This enquiry looks at the work of our favorite TV historian, Simon Schama to help work out how much William I changed Saxon crime prevention.
Schama starts his TV programme in ‘A History of Britain’ on Conquest by making some pretty bold claims. Do they stand up to scrutiny?
The specification asks us to look at how much definitions of crime changed under William including the Forest Laws. Although this unit is not aimed at assessing interpretations or the work of the historian, we think it is important to include this element as it will help our students develop all the skills they need for the exam. Here we embrace this is an interesting way at the start of the enquiry.
After establishing that Schama states that Hastings changed everything, we use a two way graph and plot important changes and continuities to see if your students agree with him.
This provides you with a clever way to get across difficult ideas. Your students finish by writing to Schama telling him how much they agree with his interpretation.
Download lesson
- Lesson presentation: PowerPoint
- Lesson write-up: PDF
- Resource 1: PDF
- Worksheet 1: PDF
- Worksheet 2 (extra stretch): PDF
