The reason for teaching history at Elson is that it changes and enriches understanding of what pupil see in the world and how they see it.  

Without children having “knowledge of their past history, origin and culture is like a tree without roots”. It should inspire pupil’s curiosity to know about Britain’s past and the wider world.  

At Elson, History will be taught in a coherent chronological narrative so that each new unit of learning will build on the last one. The focus will be on British History, and how people’s lives have shaped the children’s present culture (and how it might influence their future). We will also learn how the wider world has influenced us.  In Upper school, children will also learn about the nature of ancient civilization and how they have influenced their understanding of the world. Children will learn the wonders, achievements, mistakes and problems that have immerged from them. 

Children will learn through enquiry.  They will have an overarching question to answer. There will be opportunities for both collaborative and independent learning where the children get to grips with the nature of that question. This will need to be based on historical fact finding through using primary and secondary resources (and understand how sometimes that is challenging). 

 During the process of enquiry children will improve understanding of historical concepts such as continuity and change, cause and consequence, similarity, difference and significance and use them to make connections.  

Finally, historical enquiry at Elson will build confidence for our children to be independent thinkers, ask questions, develop high level reasoning and learn how to justify conclusions.  These are valued transferable skills for many areas of learning. Historical enquiry will develop our children as deeper thinking, lifelong learners.  

Curriculum Overview 

Please be aware that the order may change within the year group. If you have any questions, please ask your child’s class teacher.