Teaching history at Key stage 2 (KS2)

Welcome to the section for teaching history at KS2 where you will find masses of advice on how to make history both fun and satisfyingly challenging. You will be helped to design and plan an exciting primary history curriculum , taking into account the difficult areas of assessment and progression and mindful of the new focus on curriculum within OFSTED’s framework. You will see how our enquiry-led approach, structured around a limited number of expertly-chosen key questions enables you to blend substantive and disciplinary knowldge. The interplay between the tow is essential for great history learning. One without the other is of very limited value in building historical thinking.

It has been a decade since the last major curriculum review. In that time we have seen masses of superb practice which we are sharing with you. There are minor changes , principlaly around local history and diversity, for the 2028 curriculum which will be published in Spring 2027.

You will be shown which skills and concepts are best developed in which contexts along with examples of key questions that have proved most effective in deepening learning. 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 history planning, literacy, thinking skills and creativity.

The site also offers a unique set of detailed lesson plans and resources for about 150 lessons which have been judged as outstanding by OFSTED.  These cover all the major topics linked to an outstanding medium-term planner which expertly hows how to combine the most significant content  with the development of conceptual understanding.

You will see below that these resources are constantly being added to , thereby ensuring that you have not only the latest and best advise but also the highest quality learning materials for your pupils.