Ambition

Here at Parklands, we share our love of History, through celebration days, unique trips and visits and a bespoke curriculum. We aim to provide our children with engaging, memorable experiences whilst building strong historical skills of enquiry and knowledge, which builds year on year, progressively as they move through the school. We aim to deliver this within a context that enables our pupils. Over their time here at Parklands, to have built a coherent understanding of key historical moments in British and World history, and understand the vast historical legacy that we build upon in these modern times.

How we achieve our ambitions 

Our historical content takes the children on a journey from prehistory to modern times.

Starting in EYFS, children begin to understand the world and the concept of past and present, exploring prehistoric times through their themed learning.

As children head into Year 1, children will begin to understand key monarchs through British history and the impact of their reign on people living through those periods, as well as on modern day life.

Moving into Year 2, children investigate pioneers of history who took journeys into the unknown and how this changed the lives of people in that time and beyond through their perseverance  and determination. With a focus significant events, including the Great fire of London and the Civil war, that shaped history.

Building upon our History journey so far, Year 3 children continue to explore how ancient Britain shaped life today, including how the British Isles were shaped by our Roman and Viking conquerors – battles and resistance, key individuals and what life was like for the Britons and the Celts, as well as the bronze age, Iron age and the rise of Boudica.

Moving into Year 4, children will explore what ancient civilisations looked like, how they were ruled, how they lived and traded; what they achieved and the impact of this on future civilisations, making comparative links between leaders, communication, war, and explorers and conquerors throughout British and world history.

In Year 5, children explore how and why Britain declared war, not only in 1914 but also why reluctantly war was declared again only a few decades later. This incorporates all of the previous knowledge studied in previous year groups relating to warfare, communication and leaders throughout history and this in turned has shaped our lives today.

Finally in Year 6, children continue to build their historical enquiry skills by exploring life after the second world war, with a focus on the very diverse and definitive decades of world history – the 1960’s. Looking at the USA – Vietnam and the Peace Protest – children understand key events that led to the Vietnam War, how this impacted on those living in Vietnam then and now; comparing this to previous learning of World War 1 & 2, exploring opposing viewpoints and recognising cause and consequence.

Throughout their journey, from EYFS up to Year 6, children will also explore key historic periods in Britain and their local area. We seek to build links for our children as they gain knowledge, so that by the end of their time here at Parklands:

• they have an understanding of different models of leadership and government;
• are able to be discerning about historical sources and recognise the impact of partiality within this;
• can recognise similarities and differences across historical periods;
• can ask questions and make judgements based on evidence;
• and ultimately, recognise that modern life has been built on the success and failures of a vast period on human history

Alongside their knowledge curriculum, our children are encouraged to develop their historical enquiry skills year on year. We enable this through our unique skills grid that organises enquiry skills into year groups to ensure that children advance their ability to analyse and interpret history.

Each year progresses on the previous enabling children the opportunity to practise and consolidate a set of skills before progressing them the following year. This enables staff to further support or challenge each child’s learning as necessary to ensure a personalised learning journey.

Outcomes

Our History curriculum prioritises unique learning experiences in sequence with fun, creative lessons to promote our children developing a love for history and an appreciation for its impact on – and relevance in – modern society. Through a bespoke knowledge and skills based curriculum, we ensure our children approach history through a number of viewpoints.

As a result, we are preparing them with the ability to think outside the box and creatively, whilst understanding the importance of perspective and rationality. Overall, History at Parklands aims to give our children the confidence, skills and enthusiasm to delve deeper into our world’s history as they embark on their learning journey in further education.