This lesson contains an essay structure for this question: Were Republican ideas the main reason for the fact that there was a Republican president and a Republican majority in Congress in the years 1921-1931? The lesson is centred around helping students to feel confident to have a go at this.

This follows on from lesson 5 which introduces students to the ideas of isolationism, normalcy and rugged individualism. It aims to achieve these outcomes: ALL will be able to explain why the American public admired Republican ideas at this time. MOST will be able to relate these to ideas of ‘normalcy’,’isolationism’ and ‘rugged individualism and explain how the three Republican presidents used these ideas. SOME Will be able to support their answer on the appeal of Republicanism with context from the 1920’s. The lesson includes a clip with questions for students to discuss, a colour coding card sort activity, a paragraph which they use to highlight evidence, a homework sheet on Harding and Coolidge and a worksheet to focus the lesson activities.

Looking for a pen free stand alone lesson with KS3? This one has flipped learning, a kinaesthetic task, group work and absolutely no pens! (Unless you want them to fill out a self assessment) If you want FREE access to these resources, drop me an email at ruth.messenger@yahoo.com and I will send them through to you in exchange for a review of what you thought of it below. No prior knowledge required, but it is essential that you set the homework in this PP in the previous lesson as students will be making their own paper boats to re-enact the events of the Spanish Armada. By the end of this lesson: ALL will be able to re-enact the story of what happened – L3/4 depending on detail MOST groups will be able to say why they think the Armada failed and include this in their re-enactment – L4/5 depending on whether they can explain their reason SOME groups will be able to keep referring to why the Armada failed throughout their re-enactment, making connections between their reason and what happened next. - L5 EXCEPTIONAL groups will be able to make links between the reasons, showing that they all had an impact, but that one reason stands out as the main reason the Armada failed. L6+ depending on depth of analysis NB. To make this lesson even more exciting, use masking tape to mark out a rough shape of the British isles on the floor before the lesson. Students can use this as their map for their re-enactment. Alternately, go and make friends with the geography department and ask if they have a big map students could use.

This lesson is great for a brand new year 7 class and requires minimum preparation. You will need a suitcase of your possessions though as the lesson requires students to handle objects and make inferences as to what kind of person might own that stuff. I have done this lesson several times and I take things such as: a travel guide the case to Resident Evil V for Xbox 360 a picture of my goddaughter an old pipe a jar of marmite a caribena a copy of George Orwell's 1984 The better the objects, the better this lesson will go. I once encountered a teacher who used the contents of her handbag and the lesson flopped. You want to create some intrigue and use this lesson as the basis for building a relationship with your students and allowing them to get to know you. The homework task allows students to select their own objects as evidence of who THEY are, all the while making inferences before they even get it drummed into them that that is a skill. Speaking of skills, here are the learning outcomes: ALL students will know what evidence is and how we use it to build a picture MOST Students will be able to make inferences from the evidence and link evidence SOME Students will be able to explain how evidence can lead to misunderstandings

Created with a focus on speaking and listening skills, this lesson gives students the chance to research a character who would have been present at a slave auction in the US which they then have to 'hot seat' in a group of 4. characters: A slave who has just arrived from Africa A slave who was born in America and so speaks English and has a family with them A slave trader who has completed the middle passage with a fresh cargo A slave owner who is looking for a new slave at a bargain price Students have two clips and a large variety of primary sources to research from. Ideally these sources will be stuck up around the room so students can get out of their seats and wander around - ideal for your kinaesthetic learners. Sources range from HA materials of descriptions of exchanges that have taken place between slaves and prospective buyers down to lots and lots of LA pictures and posters.

This is my absolute favourite lesson to teach to year 8 - I hope you enjoy it! It is quite a long one though, so either keep the pace up, use fewer sources, or break it into two lessons. Lesson objectives: LO: To know the story of the Gunpowder plot LO: To use evidence to find out more about the Gunpowder Plot LO: To use evidence to question whether the story as we know it is true. LO: To decide whether Guy Fawkes was innocent or guilty and use the evidence to prove it This lesson works best if you have students working in groups of 4, but I have done this in pairs and it works fine as well. You will need a focus on good group work, praise for groups that are working well together and rewards for groups who are really discussing and getting into the evidence. One year, I did have to set this lesson as cover so I have also included that as a resource in case you need a quick cover, or need work for a student in inclusion. Enjoy! Ruth

This quiz was designed for my year 12 class, so students will be asked for specific details about a range of civil rights events and their accompanying Supreme Court cases. It is quite challenging, so if this covers topics you haven't spent as much time on, you may decide to allow a time limited textbook grab (60 seconds for students to locate information would be reasonable, and would improve index using skills) There are three rounds, one for civil rights movements, one for supreme court cases and one picture round. I usually get my class to split into teams and name their teams, its a great activity for a class who are stressing about an exam on this topic and need some lighter revision. You should also get a prize! My classes usually take about 35 minutes to complete this.

This PowerPoint includes all of the resources to run either a single, or a double lesson on Mansa Musa. It is aimed at Year 7 and provides support for students working between L3 and L6 on the old NC Levels. Lesson objectives: L3 - To identify facts about Medieval Mali and Mansa Musa L4 - To describe Medieval Mali and Mansa Musa L5 - To make inferences from sources about Medieval Mali and Mansa Musa L6 - To explain what Medieval Mali and Mansa Musa would seem like to a time traveller, drawing inferences from sources to support their points. Activities include: * A task where students work in pairs, one looks at an image and describes it to his/her partner. The partner draws the image. * Fact generation, teacher models how to get facts from the source, students compete. * Using written sources to gather information * Creating a Time Traveller's Guide to Medieval Mali

This is an active lesson that meets the following objectives: ALL will be able to detail events of the scare MOST will be able to explain why Americans were threatened by Communism SOME will be able to predict its ramifications on the political system. I taught this to my year 12 class two weeks ago and it was easily the best lesson I have taught so far this year, they loved it and they refer back to it still to inform their understanding of the fear of communism in the US. There is no writing involved in this lesson, it is purely talking and listening, questioning and thinking. It allows students to move around the room, investigating like in a murder mystery, and ad libbing for their own characters. Overview of the lesson: Set up the classroom like a 1920's speak easy, or at least create a big space in the middle with some chairs around the edge. Students get a character card, these include steelworkers, anarchists etc. They are allowed to tell the truth about their character, but they aren't obliged to - they can lie as much as they like. They have to find out who the communists are in the room and they do this by making conversation. One student is a journalist and this student moves events along by informing other students. You give them each event as it happens (eg bombs in the post) and they have to stir up a fuss with other students. All other instructions are included in the downloads including the character cards, events, and questions for you to use to consolidate learning and pull out the themes necessary to help students achieve the objectives. I will admit I used chocolates to get students going, but motivation really wasn't a problem - they got fully into their characters and the whole witch hunt. enjoy!

Learning Objectives: * To know the pivotal events in 1968 * To have an overview of the background to these events * To be able to make links between these crises to explore the tensions in US society. I created this lesson for my year 12, but it can be differentiated down for younger age groups so long as you have an appropriate textbook or a class that are able to listen effectively to teacher talk. This lesson was designed to work with 'Access to History: Politics, Presidency and Society in the USA, 1968-2001' by Vivienne Sanders, but can easily paired with another textbook from this year, or if you as the teacher have a good knowledge of some of the following events you can fill in the background information. Another option is to provide access to the internet so students can research the background themselves. Events covered are: The death of Martin Luther King The Tet Offensive The assassination of Bobby Kennedy Feminist protests at the Miss America Pageant Protests at the Democratic Convention in Chicago The election of President Nixon. Students will be using information on these events to say what tensions existed in US society, for example the death of MLK shows that there was huge political tension. This lesson works really well as an introduction to the time period and includes a music based homework so students can immerse themselves in the popular culture of the time. It includes a matching task, a researching task and either pair or class discussion of significance. All feedback welcome, Ruth appropriate search terms for this resource: America, USA, 1960's, 1968, Martin Luther King, Kennedy, Nixon, popular culture, music, Tet Offensive, Vietnam War, feminism

This resource contains a great game of 'Reagan bingo' where students listen to Reagan facing off against Carter and note off the issues as they arise. This is a good task to introduce students to Reagan, to understand his policies and note the absent topics. There is also a note making task using the Vivienne Sanders textbook (link at the bottom of this blurb) but any decent textbook on this topic will do. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_9qDRZ6pSRE&safe=active