I have been teaching history since 2002 and I have been head of History at a school for 10 years which sees many of my students opt for GCSE, A level and beyond. I am passionate about History being taught well, and believe that this largely stems from good resources (as well of course effective delivery). My lessons and various teaching resources are therefore produced with the intention of inspiring students to think for themselves, to be challenged yet engaged.
I have been teaching history since 2002 and I have been head of History at a school for 10 years which sees many of my students opt for GCSE, A level and beyond. I am passionate about History being taught well, and believe that this largely stems from good resources (as well of course effective delivery). My lessons and various teaching resources are therefore produced with the intention of inspiring students to think for themselves, to be challenged yet engaged.
Attached is a very simple lesson, covering the entire Explaining the modern world A syllabus for OCR. The Lesson is simple clockface with various sections broken down into 5 min sections. Students are to spend 5 mins completing what they know about each section under the 5 min time slot! The sections cover Treaty of Versailles all the way through to the New danders and Post cold war. There is also an extra session where students can add notes and give examples of nationalism and internationalism.
A very simple revision game that can be done in pairs, small groups or as a whole class in teams. Students are to roll the dice twice to come up with their coordinates for their clue on the board. They are then to respond to the clue. If they do this successfully they win the points on the dice. If they are able to give examples and discuss for 30 seconds their scores can be doubled.
I often do this kind of activity as a class with them in teams. If a team can not answer, then they must hunt out the examples before they can rejoin!
A fun way to bring in and cover lots of content as part of the revision process.
Suitable for year 9 this is a good lesson that introduces them to the idea of democracy and dictatorships and how one could lead to the other.
There is a short video clip which will need to be stopped frequently and explained as it is quick and quite complex, but covers the topic brilliantly.
The lesson has a couple of opportunities for students to evaluate their progress.
This is a revision lessons that examines the other key issues in the civil rights movement. This has been designed with the OCR Modern World A USA 1945 - 1974 People and the state in mind but will work along side other exam boards for content.
The lesson includes a worksheet to accompany the powerpoint and hyperlinks to various you tube links. The lesson does a brief recap of previous knowledge and then extends to the issue of Black Power, covering the Black Panthers and the Kerner report. It then examines the role and influence of Malcolm X and other groups who helped contribute to the Civil Rights Act of 1964 - such as the African diplomats visit in the USA.
The lesson then examines the role of each president in the 60s and 70s, with a card sort task for students to identify the contributions and limitations of each president in the civil rights campaign.
There is also a slide about analysing sources and a source based question worth 5 marks.
A revision game to encourage students to explain the various key terms and events during 1945-1975 USA: Land of Liberty unit for the OCR Modern World A GCSE curriculum. This will also work along side any exam board for basic content as it more about getting students to recall information about certain topics to win points.
This could be adapted as a whole class game / small group game and if students are unable to explain their answers, their task could be to go away and find out so that they can then come and join back in once they have gained the knowledge.
Included in this bundle are 6 essay planning sheets. There are a number of questions - each sheet has one standard A Level question. There are then the key issues that need to be addressed in order to be able to successfully answer the essay question. - This is for the student to then complete.
It should be noted that these form only a basis for student's knowledge to aid in student's revision and serve to help weaker students plan and identify necessary content. However, it can still be useful as a checklist for moreable students.
Included is a completed answer example of Elizabeth's last years. I hope your students find them useful.
A GCSE revision lesson based on the OCR modern world A specification. This could also be used as a consolidation lesson. The worksheet works along side the ppt, giving students opportunities to work independently or in pairs, on tasks such as matching up events with the countries, mini mindmap on Bin Laden, a True and False quiz, a note taking exercise on the more extreme actions of as-Qaeda, culminating in 9-11, the lesson finishes with a youtube clip covering the USA’s response and their war on terror. There are also some sample questions on the ppt for students to complete.
These lessons are suitable for Year 9 or KS3. A couple of lessons that track the rise of Hitler and the Nazis and their consolidation to total power over Germany by 1934.
These lessons deal with issues such as democracy and dictatorship and examines the various stages that took place that enabled Hitler to take power, from the impact of the depression to the death of President Hindenburg.
There are frequent opportunities for students to check and evaluate their progress. The first lesson contains a short clip - but this must be stopped and explained frequently to allow the students to understand the complexities.
The second lesson also has a short clip and there is pdf of questions to support this. At the end of the lesson students can play a game of scrabble - well kind of, they have to write 3 paragraphs and use correctly various historical terms to win points
A lesson designed for the Personal rule to Restoration unit which starts with a recap of why Englishmen were falling out with Charles I. It recaps the role of the three advisors - Weston, Laud and Wentworth. The lesson then develops in to the Long Parliament with a short task where students are asked to find a list of concessions which Charles I made.
There is then a task for students to find out the short term causes of the English Civil War. Including the Irish rebellion, the Grand Remonstrance, The attempted arrest of 5 members, the Militia Ordinance, the commissions of Array and the Nineteen propositions.
The War and Society text book will be required for this lesson.
This follows on from 3 previous other lessons (also available), but could be a stand alone lesson. Within this lesson there are 3 documents. A ppt, a word document which has the layout of the Framlingham castle ( I suggest having this blown up to A3) and a chart comparing form and function throughout the ages - this can be used as a tick sheet for weaker students and a chance to explain and justify for more able students.
The ppt has a variety of slides that can be printed out for students to work in groups - or an around the room activity. Students will need to examine the specific key physical changes to Framlingham's form under the various nobility and then add the info or picture to the A3 word document. They should then annotate the layout with the correct century, to show how the castle's form evolved over time.
The final word document is to be used to show an overview of the function of the castle and again to see how this evolved over time. Weaker students could tick the castle's use ie, as security, as an impressive home, or as a charitable institution, and more able students could give examples of justification.
This is 2 lessons approx, involving siting the chosen case study of Framlingham castle for the OCR Modern World A syllabus for 2018. This lesson develops into an overview of the changes to Framlingham castle's form and function. Included is a blank timeline and a ppt with lots of slides that makes the material slightly more accessible to learners than the text book. These can be used as a research activity to your liking - group work, research, or around the room collating, depending on your particular groups. This allows for appropriate differentiation - as the resources can be adapted. The timeline charts the key four phases of the castle as well as more specific changes to the form and function and the reasons why.
This is the third lesson following the siting and overview of Framlingham Castle. This lesson tracks the history of the individuals who lived in the castle over the four phases. As there is lots of information - this has been done with the intention of trying to bring a bit of fun back to the GCSE course by them doing it in the style of Through the Keyhole! This could be done on an individual basis or as a class they could all complete a few of the personalities and then they could be photocopied. If there is time, a few students could be brave enough to do their own version of " Through the keyhole" and ask the questions..."who lived in castle like this?" A follow up task would then be for the students to put them all into chronological order.
A great activity for year 9 understanding the rise of Hitler and the Nazis. This can be completed as an extension activity if the content has previously been taught.
There is a link to a youtube clip on the top of the sheet and the questions follow in chronological order.
The worksheet covers everything from the depression to the various elections, the burning down of the Reichstag, Night of Long knives, and the death of Hindenburg.
As the new GCSE is largely content driven, the objective of these flash cards are for students to try to help learn, revise, test and hopefully retain some knowledge of the early part of the course.
The cards ask some basic comprehension questions - with some more complicated style qs that give a good overview of the Paris Peace conference and treaties, the LON successes and failures and the causes of WW2 with Hitler's actions.
The cards are to be backed - the numbers on each question card correlate to the number on the answer card.
The cards can be emailed out to students for them to print and revise at home, or can be printed off and cut up as part of a revision activity in lessons.
There will be more to follow as I develop them.
This resource has a number of revision tasks on the unit USA 1945-1975:Land of Liberty? period of the course. The task
This is ideal resource can be used as a lesson resource to allow students to work independently whilst supporting their individual needs, or can be printed off and given as an aid to help them with their private study at home.
This is 1/5 parts of the modern world element of the course. There is an overall pack which can also be purchased.
This is just a brief task encouraging students to read the sources about the Remonstrance and answer questions on the back.
The questions encourage students to use the evidence from the sources.
The content covers the divisions that were emerging within Parliament about the Remonstrance and is a super start in allowing students to understand the complexities of the English Civil War and that it was not quite as simple as Parliament vs the King.
This is a whole revision session for OCR Modern world A USA 1945-1975 depth study. The lesson focuses on the political activism of the 1960s and 1970s linking to the Civil Rights movement. The lesson covers topics such as the women’s movement, Gay rights and the emergence of Gay pride, youth and student protests and hippy movement
There is an interactive quiz and worksheet for students to record their answers and notes and a game at the end which enables students to discuss the role of each president’s actions during this time, evaluating their successes and failures.
This is a brilliant guide to help students prioritise and conduct their own independent revision for their GCSE. This gives a break down of OCR's Explaining the Modern World History A, with the Depth study of USA 1945-1975 and Personal rule of Charles I, plus War and Society and the castle study of Framlingham castle. This document can of course be adapted to fit the various other OCR modules, as and where relevant. As the new course requires so much content, we have chosen to give this to our yr 11 at the start of the year to help them build up a bank of resources in preparation for the exams in the summer. The chart allows students to complete the chart to show how confident they are with certain topics, and allows them to go back and reflect on specific areas. The aim is for them to get to point (hopefully by May) where they can happily complete the green smiley face for all of the sections; showing that they are confident with all the content for the GCSE!
This is a whole lesson which starts with a quick true and false quiz about the beliefs of Charles I. The lesson then develops into understanding the liberties of freeborn Englishman which links beautifully to the key concepts of this course.
There are plenty of a number of tasks that encourage the students to categorise the beliefs of Englishmen, such as protecting the Protestant Church of England, Defending the rule of law, local power and accountability and not being taxed without Parliament’s agreement. The lesson then continues to examine one of Charles’s advisors during his personal rule - that of Sir Richard Weston. Students are then asked to examine evidence to show how he upset the liberties of free born Englishmen - by examining all the ways in which he tried to raise money for Charles.
This worked extremely well with my year 11 class.
All the resources for this lesson are within the powerpoint.
This lesson continues on from the the lesson about Charles I and Sir Richard Weston upsetting the political nation with the various taxes they implemented.
This looks at the role of William Laud and Sir Thomas Wentworth later the Earl of Strafford. Students are asked to examine which Englishmen rights were they trampling all over.
The lesson culminates with a section which explains how Charles went too far in trying to get the Scots to accept his English Prayer book.
Whilst most of the activities are on the ppt, there are a couple of occasion where the War and Society text book will need to be used.