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‘Our History curriculum provides students with a chronological overview of British history and places it in the context of world histories. It teaches them to critique interpretations of these histories and how sources have been used to create these interpretations. This is through the revisiting of key disciplinary(causation, source work and interpretations) and substantive (church, democracy, empire, etc.) concepts.’
Miss E Hurley - Head of History
What is it like to study History at Monk's Walk School?
Pupils will revisit key disciplinary and substantive concepts as they learn new substantive content each year. Disciplinary concepts are built on throughout Key Stage 3, 4 and 5. We measure students’ progress in building more complex analyses of these concepts. They include;
- Causation - how can we explain why historical events happened
- Source work - how to judge the usefulness of sources for different historical enquiries
- Interpretations - why do historians disagree about historical events
Substantive concepts are recurring themes. Students need to have secure understanding of a concept in order to understand it when it reappears. These include; Church, Monarchy, Parliament, Empire, War, Protest, Democracy and Gender.
How is History Assessed?
At Key Stage Three we assess disciplinary progression via a termly extended written assessment of a disciplinary concept (causation, source work, interpretations) applying recently taught content. Progress information given to students reflects the work completed in recent assessments alongside the written and verbal contributions in class.
At Key Stage Four and Five approximately every three weeks a piece of extended written work will receive feedback. This is usually a practice exam question, but can be extended writing in other contexts if appropriate.
We also assess secure understanding via formative questioning in class and make use of whole class feedback, written targets, exemplar work and visualisers to inform reteaching to address misconceptions and developing historical thinking.
