Teaching history at Key stage 1 Archives

Welcome to the teaching history at KS1 section where you will find masses of advice on how to make KS1 history lessons fun and how to help pupils to take their first steps into the fascinating world that is the past. You will be helped to design and plan an exciting primary history curriculum in line with the requirements of the National Curriculum taking into account the difficult areas of assessment and progression in history.You also will be helped to make the most of history’s contribution to the whole curriculum by being shown cutting edge practice in the areas of cross-curricular planning, literacy, thinking skills and creativity.

If it is imaginative ideas for KS1 history lessons you are looking for, then you will definitely want to spend time in the teaching section with its hundred great primary history teaching strategies and in the learning section with its wide range of imaginative approaches and brilliant ideas for products that children will love.As a subject leader, you will find easily accessible advice that is ‘right on the money’. Years of helping hundreds of infant teachers with their history planning, resourcing, and monitoring in history, has enabled me to know exactly what is needed, and which support strategies really work.

Raising the profile of history at KS1

One of the main roles of subject leaders for history is to be a passionate advocate for the subject. The…

Progression in chronology – KS1

Start of KS1 Can describe differences between him or herself as a baby and as he or she is now….

Learning principles applied to history at KS1

Effective history teaching at Key Stage 1 is rooted in sound learning principles that support young children’s development. At this…

Mind friendly learning. What should you be doing in your classroom?

Mind-friendly learning in history focuses on creating rich, engaging experiences that align with how young children’s brains develop and absorb…

Castles knowledge organiser – KS1

You are learning about castles because they are one of the most fascinating buildings that have been there for hundreds…

Castles – medium term planner

The main focus of this topic is the exploration of the past beyond living memory through a topic that is…

Castles – KQ1 – What makes a castle a castle?

Having elicited pupils’ initial knowledge of castles from books film and family visits, pupils are asked to explore a number…

Castles – KQ2 – Why did people build castles in the past?

This session is straightforward in that pupils are introduced via a short video to a variety of reasons which not…

Castles – KQ3 – What made castles so strong?

Rather than going through all the different methods used chronologically, this really fun session focuses on one year and casts…

Castles – KQ4 – What were medieval castles like to live in and how can we possibly know when so many are now ruins?

This five-part lesson starts with pupils in role as workers for company charged with recreating what a medieval castle would…

Castles – KQ5 – How did castles change over time?

This lesson starts with encouraging pupils to spot differences between 3 castles to give them confidence before working in groups…

Castles – KQ6 – How are castles used today?

Pupils have to deduce from a range of visual clues of castles they will see around them, the uses to…

Mary Anning – assessment task

Focus: Significance This simple-to-administer, uncomplicated task uses a contemporary image to stimulate pupils to think about Mary Anning’s long-term significance….

Grace Darling – assessment task

Focus: Interpretations Y1 Pupils compare contrasting images of Graces’ rescue and try to explain how and why they are different….

Seaside – assessment task

Focus: similarity and difference and change Assessing Year 1 children’s understanding of how different going for a swim in the…

Great Fire – assessment task

Focus: Causation Using one large colour image as a stimulus pupils have to draw on their detailed understanding of the…

Caxton and Bell – assessment task

Focus: characteristic features of period & using sources Y2 Using just one image which contains lots of clues, pupils have…

Moon landing – assessment task

Focus : Using sources Pupils have to identify key features from a visual source to answer a question regarding the…

Rosa Parks knowledge organiser – KS1

Rosa Parks was an important black woman who wasn’t afraid to stand up for herself when she was treated unfairly….

Mary Anning knowledge organiser – KS1

You are learning about Mary Anning because she became very famous at a very young age. She was an expert…

Progression in why people did things, why events happened, and what happened as a result (cause and consequence) in KS1 history

Start of Key Stage 1 Can explain why one character in a simple story took the action he or she…

Wright brothers – assessment task

In this brief diagnostic assessment task , supported by 4 pictorial clues, pupils are asked to show if they understand…

10 questions which we should ask when planning historical enquiries at KS1

Planning effective historical enquiries at Key Stage 1 lays the foundation for developing children’s curiosity, critical thinking, and understanding of…

Sinking of the Titanic – assessment task – looking at consequences and change

This task asks pupils to consider consequences of the disaster and changes over time arising from it Assessment task and…

Florence Nightingale – assessment task

Focus: Change and significance This task offers pupils 3 carefully chose images to support their understanding of the achievements of…

Amy Johnson – assessment task – Can you explain why Amy Johnson was so important?

The children are given the task sheet containing three pictures and the question. Each has been included for a particular…

Toys; old and new – assessment task

Focus concept: Making deductions/ similarity and difference This task is designed to be non-threatening and to be carried out in…

Scott of the Antarctic – assessment task Y2

Focus concept: Causation The first task serves as a more gentle introduction to the idea of cause by looking at…

Mary Seacole – Assessment task – Assessing pupils’ understanding of the work of Mary Seacole

Target concepts: characteristic features of the period and significance This task is designed to elicit pupils’ understanding of the contribution…

Amy Johnson knowledge organiser – KS1

You are learning about Amy Johnson because she was a very famous British pilot who flew her plane, called Jason,…

Toys old and new knowledge organiser – KS1

You are learning about old toys to help you to understand the difference between toys people played with in the…

Moon landing – end of unit quiz – KS1

Welcome to the end of unit Moon landing quiz for KS1. You’ve learned so much about how astronauts traveled all…

9 highly effective retrieval activities that really help history to stick ..and show real historical understanding too!

To prevent retrieval activities simply resembling a random fact pub quiz consider using the following , which I’m sure many…

Ideas for assemblies on the Olympics: Dorando’s story

At both KS1 and KS2 it would be good to focus on one individual and see the extent to which…

Using story books at KS1 to develop a sense of time

I have written on this topic before, but there are always new and fresh titles appearing that necessitate an update….

Left luggage activity on the Titanic using artefacts provided by a Southampton Museum

Strategies for introducing and using historical artefacts at Key Stage 1

As a preliminary activity try using sheets of unused tissue paper. Challenge the class to pass the unfolded piece of…

Six step approach to structuring history lessons at KS1

Step 1: Teacher motivates pupils to want to learn and scopes the enquiry Hooking them in: eg. with a slow…

Case study: The importance of history to the curriculum – history policy at Vicarage Primary

History is all about people. The study of people of different types from different times and different places is the…

Amelia Earhart knowledge organiser – KS1

You are learning about Amelia because she was a very famous American woman who learned how to fly and then…

Amelia Earhart – KQ1 – Why do we think that Amelia was famous?

This introductory session starts with firing pupils’ curiosity via a slow reveal in which pupils build a picture of her…

Amelia Earhart – KQ2 – What were the main events in Amelia’s life that shaped her ?

Having listened to an illustrated description of Amelia’s early life, pupils have to select suitable adjectives to describe her character…

Amelia Earhart – KQ3 – Why was Amelia so keen to fly when so few women at the time were interested?

A relatively short session exploring Amelia’s motivation starts with pupils drawing on their prior knowledge to consider why she took…

Amelia Earhart – KQ4 – What were the main ups and downs in Amelia’s life?

Using the living graph technique pupils sequence the events of Amelia’s flying career and then physically create points on a…

Amelia Earhart – KQ5 – How do we know so much about Amelia’s life when she lived so long ago?

In this session pupils get to work as history detectives matching clues within sources to statements historians have made about…

Amelia Earhart – KQ6 – What was Amelia’s greatest achievement and how should it be remembered?

Working towards the end goal of producing a book cover to encapsulate the key details of Amelia’s achievements, pupils learn,…

History as problem solving

Pupils solve problems when they study mathematics. They solve problems in science lessons. So why not in history? Perhaps it’s…

When three queens ruled knowledge organiser – KS1

In this topic you are going to find out about three of the most famous queens that each ruled this…

When three queens ruled – KQ1 – Which three queens of England are most remembered in history and why?

This active and entertaining first session aims to provide pupils with a clear chronological overview of the last 500 years…

cartoon of queen victoria looking out window

When three queens ruled – KQ2 – How different was life in England when the 3 queens were ruling?

Out of the window Children are shown three images of scenes from the different periods as seen through a window….

When three queens ruled – KQ3 – How do we know about the queens who lived so long ago?

Handling sources of evidence Having explored the range of visual sources available to historians studying the three queens, pupils actively…

Teaching history at Key stage 1

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