History
At our school, history is taught as a discipline in which children learn to work as historians. Through carefully structured enquiries, children investigate the past by asking questions, analysing evidence, and developing interpretations about how and why events happened.
Our curriculum is designed using a task design approach, ensuring that learning is accessible to all children. Lessons are carefully sequenced so that each task builds on prior knowledge and supports children in developing both historical knowledge and disciplinary thinking. Through scaffolded activities, discussion, and structured historical enquiries, children learn how to examine sources, recognise different perspectives, and construct evidence-based conclusions.
We place strong emphasis on making connections with prior learning, enabling children to revisit and deepen key historical concepts such as chronology, change and continuity, cause and consequence, and similarity and difference. This cumulative approach helps children develop a coherent understanding of the past over time.
Where possible, our history curriculum is rooted in our local area and community. By exploring local historical sites, people, and events, our children develop a meaningful connection between national and global history and the place in which they live. These contextual links help children see history as relevant, tangible, and part of their own story.
Through this approach, children leave our school with a strong understanding of the past and the ability to think critically, question evidence, and engage with history as active historians.
Heritage Schools Award
We are proud to announce that our school has been awarded the Heritage Schools Award in recognition of the strength, development, and impact of our history curriculum. This achievement reflects our commitment to bringing the past to life for our children and fostering a deep understanding of heritage within our community.
Congratulations on achieving the Heritage Schools award. You submitted fantastic evidence and its clear how important local heritage is to the school. Its very obviously the golden thread that holds the curriculum together. You can see its prevalence in history but also right across the wider curriculum. I love that you use the Blaydon Races in art and that remembrance focuses on Saltwell Park and local memorials.I was particularly impressed by your focus on diversity in the curriculum and the fact you link Martin Luther King to Newcastle.It was great to see so much local geography and to see you are using the map and photo packs provided by Historic England. I was also really pleased to see the amount of CPD you have had and your engagement with local historians.There is wonderful hyper local heritage used such as looking at the school and Low Fell but also you link your curriculum to northeast heritage and then also link the northeast to national and global events and individuals. There is also lots of examples of where you tell the national story through a local lens such as Anglo Saxons and Lindisfarne and the Titanic and Wallsend shipsYou and your school are amazing, and I am so pleased to give you the award.