OFSTED History Deep Dives | What to Expect & How to Prepare | Keystage History
OFSTED’s focus on all foundation subjects not just the core is to be welcomed. Less welcome are the unrealistic expectations being placed on often very inexperienced history leaders in primary schools. We need to get a sense of proportion here.
There’s nothing wrong with OFSTED shining a light on important aspects of the curriculum-indeed, I welcome this- but there needs to be a better balance between growing and weighing. Its all very well to critically appraise provision but how are subject leaders being supported both before and after the inspection. That is where this site comes into its own.
OFSTED’s focus on history deep dives 2024
From time to time, its worth reminding ourselves of what OFSTED chooses to comment on when reporting its findings from deep-dive inspections. Most of you won’t have time to read…
Read More7 don’ts when it comes to OFSTED deep dives in primary history
1. DON’T assume that OFSTED has an expectation of what constitutes schemes of work: they don’t I mention this because you can spend so long trying to get the paperwork…
Read MoreEYFS and History in OFSTED deep dives
According to OFSTED (January 2023), inspectors will want to know how key stage 1 builds on the knowledge that children learn in the early years. They will want to look…
Read MoreKey points from OFSTED’s briefing on 2nd February 2022
Do leaders of a subject need to be specialists? In primary schools, particularly small ones, we know that staff wear lots of hats. In small schools, it may be the…
Read MoreOFSTED’s view of deep dives in history
Recently Matthew Purves , the Deputy Director for Schools, set out OFSTED’s latest thinking on deep dives in primary schools. He makes reference a number of times to what that…
Read MoreDeep dive issues: progression and assessment in primary history
One of the features of deep dive subject inspections is that the two hardest areas of a primary history leader’s role are in danger of being painfully exposed. One is…
Read MoreOFSTED’s early EIF (2019) primary history deep dives
What do the first 3 months’ of reports tell us? Although there is even less detail in the new shorter OFSTED reports than in the previous ones, there are still…
Read MoreWhat do deep dive OFSTED inspections look like for history?
What does a new deep dive 2019 inspection look like for history? Basically, there are 6 areas that the history subject leader may expect to be involved in Exploration of…
Read MoreMore thoughts on primary history OFSTED deep dives
Recently Matthew Purves, the Deputy Director for Schools, set out OFSTED latest thinking on deep dives in primary schools. He makes reference a number of times to what that means…
Read MoreWritten by Neil Thompson
All content on Keystage history is written and quality assured by Neil Thompson, a former history teacher, county history adviser and Ofsted inspector with more than 30 years’ experience in history education.