Intent

 

At Cooper Perry, we are passionate about guiding our pupils to become skilled and accomplished historians. History at Cooper Perry aims to be ambitious, motivating, inspiring and purposeful. Above all, we want our children to develop a broad and balanced view of the past and a robust understanding of how history has shaped our lives. Throughout their time at Cooper Perry, our children will actively engage in a curriculum which will enrich their cultural capital, further develop their knowledge of the world around them and enhance their understanding of their own heritage.

Through high-quality learning opportunities, our children will:

• Become increasingly critical and analytical thinkers.
• Possess a secure understanding of the chronology of the periods of history they have studied. 
• Develop and ask perceptive questions and form their own opinions and interpretations of the past.
• Interpret and analyse different sources of evidence, draw conclusions, sift arguments and develop perspective and judgements.
• Discover links and connections within and across the periods they study.
• Understand the complexity of people’s lives, the process of change, the diversity of societies and relationships between different groups, as well as their own identity and the challenges of their time.

 

 

Implementation

 

At Cooper Perry, History is taught in alternating half-termly blocks, so that children achieve depth of understanding. Our teachers work together to plan collaborative topics, ensuring that promoting a passion for history is at the center of all they do.

 

Our History curriculum is made up of engaging topics that inspire wonder and awe amongst our children. When presented to the children, our topics are inspired by an overarching question and key themes are identified so that robust links can be made with other curriculum areas. Throughout the sequence of lessons, teachers plan and deliver opportunities to develop both Procedural Knowledge (skills) and Propositional Knowledge (content and facts). Lessons are structured around precise learning objectives selected from our Progression of Skills. Teachers identify the key vocabulary for a topic and for specific lessons, ensuring that it is effectively introduced to the children and referred to throughout the topic.

 

At Cooper Perry, we believe in the importance of providing exciting, engaging and memorable experiences for our children, and these are incorporated in our History teaching and learning. Our thematic approach means our learning environments are transformed to reflect the themes and content of our current topic and ‘WOW Day’s are planned to enhance the ‘buzz’ around learning. Cross-curricular links are specifically planned for, with strong links between the history curriculum and writing lessons, art and DT projects.

 

Wherever possible, we make links within and between historical periods to deepen our children’s understanding of how history has changed over time.

 

 

 

Impact

 

By the time our children leave our school at the end of Key Stage 2, they will have:

• A secure knowledge and understanding of people, events and contexts from the historical periods covered.
• The ability to think critically about history and communicate confidently in styles appropriate to a range of audiences.
• The ability to consistently support, evaluate and challenge their own and others ‘views using detailed, appropriate and accurate historical evidence derived from a range of sources.
• The ability to think, reflect, debate, discuss and evaluate the past, forming and refining questions and lines of enquiry.
• A passion for history and an enthusiastic engagement in learning, which develops their sense of curiosity about the past and their understanding of how and why people interpret the past in different ways.
• A respect for historical evidence and the ability to make robust and critical use of it to support their explanations and judgements.
• A desire to embrace challenging activities, including opportunities to undertake high-quality research across a range of history topics