Princes in the Tower

Going straight into sources doesn’t give students the best chance of developing their interest in the topic or understanding the events that occurred in the run up to the disappearance of the Princes. Therefore the first stage of this activity is story-telling , using the room as a map to  help students see how events unfolded in the spring and early summer of 1483 up to Richard’s accession.

Once that story has been told we can move onto the fate of the Princes, exploring how certain we can be that Richard was responsible for their deaths. Hopefully this will give KS3 pupils a chance to gain experience in handling degrees of certainty and developing the vocabulary they need when discussing such issues – and hopefully they’ll enjoy the sense of mystery but also that these events are not just a ‘Cadfael’-style medieval mystery but real events involving real individuals, something that I hope is established by the first story-telling stage.

Plus a recommendation for some great music – what more can you ask?

Music from the Time of Richard III by the York Waits

Ian

The whole family tree of Edward III’s descendants can be intimidating. To avoid over-powering students this PowerPoint provides a sequence of 5 screens which gradually build up the royal family tree.

To see the PowerPoint and an outline description click here.

Ian

The second book in our new A level series – The Russian Revolution by Chris Culpin – is published in May.

There’ll be more information about this book on the SHP site shortly but for now, if you want to see a sample chapter click see:

www.hoddereducation.co.uk Russian Revolution

 For more information on the book see:

www.hoddereducation.co.uk Enquiring_History_The_Russian_Revolution

And for a sample chapter from The Wars of the Roses see:

www.hoddereducation.co.uk Wars of the Roses

Ian

First up – there’s a lot of lightweight ‘discussion’ in the press about what should be taught in History but it rarely, if ever, goes beyond a list of events. Over the last few years I’ve been building up discussion essays which attempt to go a little further, discussing in more depth what we might teach about some of the major topics in the KS3 curriculum. You’ll find them in the Teaching Issues section.

For example, there are short discussions (with linked activities) on:

• 1381, the Great Revolt
• The English Civil War
• The Industrial Revolution

Plus a broader discussion of what we mean by ‘historical knowledge at KS3’. Answer – it’s important and ‘a good thing’ but does bear thinking about!

You’ll find all this at

Teaching Issues

And in the summer break I’ll (hopefully) add a discussion on the Saxons and Normans and what students might learn about them at KS3.

Ian

It’s proving very readable and thought-provoking, even for someone who thought he’d read enough books on 1066 to last for many years. It’s very much in the style of the best of modern ‘popular’ history – the author’s voice is audible with asides and commentary but his analysis is rooted in the sources (plenty of endnotes – though as an inveterate footnote reader I hate having to keep turning back to the end of the book) and he places his arguments very helpfully within the historiography. A really good book – even if I know how it ends.

At the same time I picked up a half-price paperback of the same author’s Edward I: A Great and Terrible King which I read, enjoyed and learned a lot from a couple of years ago and now look forward to reading again. Maybe a KS3 activity will emerge from my re-reading!

To see them on Amazon:

The Norman Conquest Marc Morris

A Great and Terrible King Marc Morris

Ian

It’s only taken eight years!

You can click on the Wars of the Roses tab (in the navigation section of the main part of the website) to enter this new section or find it in the Teaching Issues section.

I’m not going to predict how often I’ll add material but I’m aiming for little and reasonably often.

• The first item is a simple set of PowerPoints containing family-trees from our new text book. And that’s an indication that some of the material in this section will be specifically linked to the book – but other resources will be quite independent of the book.  This will include structured role-plays and, who knows, podcasts and maybe even video.

• Next up in a week or two – a sequence of PowerPoint screens building up the royal family tree in stages so students aren’t overwhelmed by seeing too much in one go.

If you have any particular ideas for activities and resources do get in touch especially if you can tell me what it is that students struggle to understand – then I can try to create an activity that tackles that problem.

And in case you haven’t found it yet all the details about the book and the series are on the SHP site at:

www.schoolshistoryproject.org.uk

 Ian

One misconception I’ve often come across is that the Conference is only relevant to those who teach the SHP exam course. Far from it. Plenty of teachers at the conference teach Modern World GCSE and still have a rich mix of workshops to choose from. This year’s melange (wonder what that really means) includes a variety of workshops on A level teaching, a mix of sessions on using more varieties of technology than you can shake a memory stick at, workshops on teaching Ancient History, the Saxons, Industrial Britain, the Great War, the Versailles Peace Conference etc etc plus workshops on enhancing understanding of change and continuity, representations, enquiry questions …

Plus there’s the amazing buzz of being with 250 other people who really care about teaching History – that’s what really enthuses the first-time delegates.

You can see the complete programme at:

www.schoolshistoryproject.org.uk

Ian

It’s based on the well-known children’s game ‘Guess Who?’ – gosh that takes me back!

You could use it in a wide variety of contexts, at KS3 and GCSE, to help students revise the roles and significances of a range of individuals.

HistoricalWhosWho.html

Ian

That first book has just arrived and as I wrote it I feel suitably excited because this is a book I’ve wanted to write for years but have never been able to because it’s not for a huge market. However supporting ‘minority’ topics is one of the aims of SHPs new A level series so it’s fitting to be starting with The Wars of the Roses and later this year we’ll have The Crusades written by my co-editors, Michael Riley and Jamie Byrom as well as two books to keep the accountants happy – The Russian Revolution by Chris Culpin (on schedule for publication in May) and The French Revolution by Dave Martin.

To read a full description of the series approach visit the SHP site where we’ve explained what this series is aiming to do and how we’ve gone about it.

You’ll also find the teachers’ support material for each book on the SHP site. There’s no separate ‘to be paid for’ TRB – it’s available on-line free of charge.

And you can find a full sample chapter (one of two in the book on Richard III) on the Hodder website at:

www.hoddereducation.co.uk/SiteImages/

Apparently it’s available as an e-book as well though I’m not entirely sure what one of those is!

Finally for those of you teaching The Wars of the Roses at a level keep an eye on Thinkinghistory across the summer as I hope to expand the range of resources and activities on the site for this topic. Lots of ideas cropped up while writing the book so hopefully I can begin putting them on the site.

Ian

More importantly this activity will get pupils talking about causation and will add to your armoury of 1381 activities – but where does the purple vase fit in? Find out at:

DiscussingCausationWithYear7.html

Ian