Teaching history at Keystage 4

Welcome to the Key Stage 4 section of the site. There are a significant number of history department sites where the target is clearly GCSE history students. This site's focus is quite different. It has been written for history subject leaders and classroom teachers. 

You will find that there is a wealth of advice on all aspects of leading history. Because I have spent so much of my professional life improving schools' GCSE history results I have accumulated considerable knowledge of what works, which I want to pass on. The 25 history departments I worked with recently showed an average improvement of half a GCSE grade for every student compared to the results two years previously. As you might expect, therefore, the sections on raising attainment and using data have had a massive influence on those departments that have already acted on the advice. Colleagues I have worked with have kindly contributed short case studies describing how they managed to bring about rapid and substantial improvement. You can't find this sort of material elsewhere. 

Likewise with monitoring. The incredibly useful advice on conducting student, interviews and work scrutiny will prove every bit as helpful as the very practical advice on classroom observation and feeding back to colleagues. If you are looking for guidance on prioritising and forward planning you will find not only advice but an element of interactivity. 

For many of you, the site will simply prove to be a source of inspiration. You may choose to visit the very popular 100 great teaching ideas, or the equally influential imaginative learning activities, all of which have been tried and tested by many teachers.

 Few of you will be able to resist coming back to the outstanding lessons section. Here you will find a large and growing list of lessons that I have rated as outstanding either during routine work in monitoring achievement or in one of my 65 OFSTED history inspections. Because we see the lessons being customised to suit your teaching style and your learners' needs, we have put most of the learning materials in PowerPoint presentations which you can easily modify and personalise.

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