History skills resources

Develop and assess key historical skills with your secondary history students using this hand-picked selection of skills and investigation lessons, activities and baseline assessments

Tes Resources Team

History books on shelves for History skills with secondary students

To support you in assessing your history students' key skills, we have gathered together a helpful selection of skill-based resources perfect for developing historians. Whether you're looking for full lessons that explore what history is and why it is important to learn about it, or activities and assessment resources which cover a range of key historical skills including chronology, evidence and interpretation, we have you covered.

History skills lessons and activities

Stone Age Artefacts and Sources of Evidence (Lesson for KS2)
KS2History

Stone Age Artefacts and Sources of Evidence (Lesson for KS2)

(6)
A full lesson for KS2 exploring the types of historical evidence that tell us about the Stone Age. The resource includes a detailed lesson plan, Powerpoint and pupil resource sheets. **What kind of sources tell us about the Stone Age?** This lesson addresses the question of how we can know about a ...
Bias, Fact and Opinion - History Skills
mrshopehistory

Bias, Fact and Opinion - History Skills

(1)
This lesson has been created for KS3 history students and covers the key historical skills of bias, fact and opinion. The purpose of the lesson is to get students to identify and understand bias, fact and opinion and how it can be applied and affect our understanding of history. This resource has be...
Chronology (What is history? (KS3))
Historybuff .

Chronology (What is history? (KS3))

(1)
Pupils explore the concept of chronology and how it supports historical learning, they are also introduced to the concept of a turning point and identify turning points in their own lives/across history. Includes a chronological order game of significant events from history. WALT: define chronologi...
Year 7 History Transition timeline work
Peatock

Year 7 History Transition timeline work

(1)
This is a timeline activity designed for use by year 6/ year 7 students. The aim is for them to develop a basic, chronological understanding of major British historical events from the Stone Age up to the Stuart era.
Ice Mummy Interpretation Skills Lesson (What is history? (KS3))
Historybuff .

Ice Mummy Interpretation Skills Lesson (What is history? (KS3))

(1)
This lesson follows a pupil led investigation in which they discover what has happened to the ice mummies - this lesson builds upon this knowledge and develops skills of working with interpretations prior to baseline assessment - this lesson is part of a series of lessons that build upon use of sour...
Richard III : King in the Car Park
DiscoveringHistory

Richard III : King in the Car Park

(1)
This Historical Skills lesson investigates the importance of the discovery of King Richard III : the King in the Car Park. Students look at the evidence found (including skull, teeth, skeleton etc) during excavation to explain how important his discovery was. This download includes a fully editab...
History Detective - The  Mystery of  Easter Island
Phil @icHistory

History Detective - The Mystery of Easter Island

(1)
The History Mystery series is a very good hisroy skills builder and great for the teaching of ... - Critical thinking. - Historical inquiry. - Understand that historical understanding is always evolving. - Personal bias . are students prepared to let go of their first hypothesis ? - Corrobor...
Jack the Ripper Investigation Lesson
lgibbins

Jack the Ripper Investigation Lesson

(1)
This lesson is based around the five canonical Jack the Ripper murders in 1888. Students will learn about the context of the East End of London in 1888 and then use evidence collected by the police at the time to analyse the suspects. By the end of the lesson, students should be able to infer who th...