A special episode of the historical sketch show about Oliver Cromwell. We follow Oliver as he rises from obscurity, challenges King Charles I in the English Civil War, and ultimately orders the King’s execution - as he says, a it was a ‘cruel necessity’. In other parts of Britain we meet a bunch of oddly named Puritan soldiers, and the great writers Shakespeare and Milton square up for a word battle. With of course, our host Rattus to guide the way! Written in Publisher and formatted to A3 printing the resouce can be saved as a PDF and printed in A4

Blackadder Goes Forth - Goodbyeee - Worksheet to support the BBC TV programme. This task has been written to support both Ks3 as an introduction to WWI and a consolidation / flipped task for the GCSE 9-1 curriculum studying the Western Front . Students are to watch and study the script of the programme, making inferences about : Conditions, Attitudes to War, Food and Causes of the War. They are asked to consider why things are funny and develop the habit of explaining their inferences. The work is set out in tables so could easily be cut up for card based group work The worksheet, due to its content, is designed to be printed on A3 but can be fully edited and exported for printing by PDF to A4

Based on Ian Mortimer’s popular ‘A Time Traveller’s guide to Elizabethan England’ series, these worksheets provide a useful note taking scaffold for KS3 and KS4 students. The set of resources could be used as a useful overview to the Edexcel 9:1 GCSE - Elizabethan England 1558 - 88 supporting the syllabus topics: Challenges to Elizabeth’s rule & Life in Elizabethan England. Each film clip is around 10 minutes in duration making them an ideal flipped learning task, starter or plenary activity. Search - BBC Teach - Class Clips - KS3 History: What was life like in Elizabethan society? The historian, Ian Mortimer, journeys back in time to find out what life was really like in the court of Elizabeth I. He starts at Hampton Court, one of twenty royal residences inherited by Elizabeth I. Here he discovers that appearance played a vital role at court helping to denote a person’s social status and whether they were of sufficient importance and wealth to be granted an audience with the Queen. He retraces Elizabeth’s royal progresses around the country and uncovers evidence that increasing numbers of people were becoming richer and using their new-found wealth to build their own manor houses. A visit from the monarch and her vast entourage would be a mixed blessing, the ultimate privilege and confirmation of the highest social status but also ruinously expensive.

A short film for secondary schools, presented by David Olusoga, which explores the lives of some of the hundreds of black migrants who were in England during the Tudor period. Olusoga visits The National Archives in Kew, where he meets Dr. Miranda Kaufmann. They discuss John Blanke, a trumpeter in the court of Henry VIII, who was so well established that he actually submitted a request for a pay rise, and a diver, Jacques Francis, who gave evidence in a court case. Dr. Kaufmann concludes that some black people in England were accorded greater privileges than many white English people at the time. Search - BBC Teach - CLass Clips - KS3 / KS4 / GCSE History: The story of black migrants in Tudor England A one page resource Written in Publisher and formatted to A3 the resource can be saved as a PDF for A4 printing

Worksheet to support the BBC Teach video extract BBC Teach - Class Clips - History KS3 / GCSE: Small Axe - The Mangrove Nine Rochenda Sandall, who plays one of The Mangrove Nine in Steve McQueen’s Small Axe, tells the true story of this significant event in black British history. The Mangrove restaurant was opened in March, 1969, by Trinidadian Frank Crichlow. The restaurant became a home from home for the black community in Notting Hill. It attracted artists, musicians and activists from around the world. Bob Marley, Marvin Gaye, Jimmy Hendrix, Nina Simone, Diana Ross and the Supremes, all congregated at the Mangrove to enjoy Caribbean food. But the Mangrove restaurant became a target for the police, which ended up destroying it. Written in Publisher and formatted to A3 the resource can be saved as a PDF for A4 printing A two page resource

BBC Learning Zone - Was the British empire a force for good? (part 1/2) worksheet to support the BBC Jeremy Paxman Documentary: Empire This clip tells the story of how Hong Kong came under British control, reflecting the Empire’s often ruthless pursuit of profit - opening up China for trade, at a cost of thousands of ruined lives. Search - BBC Learning Zone - Was the British empire a force for good? (part 1/2) Written in Publisher and formatted to A3 the resource can be saved as a PDF for A4 printing This is a one page resource

GCSE History 9-11: Medicine through time, c1250–present - Plague - Worksheet to support the Channel 4 Plague Documentary - Fire, Plague and Treason narrated by Brenda Blethyn.

Gaining and Losing an Empire: 1763-1914 Changing nature and extent of trade Overview/Revision Booklet. Introductory/Revision Booklet based around the Pearson Christie & Christie textbook. The PDF version includes scans of existing free resources available from my shop. Planned to be used as the core course notes for next years teaching and a class based or independent learning resource. This resource deals with content and knowledge and does not contain any assessment.

1066: A Year to Conquer England Ep3 - Worksheet to support the BBC Documentary with Dan Snow In this three-part drama-documentary series, Dan Snow explores the political intrigues and family betrayals between Vikings, Anglo-Saxons and Normans that led to war, and the Battle of Hastings. King Harold of England has to take on two invasion forces. First, his brother Tostig attacks the south coast. He is repelled, but there is more to come. Later in the year, a vast Viking invasion force led by King Harald Hardrada of Norway lands in the north of England. Harold rushes to Stamford Bridge to fight for his kingdom and for his life. Meanwhile, Duke William of Normandy is ready to invade, but storms keep his invasion fleet trapped in port. Written for enrichment/independent/flipped activities, the sheet contains a variety of data collection activities based upon the TV programme Written in Publisher and formatted to A3 the sheet can be saved as a PDF to A4

BBC - Armada: 12 Days to Save England - Episode 3 - Worksheet to support the BBC Documentary Written to provided extension/ enrichment / independent learning options The final episode of a three-part drama-documentary series telling the story of how England came within a whisker of disaster in summer 1588. Newly discovered documents reveal a remarkable web of misunderstandings that stopped the Spanish from invading, and show how the English victory forged the reputation of Elizabeth. Written in Publisher and formatted to A3 the worksheet can be saved as a PDF for A4 printing

Lucy debunks the foundation myth of one of our favourite royal dynasties, the Tudors. According to the history books, after 30 years of bloody battles between the white-rosed Yorkists and the red-rosed Lancastrians, Henry Tudor rid us of civil war and the evil king Richard III. But Lucy reveals how the Tudors invented the story of the ‘Wars of the Roses’ after they came to power to justify their rule. She shows how Henry and his historians fabricated the scale of the conflict, forged Richard’s monstrous persona and even conjured up the image of competing roses. When our greatest storyteller William Shakespeare got in on the act and added his own spin, Tudor fiction was cemented as historical fact. Taking the story right up to date, with the discovery of Richard III���s bones in a Leicester car park, Lucy discovers how 15th-century fibs remain as compelling as they were over 500 years ago. As one colleague tells Lucy: 'Never believe an historian! Written in Publisher to an A3 format but also saved as a PDF for A4 printing

BBC Documentary - Genghis Khan - Rise Of Mongol Empire He was a man who combined the savagery of a real-life Conan the Barbarian with the sheer tactical genius of Napoleon, a man from the outermost reaches of Asia whose armies ultimately stood poised to conquer Europe. His name was Genghis Khan. Today the name of Genghis Khan is synonymous with dark evil yet in his lifetime he was a heroic figure, a supreme strategist capable of eliciting total devotion from his warriors. He grew up in poverty on the harsh unforgiving steppe of Mongolia. From the murder of his father, the kidnap of his wife and the execution of his closest friend, he learned the lessons of life the hard way. So how did this outcast come to conquer an empire larger than the Roman Empire? And was Genghis Khan the brutal monster who ruthlessly slaughtered millions in his quest for power, or was he a brilliant visionary who transformed a rabble of warring tribes into a nation capable of world domination? Filmed entirely on location in Mongolia, the film tells the truth behind the legend that is Genghis Khan. Written in Publisher and formatted to A3 the resource can be saved as a PDF for A4 printing

BBC -British History’s Biggest Fibs with Lucy Worsley - The Glorious Revolution In this episode, Lucy debunks another of the biggest fibs in British history - the ‘Glorious Revolution’.In 1688, the British Isles were invaded by a huge army led by Dutch prince, William of Orange. With his English wife Mary he stole the throne from Mary’s father, the Catholic King James II. This was the death knell for absolute royal power and laid the foundations of our constitutional monarchy. It was spun as a ‘glorious and bloodless revolution’. But how ‘glorious’ was it really? It led to huge slaughter in Ireland and Scotland. Lucy reveals how the facts and fictions surrounding 1688 have shaped our national story ever since. Written in Publisher and formatted to A3 the resource can also be saved as a PDF for A4 printing

Dr Suzannah Lipscomb journeys back to Tudor times, when the newly emergent middle classes had money for luxuries and early consumer goods, many of which contained hidden dangers. Dr Lipscomb takes us back to Tudor times in search of the household killers of the era. It was a great age of exploration and science where adventurers returned from the New World with exotic goods previously unknown in Europe. An era in which the newly emergent middle classes had, for the first time, money for luxuries and early consumer goods, many of which contained hidden dangers. The period also saw a radical evolution in the very idea of ‘home’. For the likes of Tudor merchants, their houses became multi-room structures instead of the single-room habitations that had been the norm (aristocracy excepted). This forced the homebuilders of the day to engineer radical new design solutions and technologies, some of which were lethal. Suzannah discovers that in Tudor houses the threat of a grisly, unpleasant death was never far away in a world (and a home) still mired in the grime and filth of the medieval period - and she shows how we still live with the legacy of some of these killers today Written in Publisher and formatted to A3 for printing the worksheet can be saved as a PDF for A4 printing

Julius Caesar is the most famous Roman of them all: brutal conqueror, dictator and victim of a gruesome assassination on the Ides of March 44 BC. 2,000 years on, he still shapes the world. He has given us some political slogans we still use today (Crossing the Rubicon), his name lives on in the month of July, and there is nothing new about Vladmir Putin’s carefully cultivated military image, and no real novelty in Donald Trump’s tweets and slogans. Mary Beard is on a mission to uncover the real Caesar, and to challenge public perception. She seeks the answers to some big questions. How did he become a one-man ruler of Rome? How did he use spin and PR on his way to the top? Why was he killed? And she asks some equally intriguing little questions. How did he conceal his bald patch? Did he really die, as William Shakespeare put it, with the words Et tu, Brute on his lips? Above all, Mary explores his surprising legacy right up to the present day. Like it or not, Caesar is still present in our everyday lives, our language, and our politics. Many dictators since, not to mention some other less autocratic leaders, have learned the tricks of their trade from Julius Caesar. Written in Publisher and formatted to A3 the resource can be saved as a PDF for A4 printing

BBC - Jerusalem: The Making of a Holy City—Ep1 -Wellspring of Holiness Author and historian Simon Sebag Montefiore presents a three-part series illuminating the history of the sacred and peerlessly beautiful city of Jerusalem. Jerusalem is one of the oldest cities in the world. For the Jewish faith, it is the site of the Western Wall, the last remnant of the second Jewish temple. For Christians, the Church of the Holy Sepulchre is the site of the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. For Muslims, the Al-Aqsa mosque is the third holiest sanctuary of Islam. In episode one, Simon delves into the past to explore how this unique city came into being, explaining how it became of such major importance to the three Abrahamic faiths, and how these faiths emerged from the Biblical tradition of the Israelites. Starting with the Canaanites, Simon goes on a chronological journey to trace the rise of the city as a holy place and discusses the evidence for it becoming a Jewish city under King David. The programme explores the construction of the first temple by Solomon through to the life and death of Jesus Christ and the eventual expulsion of the Jews by the Romans, concluding in the 7th century AD, on the eve of the capture of Jerusalem by the Muslim caliph, Umar ibn al-Khattab. Written in Publisher and formatted to A3 the resource can be saved as a PDF for A4 printing

Written as an enrichment/flipped/independent learning activity the worksheet contains a variety of data collection activities for the video. Covers the Yom Kippur War from start to finish concentrating on both the Syrian and Egyptian fronts. It also briefly covers the six day war of 1967, in which Israel launched a preemptive strike against Syria, Jordan and Egypt. Does not cover one engagement primarily, other than a slight focus on the Battle of Chinese Farm near the Suez Canal. The Palestinian struggle for statehood is heavily emphasized. The episode is filmed in the Negev Desert in Southern Israel, since neither Egypt nor Syria gave permission to film in their countries. Dan Snow learns how to operate an anti-tank missile. Written in Publisher and formatted to A3 the worksheet can be amended and saved as a PDF for A4 printing

In this section Starkey focuses on the early years of Elizabeth’s rule and her reluctance to marry. Her dalliances with court favourites like Lord Dudley provoked speculation, but what concerned her advisers was her refusal to consider a suitor from France or Spain, powers which constituted a military threat. She was in a precarious position: a Protestant Queen in a Catholic country, and Mary, Queen of Scots, who wanted to claim the throne and return the nation to Catholic rule, was a great threat to Elizabeth. Elizabeth, the virgin Queen, the most powerful woman in English history. She emerged as a young princess against a backdrop of civil unrest, political intrigue, executions and coups. She ruled for 45 years and presided over a new kind of state. Her reign saw England emerge from the threat of European annexation to burst forth in a unique flowering of culture and became the world’s leading sea power. In this four part series David Starkey charts the rise and fall of her reign and reveals the powerful resonance it has for the present. This series covers one of the most glamorous and exciting reigns in English history, with bloodthirsty tales of sex, lust, murder and mayhem.

Cold War (TV Series) Ep.23 - The Wall Comes Down - Supporting Worksheet for the BBC / CNN co-production, narrated by Kenneth Brannagh - Written as a extension and enrichment task for GCSE, it would also be appropriate for A Level studies. It is written in Publisher formatted for A3 printing, but can be amended and saved as a PDF for A4 printing Gorbachev makes clear Eastern European countries were free to determine their own destinies. In Poland Solidarity enters into negotiations with the Government, and would end up winning a landslide election. In Hungary the Government chooses to symbolically re-inter Imre Nagy, and open its frontier with Austria, which is then crossed by increasing numbers of holidaying East Germans. Erich Honecker refuses to implement reforms, despite subtle pressure from Gorbachev and growing protests across East Germany. The bloody end to dissent in China is never far from the minds of protesters. Just as protests reach a peak, Soviet forces in East Germany are stood down, and Honecker is replaced by an unimpressive Egon Krenz. As a concession travel restrictions are lifted but the new regulations are miscommunicated, and the Berlin Wall is suddenly and irrevocably breached by masses of East Germans. In the momentum, the fate of communism in East Germany is sealed. Interviewees include Mikhail Gorbachev, Miklós Németh, Egon Krenz and George H. W. Bush. The pre-credits scene includes Gorbachev explaining that by 1989, force alone could not secure the world.