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 is a lesson for HA year 7 students. It gives them the opportunity to write an essay aiming to hit the old NC levels 5,6 and even 7. I have had a 7A essay handed in using this lesson and most were L6 so if you want to challenge your HA, give this a go. Be aware though that this resource covers three lessons and is mostly concerned with essay structure. I haven't indicated in the PP at which point the students write the essay, so here is how I did it: Lesson 1: students use a card sort to examine the consequences of the black death, they work in pairs and groups to find the most significant/substantial change and the least significant/substantial change. They then choose three pieces of evidence that show significant change, three that show medium change and three that show no change. These will make up their paragraphs. Lesson 2: Students look at a dummy essay on how much school rules changed life for students. I have labelled a paragraph with structural necessities such as 'point, evidence, explanation' and they use highlighters to spot where the author of the essay has done this. Students get started on the essay, aim to finish one paragraph in class, then set one for homework. Lesson 3: You can allow students to peer assess each other's essay so far (in the same way they highlighted the dummy essay), or you can just give them half an hour to finish the essay. They need to have completed their third paragraph before you show them how to write the conclusion. There is a conclusion to the dummy essay that students analyse the structure of before having a go themselves. Most likely, you will want to set this for homework as if your HA class are like mine, they are crazy perfectionists. Please note, this lesson is not differentiated. You would have to approach this essay in a completely different way for a class that is targetted L3-5 and a L4 student would need support to access it. But if you want to push your HA, this resource is really strong. Learning Objectives: ALL students will be able to Describe some of the ways in which life changed using some detailed evidence. Write a conclusion to say how much life changed. (L5) MOST students will be able to Explain how the black death changed the lives of peasants by thinking about the short term and the long term effects of the changes. Supporting all comments with detailed factual knowledge (L6) SOME students will be able to use a lot of detailed factual knowledge to analyse how much change has taken place. This means that you really pick the facts apart to show how much life changed. (L7)

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

UK Teachers: This resource is intended to support the learning of AS and A Level students, but can be adapted to support learners in KS4. It is designed to cover 2 lessons and lead towards students writing an essay on the topic for homework, alternatively the essay could be completed in class and form a third lesson. Essay resources and structure included in the PowerPoint. US Teachers: This resource is aimed at students who would be aged 17 and 18 in the UK, although it can be adapted for younger or less able learners. It is an in depth investigation of the success of the civil rights movement using facts and statistics, leading learners to write an essay on the topic. Learning time should be 2 hours in class, plus time to write the essay. NB the term 'black Americans' is used throughout, you may want to change this to African Americans. Lesson Objectives for this resource: LO: To be able to make a judgement on how much change took place by 1968 LO: To be able to support this judgement with detailed pieces of evidence LO: To be able to organise our analysis into factors or themes that can be used in an essay LO: To show how our overall judgement has been arrived at from our analysis of these factors Activities include a starter based on school experiences, a card sort into factors, a living graph activity that can be done in pairs, or groups, and an essay based on the above question. Resources needed: scissors, glue, coloured pens, sugar paper or large piece of white paper (A3 should do) Please let me know what you think of this resource in the reviews - particularly if you have any suggestions on how to improve it.

This game gives students the chance to be a boy in the Hitler youth following the Nazi policies. Board spaces are either events such as reading aloud from Mein Kampf, or questions from the sheet provided to test students knowledge, allowing them either to move forwards or remain. Great consolidation game for KS3 and KS4, especially when revision pressure starts! Thanks to Paul Durnall who gave me this.

A source based lesson on life in cities during the industrial revolution focusing on making and supporting inferences. A mixture of picture sources and written sources are used and a homework suggestion is included. The Learning Outcomes this lesson targets are: ALL will be able to use sources to find out information (L4), MOST will be able to make inferences from the sources (L5) SOME will be able to explain our inferences by linking the sources to each other, or our own knowledge (L6)

It was the end of term, my lovely year 7 asked me for a drama lesson, so I wrote this play. We rehearsed and performed it within just one lesson, minimum props needed. The play is several very short chunks that allows up to 32 students to have a named part. Each scene is written for between 2 and 5 students and there are 10 'scenes' so lots of people get to be Henry and lots more get to be various wives. I provided yellow cardboard crowns and some cardboard swords and we used our imagination for the rest. After each group had had 15 minutes to rehearse, to plan their entrances and props and actions etc, I gathered them all into an arena shape with a half circle of chairs in front, several tables behind so all could sit and all could see. The groups performed the scenes in order as I called them, it was a beautiful farce that was lots of fun, and lots of clapping. The most memorable part was when a group of boys enacted Jane Seymour giving birth.. lots of ad libbing! I hope you enjoy this as much as we did, I will definitely be using this again. NB I wrote it with a mixed ability class in mind so the reading isn't too challenging. To beef it up you could have a selection of keywords, or historical terms on the board and give points for groups that include them.

This lesson is an introduction to the historical skill of significance and explaining significance. It gets students to discuss why someone might be significant in history eg. They changed peoples lives at the time, or they made a lot of money, or they achieved something extraordinary. Students put these in order of the most effective way of measuring historical significance to the least. I designed this for year 7, but have found myself using this lesson over and over again with all secondary year groups as it helps to reset the basics for understanding significance. The second part of the lesson is the balloon game, I would get students to play this in groups rather than as a class.

This lesson is an introduction to the basic issues that Martin Luther had with the Catholic church. It touches on the central role of the priest, indulgences and the financial profligacy of the church. There is one task that uses a page from the SHP Year 7 textbook, but most textbooks will have a page to help answer the question 'what were the main differences between Protestants and Catholics?' This is the question that students use the page to answer, so if you have a similar resource then this lesson is still good for you. Here are the lesson objectives this lesson is designed to satisfy: ALL: Will be able to identify differences between the Catholic and Protestant Churches MOST: Will be able to explain the differences based on what the Protestants protested about SOME: Will be able to make supported inferences about why some people were unhappy with the Catholic church

This is a pretty relaxed lesson that guides students towards the following objectives: ALL: Will be able to describe doom paintings and their message MOST: Will be able to make inferences from primary sources SOME: Will be able to analyse sources to make an inference as to how powerful the church was in the middle ages. This lesson features a 'see it, describe it, draw it' starter, some paired discussion and a written task to demonstrate understanding. NB. there is no text or clip detailing what a doom painting is, or where they were found. This lesson relies on you having subject knowledge to support students in their inferences.

This lesson gives students the task of working together in a group to publish a short newspaper and it is designed for KS5 as independent research skills are central to this lesson. They have to chose whether they use a Pro Ford headline, or an Anti-Ford headline and need the resources available to research aspects of Ford's presidency. I strongly suggest that you make textbooks available such as 'Access to History, Politics, Presidency and Society' to support this piece of group work. Within this PP are prompts for the group to research on the economy, women's rights, racial equality and politics within the Republican Party. At the end, students have to decide whether to include a political cartoon about Ford being the 'the mender'.

Includes instructions for how to make a board game that includes elements of luck and elements of testing knowledge. This activity needs to follow at least one lesson on the home front so students can set their own questions. Essential Resources needed: Large pieces of paper, pens. dice Desirable Resources: coloured paper and card, scissors, coloured pens This is a fun lesson for the end of a unit, feel free to make your own board game as an example, or to model what other board games look like. I have attached a list of questions if your students are a little stuck on setting their own, the answers have a star next to them

Teaching the feudal system is not the most exciting lesson, so I have turned this one on its head. Students spend the lesson preparing to teach the feudal system to their parents/guardians at home, using the facts they can gain from the lesson. They know this at the outset, have the feudal system explained to them and have 20 minutes to prepare their 'mini lesson' during their history lesson. I have several slides explaining the feudal system with cartoon pictures in colour to liven things up, then you have a class discussion about the homework. Ask them about their favourite lessons and what kind of activities the teachers had them doing. I've put loads of suggestions for this on the PowerPoint and the best thing about this lesson is that there is absolutely no marking! Parents fill in a feedback sheet for the homework and all you need to do is smile and say well done - the parents have marked them for you! Learning Objectives covered here: ALL: Will be able to describe the feudal system MOST: Will be able to explain the relationships between each level SOME: Will be able to explain how this would help William to keep control over his new country. Bonus material - a colouring in sheet of the feudal system. Not bad cover if you got them to colour and then annotate it.

These assorted resources are designed to support your own teaching and provide a basis of knowledge for students to build on. They are not 'download and go' material, but do provide straightforward activities, an assessment and a research based homework task that are great if you are feeling a little frazzled. I'll talk you through what is included: * 'Evacuation Research Homework' gives students a URL and a series of questions to answer based on what they read on the webpage. * 'Evacuation Question and Answer matching task is extremely straight forward, you could use it as a starter or with an LA group it might be fun to cut out the questions and answers and ask the student to find their match. * 'Evacuation Experiences Living Graph' and 'Evacuation Experiences Events' are a worksheet and a PP that give students 5 events in the journey of the evacuee and they flip a coin to decide if they get the positive experience or the negative experience. They plot these experiences on a living graph. * 'Evacuation Accounts' is a real gem here, 11 primary source accounts of evacuation of a decent length to challenge your HA. Accounts range from recollections of evacuees to government leaflets. There is no accompanying task for this resource, but it is highly adaptable and extremely useful as a base of study. You would probably need about 2 mins to set questions from this resource and you would want to use only 3 or 4 of the sources at a time. Many Thanks to Paul Durnall who gave me these

The main bulk of this is the newspaper task, designed to meet the following LOs * ALL: Will be able to describe aspects of what happened at Dunkirk * MOST: Will be able to support an opinion as to whether Dunkirk was a defeat or a victory * SOME: Will be able to use the origin of the source to comment on whether the source is reliable. * ONE or TWO... Might be able to use their analysis of source reliability to explain why they trust some sources over others and how this has affected their own overall judgement. There is a presentation about Dunkirk with pictures and statistics, you may choose to deliver this yourself, or stick it up around the room for students to find and examine themselves. They may then read the interpretations/opinions sheet in which various sources give their verdict on Dunkirk, and the Dunkirk survivors sheet which does the same. Finally I have included an electronic template for the newspaper front page that the students will write, this could be set for homework over a VLE, or printed and handed out for students to fill in. If they are making handwritten copies, I would recommend having a stash of plain paper ready as most students prefer to establish the layout themselves. Thanks to Paul Durnall who gave me parts of this.

You need a specific textbook to use this resource - if you download this without it, you will have to spend time pulling alternative resources together. Lesson Outcomes: ALL Will be able to describe at least two reasons why confidence in the President declined MOST Will be able to assess which factor was most damaging SOME will be able to link the factors Lesson includes source analysis, independent research and structured explanations.

Edexcel Paper 1, Option F: In search of the American Dream LESSON 2 What is the American Dream? Follow on from the intro lesson, this lesson uses the homework students were set in the first lesson as a task in this lesson. You could just print off some articles about the US in the news though and students could use those instead. - Students identify themes in the news articles - definitions of the American dream used and discussed as a basis for finding a class definition

Describes the structure of the US government and the difference between state and federal laws.

I attended a lecture with my year 12 and took these notes which I then typed up into a resource for them to use. There were lots of facts that weren't covered in any of the textbooks so this is a useful resource to read over before planning a lesson on this topic. Please review if this was useful.