History

History Intent

We aim to provide a history curriculum that is engaging, diverse and relevant to the children at our school. With thoughtful planning across the school, we ensure that the children enjoy a range of broad and exciting topics in each year group which link to the wider curriculum. We teach the children about key figures from the past who have influenced our lives and events that have shaped the world we live in. As well as looking at global history, we also look at the history of our country and find out about the local history of Horley.

We want the children to develop an enjoyment of history and a curiosity about the past which then informs their understanding of the present. We provide learning from a wide range of different time periods to help the children develop a sense of chronology and encourage the children to identify similarities and differences between ways of life in these different periods. In addition to developing the children’s knowledge about each of these topics, we also develop the children’s enquiry skills, encouraging them to ask and answer questions about the past.

What does History look like at our school? (Implementation)

In Reception, the children begin their history learning journey by talking about and sharing their own history and that of their family. We discuss the people and settings in the stories we read, talking about whether these are in the past and how we know. We finish the year by talking about the changes that have happened during the Reception year.

In Year One, we look at the exciting topic of space exploration and find out about the lives of some famous astronauts including Neil Armstrong, Tim Peake and Helen Sharman. We love our Space Day and astronaut training! We use our class timeline to compare when the moon landing happened to when the dinosaurs roamed the earth millions of years ago. We find out about the life of Mary Anning and the discoveries she made. We look at the history of Horley Town Centre, talk about how it has changed and go on a walk of our local area.

In Year Two, we continue to use the class timeline to think about different time periods starting by looking at how the seaside has changed and finding out about the life of Grace Darling. We build on the learning about Horley from Year One when we discover the local history of the Horley Car. Everyone loves learning about The Great Fire of London, particularly when we recreate a fire on the playground to burn the model houses we have made! We learn about the interesting life of Roald Dahl as well as reading his amazing stories. Finally, we research the life of Henry VIII, Anne Boleyn and Elizabeth I, and visit Hever Castle to enhance our learning.