Key Stage 3

Year 7

Intent

Students will develop an understanding of how England developed from the Anglo-Saxon period through to the beginning of the 16th century. This will include learning how England became a monarchy, and how the power of the monarch was challenged across the period. Students will also see the importance of religion in people’s lives and the complexities of the relationship between Church and the State. Students begin to see the emergence of Britain today and begin to make comparisons to the modern world we live in.

Learning Journey

Themes, Concepts and Questions

  • Who were the early people of Britain?
  • Why did the Anglo-Saxons come to England?
  • What was life like in Anglo-Saxon England?
  • What impact did the Anglo-Saxons have on England by 1066?
  • Were the Anglo-Saxons the founders of England?
  • Why was there a crisis in 1066?

Key Knowledge

  • Immigrant
  • Tribe
  • Anglo-Saxons
  • Migration
  • Invasion
  • Monarch
  • Kingdom
  • Pagan
  • Witan
  • Monasteries

Themes, Concepts and Questions

  • How did the Normans gain control over the Anglo-Saxons?
  • How and why did castle design change over time?
  • What was the difference between a siege and a battle?
  • What was the most important factor in deciding the outcome of a battle?

Key Knowledge

  • Motte and Bailey Castle
  • Siege
  • Battle
  • Leadership
  • Trebuchet
  • Archers
  • Concentric Castles
  • Square Keep Castles

Themes, Concepts and Questions

  • What role has religion had throughout history?
  • How important was Christianity in the Middle Ages?
  • How did the Islamic World reflect a Golden Age?
  • Why were the Crusades significant?
  • Why was the Black Death so deadly?
  • What was Africa like in the Middle Ages?

Key Knowledge

  • Pope
  • Archbishop
  • Clergy
  • Pilgrimage
  • Caliph
  • Golden Age
  • House of Wisdom
  • Crusade
  • Holy Land
  • Pandemic
  • Cesspit

Themes, Concepts and Questions

  • What does Henry II’s reign show about the relationship between the Church and State?
  • What was the significance of the Magna Carta?
  • How much power did medieval queens have?
  • How did Parliament evolve?
  • Why was the Peasant’s Revolt significant?

Key Knowledge

  • Magna Carta
  • Barons
  • Parliament
  • Mansa
  • Charter
  • Poll Tax
  • Excommunicate
  • Revolt
  • Penance

Themes, Concepts and Questions

  • What was the Renaissance?
  • What was the Reformation?
  • Who was Martin Luther
  • Why did Henry VIII create the Church of England?
  • How ‘bloody’ was Bloody Mary?
  • How successful was the Elizabethan Settlement?
  • Why was the Spanish Armada defeated?

Key Knowledge

  • Renaissance
  • Christianity
  • Protestant
  • Puritan
  • Catholic
  • Persecution
  • Reformation
  • Settlement
  • Heretic

Themes, Concepts and Questions

  • What was the attitude to women during the Tudor period?
  • Why did Elizabeth I encourage exploration?
  • How did the British Empire begin?
  • How important was Elizabethan Theatre?
  • How was poverty an issue in Elizabethan England?
  • Why was Mary Queen of Scots a threat to Elizabeth I?

Key Knowledge

  • Patriarchal
  • Divine Right
  • Privy Council
  • Propaganda
  • Gloriana
  • Foreign policy
  • New World
  • Voyage
  • Poverty
  • Colony

Skill Development

Students will develop the following skills:

  1. Causation – learning that the reason events happened and outcome of events were multi-causal. Students will begin to consider causes as short term, long term and the trigger cause of an event happening.
  2. Significance – understanding the impact events/people had on society at the time but also starting to consider the long term impact on modern society, e.g. impact of Norman Conquest and Magna Carta.
  3. Evidence – appreciate how our understanding of the past has been come from primary and secondary sources. Students begin to make inferences from evidence presented to them and link sources together to reach a judgment.
  4. Interpretations – starting to access historical interpretations and interpret what these interpretations suggest. They begin to explain if they agree with the interpretation or not.

Year 8

Intent

Students will learn how England underwent radical changes from the 17th century and progressed towards the modern state in which we live. They will understand politically how England developed into a constitutional monarchy and a democratic country. They will also look at the social and economic changes brought by the Industrial Revolution and how this intertwined with the growth of the empire and Atlantic Slave Trade. Our students will also develop an appreciation of the ongoing struggle for civil rights in the western world.

Learning Journey

Themes, Concepts and Questions

  • Why did a Civil War breakout in England?
  • Why was Charles I executed?
  • What was the significance of the Civil War to Newark?
  • How did Cromwell change England?
  • What was the Glorious Revolution?

Key Knowledge

  • Civil War
  • Divine Right
  • Government
  • Parliament
  • Absolutism
  • Tyranny
  • Democracy
  • Constitutional Monarchy
  • Revolution

Themes, Concepts and Questions

  • What was the Industrial Revolution?
  • What were the causes of the Industrial Revolution?
  • How did the factory system develop?
  • How did Industrialisation affect city life?
  • What have the consequences of Industrialisation been on the modern world?

Key Knowledge

  • Industrialisation
  • Industrial Revolution
  • Raw materials
  • Manufacture
  • Agriculture
  • Domestic system
  • Cholera
  • Economy
  • Trade union
  • Superpower

Themes, Concepts and Questions

  • Why did Britain want an empire?
  • How did the empire first develop in the Americas?
  • Why was India the ‘Crown in the Jewel’?
  • What impact did the Scramble for Africa have?
  • Was the British Empire a force for good?

Key Knowledge

  • Empire
  • Colonialism
  • Colony
  • Commerce
  • Native Americans
  • East India Company
  • Revolt
  • Scramble for Africa
  • Independence
  • Commonwealth

Themes, Concepts and Questions

  • What is slavery?
  • Why did the Atlantic Slave Trade happen?
  • What did slaves experience during the Atlantic Slave Trade?
  • What was Britain’s involvement in the Atlantic Slave Trade?
  • Why did the Atlantic Slave Trade come to an end?

Key Knowledge

  • Slavery
  • Trade
  • Middle Passage
  • Plantation
  • Cash crops
  • Prejudice
  • Abolitionist
  • Institutional racism

Themes, Concepts and Questions

  • What was life like for women in Victorian and Edwardian England?
  • Who were the Suffragettes
  • What methods did the Suffragettes use to achieve suffrage?
  • How did the government respond to the Suffragettes?
  • When did women gain the right to vote?

Key Knowledge

  • Suffrage
  • Suffragist
  • Suffragettes
  • Democracy
  • Propaganda
  • Martyr
  • Cat and Mouse Act
  • Terrorism
  • Feminism

Themes, Concepts and Questions

  • What were the hopes and fears of European countries before 1914?
  • How an arms race develop in Europe?
  • How did an alliance system cause a World War?
  • How did the Scramble for Africa increase tensions?
  • Why was Franz Ferdinand assassinated?

Key Knowledge

  • Militarism
  • Alliances
  • Imperialism
  • Nationalism
  • Scramble for Africa
  • Arms Race
  • Kaiser
  • Weltpolitik
  • Empire
  • Assassination

Skill Development

Students will develop the following skills, building on from Y7:

  1. Causation – Students will link causes together to explain why events happened, e.g. political, economic, social, religious.
  2. Significance – Students will start to question what makes something significant and be able to articulate this, e.g. causing change, having an effect on future generations, having a wide-ranging impact.
  3. Evidence – students will link own knowledge of a topic to a source to support what it infers about a topic. Students will start to consider why some sources are more useful than others through considering the background of a source such as who produced the source and when it was produced.
  4. Interpretations – Students will compare historical interpretations and be able to describe how these are different. They will start to consider why historical interpretations can be different through considering the background of the interpretation.

Year 9

Intent

Students will know about the international conflicts of the 20th century and how these have shaped the modern world in terms of the political landscape. Students will acquire an understanding of what political ideologies exist in the world and how these have created conflict. They will develop an appreciation for the freedoms brought by democracy in contrast to a dictatorship and develop empathy for what people went through as a result of 20th century conflict.

Learning Journey

Themes, Concepts and Questions

  • How was propaganda used to recruit soldiers?
  • Why did the Schlieffen Plan fail?
  • Was World War One the first mechanised war?
  • How revolting was Trench life?
  • How did World War One come to an end?

 

Key Knowledge

  • Propaganda
  • Trenches
  • No Man’s Land
  • Artillery
  • Shellshock
  • Armistice

 

Themes, Concepts and Questions

  • What were the causes of World War Two?
  • What was Britain’s ‘Finest Hour’ in World War Two?
  • What was the significance of the Battle of Stalingrad?
  • How was VE Day achieved?
  • How did the atomic bomb help achieve Victory in Japan

Key Knowledge

  • Treaty
  • Appeasement
  • Blitzkrieg
  • Royal Air Force
  • Luftwaffe
  • Home Front
  • Evacuation
  • Blitz
  • D-Day
  • Atomic Bomb

Themes, Concepts and Questions

  • What different political ideas exist in the modern world?
  • What prejudice did Jewish people face throughout history?
  • How did anti-Semitism grow in Germany during the Nazi regime?
  • What impact did World War II have on the Jewish people?
  • Who holds accountability for the Holocaust?

Key Knowledge

  • Holocaust
  • Genocide
  • Prejudice
  • Anti-Semitism
  • Ideology
  • Fascism
  • Right-wing beliefs
  • Left-wing beliefs
  • Aryan Race
  • Police State

Themes, Concepts and Questions

  • How did events after World War Two escalate tensions between the USA and USSR?
  • How did the Arms and Space Race develop?
  • Why was the Berlin Wall built?
  • How close did the world come to war in the Cuban Missile Crisis?
  • Why did the Korean and Vietnam Wars increase tension?

Key Knowledge

  • Cold War
  • Superpower
  • Ideology
  • Iron Curtain
  • Truman Doctrine
  • NATO
  • Collective Security
  • ICBM (Intercontinental Ballistic Missile)
  • Mutually Assured Destruction
  • Domino Theory

Themes, Concepts and Questions

  • What was Afghanistan like in the early 20th century?
  • What impact did Al-Qaeda have in the 1990s?
  • How did the events of 9/11 shake the world?
  • What has happened in the War on Terror in Afghanistan and Iraq?
  • How has modern terrorism changed the present day?

Key Knowledge

  • Al-Qaeda
  • Mujahedeen
  • Taliban
  • ISIS
  • Radicalisation
  • Islamophobia
  • Jihad

Themes, Concepts and Questions

  • Why did the Civil Rights movement happen in the USA?
  • How did Martin Luther King and other campaigners protest for civil rights?
  • What was Apartheid?
  • Who were the Windrush generation?
  • How have  civil rights developed in modern Britain?

Key Knowledge

  • Civil Rights
  • Discrimination
  • Jim Crow Laws
  • Segregation
  • Lynching
  • Peaceful Protest
  • Black Power
  • Apartheid
  • Windrush Generation

Skill Development

Students will develop the following skills, building on from Y8:

  1. Causation – Students will be able to link causes together but also confidently evaluate causes to consider which was most important and create counter-arguments to diminish the argument of other reasons.
  2. Significance – Students will be able to explain how events/people were significant by affecting future generations and not just explaining the impact on the time.
  3. Evidence – Students will develop source analysis skills further by considering why one source is more useful than others through considering the purpose of sources, i.e. why they have been produced. Students will consider the motive of the author and the audience to explain why a source could be considered more useful.
  4. Interpretations – Students will explain why people have particular interpretations – background of the historian giving their view, how their view might be influenced by the motive of their work. Students will be able to explain using their knowledge, why an interpretation is convincing and begin to explain why one interpretation might be more convincing than another.

March 2024

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