Teaching GCSE History: Northern Ireland 1968-99 (AQA and Edexcel)

>>SMART TASK ADDED OCTOBER 2011

Teaching the Irish question as part of the SHP Modern World Study coursework will be familiar to many of you.  Now the option has been extended so that it appears as part of Edexcel’s Controlled Assessment.

Smart Task

Overview of Irish history; a question of perspectives.  Challenging activity in which students have to predict which iconic moments in Irish history are best known by 16-year-old Protestant and Catholic students in Ireland today. Great scope for rich discussion in which contrasting perspectives are examined and explained. By using the actual results of a recent survey students can see that there is real purpose to the task. They enjoy seeing how close they can get to what their contemporaries in Irish schools today know about their own history.

Recommended Resources

By far the best starting point is the Ireland in schools website which is geared specifically to the demands of the SHP course and developed by a team of Nottinghamshire history teachers.  The main headings focus on the historical background to Bloody Sunday and are organized as below.  

• Division & Peace
• Ireland’s Bloody Past 1 - Lower
• Ireland’s Bloody Past 2 - Higher
• Orange Marches
• Bloody Sunday & IRA 1 - Assignments
• Bloody Sunday &IRA 2 - Background
• Partition of Ireland 1. Study unit 2. Documents
• Conflict at Holy Cross School, Belfast

The site also offers some excellent preparatory materials for Year 9.

Here is a very useful site from the Northern Ireland branch of the BBC. As you can see, it focuses on the Siege of Londonderry.

>>Outstanding lessons and other smart tasks to follow.