learning questions that reflect the different concepts and themes. Staff are encouraged to use these questions as the basis for their assessment of a student's understanding and as a vehicle to explore various themes in the period or topic.

EYFS 

Whilst the EYFS curriculum does not explicitly have a historical aspect, it is fundamental in building pupils' understanding of the wider world and concepts around the past. At Coltishall, much of the EYFS curriculum is child led, however the EYFS team ensures the foundations of a historical understanding is developed. This is covered in building their understanding of our community and the world in the wider world part of the curriculum, which includes religious stories and visits to and from members of the community . Chronology and ideas around the past are included in storytelling, observation of changes in seasons and sharing news and past experiences. 

SEND

History should be accessible for all learners at Coltishall and  all children should be given challenging and meaningful experiences in history. Other barriers to learning should not impede children’s understanding of history and historical concepts.  Learning may be scaffolded to enable children to access the concepts in a history lesson, so they are not held back by other barriers to their learning. Children may be given access to additional resources such as timelines, word banks or visual prompts. In some cases it may be appropriate for some learners to complete parallel tasks that have the same objectives, but suit the needs of the learner.