Stuarts - What Were the Impacts of Witch Hunts

This lesson contains:

• A starter task that has questions that can be amended or altered based on what you have been previously teaching.
• A quick reminder/discussion about why witches were scary to people in Europe at the time and what people worried might happen.
• An introduction to Matthew Hopkins and his role in the witch craze. Students read the information sheet and use it to answer a couple of questions about him in full sentences.
• A larger task to use the worksheet to label the different methods Hopkins used to discover the guilt of witches. Students look at familiars, herb use, pricking witches, waking witches, swimming witches, marks and moles and their actions as well. They have some extension questions to follow up on the information they have learned and extend their thinking.
• An overview of how witches were then punished, followed by the modern cultural depictions of witches. There is then a short activity to read the later Witchcraft Act of 1735 and to summarise how it ended the witch craze, including information on the last cases tried in the UK.
• A plenary to write a letter making arguments against Hopkins and his use of torture against witches as a way of summarising what they have learned.

Attachments:

• 1 x Powerpoint Presentation
• 2 x Publisher Files