History

At St George’s, everything we do is underpinned by our four Christian values of Love, Faith, Courage and Honour. Through these values, we aim to provide an excellent, well-rounded education that nurtures academic, emotional and spiritual development, enabling every child to fulfil their potential in an inclusive environment within God’s world. Our history curriculum reflects this vision: it empowers children to understand humanity, appreciate diversity, recognise injustice, and develop wisdom and compassion as they explore the past.

Our Intent

History at St George’s is designed to ignite curiosity, deepen understanding and equip pupils with the knowledge and skills to make sense of the world around them. Our curriculum is sequenced from KS1 to KS2 to ensure that pupils develop a secure sense of chronology, strong substantive knowledge and the ability to think critically as young historians.

A Coherent Thematic Story from KS1 to KS2

Thematic Stories in History

History Road map

Our curriculum follows a carefully planned thematic story that builds year on year. Pupils revisit and develop understanding of key historical ideas as they progress:

Arrivals and Departures: Why do people come to Britain?

Emergence of civilisations: What is advanced society?

Development of technology: Does development always mean progress?

Power and Conflict: What makes people powerful?

• KS1: Children begin with themes of belonging, community, significant people and local history. These lay the foundations for understanding continuity, change and how events shape lives.

• Lower KS2: Themes broaden to include early civilisations, settlement, society and technology, helping pupils understand how the earliest communities developed and the challenges they faced.

• Upper KS2: Pupils explore more complex narratives involving power, democracy, empire, invasion, innovation and global civilisations. They make connections across time between the ancient world, medieval history, early modern periods and modern conflict.

Through this repeated exposure, pupils develop deep conceptual understanding of key substantive concepts such as power, civilisation, technology and invasion/settlement. This enables them to see how ideas evolve, overlap and influence one another across history.

Developing Disciplinary Thinking

We teach pupils the distinct ways historians investigate the past. At St George’s, disciplinary learning is structured around four consistent historical lenses:

1. Historical Evidence – Interpreting and questioning primary and secondary sources, understanding perspective and reliability.

2. Historical Significance – Deliberating over what is meant as significant and who decides whether someone is significant or not. Evaluating why certain events or individuals mattered and how their impact is judged.

3. Chronology, Continuity and Change – Understanding timelines, sequencing and patterns across periods.

4. Cause and Consequence – Explaining why events happened and analysing short- and long-term outcomes.

These analytical skills are revisited in every year group, helping pupils build the habits of enquiry, critical thinking and reflection.

Inclusive Practice and Adaptations for SEND

Our history curriculum is designed to be inclusive and accessible. Adaptations for pupils with SEND may include:

• pre-teaching and explicit modelling of vocabulary

• visual scaffolds such as timelines, diagrams, maps and storyboards

• simplified or adapted historical sources

• structured writing frames or sentence stems

• opportunities for talk-based responses or practical exploration

• adult support to chunk inquiry tasks into manageable steps

We ensure that all pupils can engage with key concepts and develop confidence as historians.

Retrieval Practice and Assessment for Learning

Retrieval practice is embedded throughout each unit to strengthen long-term memory, activate prior knowledge and support pupils in making meaningful links. This includes:

• low-stakes quizzes and review questions

• flashbacks to previous units or prior periods

• concept-mapping and vocabulary recap

• questioning that links themes across chronological periods

Teachers use retrieval to identify gaps and misconceptions, adapting teaching accordingly.

End-of-Unit Assessment

Each unit concludes with an assessment task that enables pupils to demonstrate both their substantive knowledge and their disciplinary skills. These may include extended responses, source evaluations, comparative tasks or chronological summaries. Assessment outcomes are used to inform next steps, support pupils who require additional clarity, and ensure strong progression across KS1–KS2.