History

Teaching of History at Elevate Trust schools is based on the aims and purposes outlined in the National Curriculum and has fidelity to the historical academic discipline.

Our curriculum is guided by the following academic fingerprint:

Children will:

• Have secure knowledge and understanding of the past, on a local, national and global scale.
• Have a coherent chronological understanding, be able to analyse sources and weigh evidence, and confidently enquire and ask perceptive questions about the past.
• Become confident in their understanding of key historical concepts (disciplinary knowledge), including continuity and change, cause and consequence, similarity, difference, sources and evidence, interpretation, and significance.
• Use their knowledge and understanding to make connections, create historically valid questions, and create structured accounts, including, but not limited to, written responses.
• Grow in their curiosity and enthusiasm about the past and use this to understand the diversity of different cultures and societies, as well as their own identities.

We have carefully designed a knowledge-rich curriculum, underpinned by a progression of skills. In our mixed age classes, children are supported to develop a clear chronological understanding of the past through regular revisiting of timelines and retrieval activities to ensure that all new learning is contextualised by what children have learnt before. Curriculum content has been carefully chosen to develop children's understanding of the diverse world beyond their local area. Knowledge and skills build incrementally so that by the end of Key Stage 2 children can know, understand and apply the subject content taught, and be fully prepared for their secondary school History learning.

EYFS 

The Early Years Foundation Stage Curriculum supports children’s understanding of History through the planning and teaching of ‘Understanding the World’. This aspect is about how children find out about past and present events in their own lives, their families and other people they know. Children are encouraged to develop a sense of change over time and are given opportunities to differentiate between past and present by observing routines throughout the day, growing plants, observing the passing of seasons and time and looking at photographs of their life and of others. Use of language relating to time is used in daily routines and conversations with children for example, ‘yesterday', ‘old', ‘past', ‘now' and ‘then', supported by photographs and floor books to enable children to relate the past to their own experiences. Children in EYFS may access some learning alongside their older peers but content is carefully planned using the EYFS curriculum to ensure this prepares them for later learning.