The Great Fire of London, 1666

This KS3 lesson should take at least one hour. The Power Point leads students through all activities with accompanying resources included.

Aims and Objectives:

• To know the main events of the Great Fire of London.
• To figure out what caused it, why it spread so quickly and who/what was to blame.
• To understand how it changed London forever and decide overall if it was a good or bad thing for the city.

Activities include a question formation/answer starter whereby students form their own who, what, why, where, when and how questions and then see how many they can answer using the short video. We then sort the cause cards into evidence that the fire was intentional/a plot vs. an accident. We then move on to consider the effects by comparing a picture of London before and after the fire. Having gone though some facts on the extent of the improvements made to the city, students write a paragraph answer deciding whether, on balance, the Great Fire of London was a good or bad thing.