Since setting foot on a windswept Cumbrian beach in 1568, Mary, Queen of Scots had long been a thorn in Elizabeth’s side. Despite this, Elizabeth avoided having to deal with her cousin until 1587 when she was finally executed for treason. The damning evidence resulting from Walsingham’s code breakers during[…]
In 1558 Elizabeth had been asked to marry Philip II of Spain. Despite turning him down, relations between the two countries remained good for the early part of her reign. Yet by 1585, Elizabeth found herself in a war she never wanted with the most powerful nation in Europe. Why?[…]
In 1588, Philip II began his ‘enterprise of England’ or the Spanish Armada as it is better known. For many years historians in England and Spain subscribed to the view of the Spanish Armada as a great English victory against the odds. Superior English seamanship along with heroic captains such[…]
This enquiry deals with causation and the reasons for the increase in poverty during the Elizabethan era. It covers the skills necessary to help students really explain why things in history happens AND saves time by providing students with a range of explanations to match to the causes. This allows a[…]
This enquiry deals with Elizabethan attitudes to poverty and the considerable fear of vagabonds and the ‘idle poor’ that existed. The ‘rascally raballage’ of the title was a phrase coined in Thomas Harman’s dramatic description of vagabonds in his 1567 book. Students look at a range of information in order[…]
Students read a reconstruction of an entertaining day spent by a rich chap in London in 1588.
Why did so many Elizabethan adventurers risk long voyages overseas at a time when circumnavigating the globe was statistically riskier than modern day space travel? This enquiry (probably 2 lessons) helps your students understand the driving factors behind the voyages of discovery, trade and privateering that were undertaken in the[…]
Disease, suspicion, starvation, murder and Walter Raleigh. The story of England’s first two American colonies has it all. This enquiry asks your students to think about the reasons why the first two attempts at colonisation in Virginia failed. The class will consider the relative importance of the challenges facing the colonists[…]
Students become gallery curators – which impressive portraits of Walter Raleigh and Francis Drake should stay in Room 2 of the National Portrait Gallery?
Whether or not an aging Elizabeth and a seventeen-year-old Earl of Essex enjoyed all-nighters playing cards is perhaps open to debate. However, what is not open to debate is the spectacular fall from grace that attended Essex, from one of Elizabeth’s favourite courtiers to traitor with his head on the[…]
This mystery lesson gets your students use a range of evidence to go from initial guess work to formulating, testing and refining their hypotheses. This enquiry aims to cover the reasons for Spanish attack on Britain and why the Armada failed in one history mystery. We love a mystery and this one works a treat!
The class work out Why were ‘they’ punished so harshly.
This historical enquiry uses the case study of Matthew Hopkins to evaluate some sloppy work by school text book historians.
Download this free knowledge-rich plan for a 5 enquiry study into Power in the Early Modern Period. This fits into our coherent Key Stage 3 curriculum. The free downloadable scheme provides you with the core knowledge each lesson delivers and the first-order concepts / key terms each lesson will focus[…]
This clever enquiry provides the antidote to those turgid lessons on the complicated causes of the English Civil War. Your students will think deeply, develop good historical thinking and do very little writing!
UPDATED FOR 2020 We have worked out how to teach this difficult topic for you. That is what collaborative planning does! High in thinking and low in writing, we have created a clever way to get across the significance of the English Civil War. The aim of this lesson is for[…]
Interpretations can be tricky to teach. But with this quirky enquiry you can help your classes see how interpretations are affected by the context in which they are created in AND why they differ.
Download this knowledge organiser for this unit focusing on power in the Early Modern Period. The unit provides you with enquiries showing how power shifted in this period. The first three enquiries discuss the Civil War and Cromwell. The next two assess the what extent power shifted after 1688. This[…]
This simple and effective enquiry asks your students to challenge historian Howard Nenner’s view of 18th-century British politics. You start by getting your students to look at Thomas Hobbes Leviathan (yes, really, but only a quote and the book cover). Having worked out that Hobbes believed in a strong monarch,[…]
This enquiry introduces students to the comedy genius of Blackadder. It asks your classes to decide how accurate the Blackadder interpretation of 18th-century politics is. Students first work out the message of the interpretation, before considering a range of evidence to support or challenge some of the main aspects of the[…]
Download this substantive knowledge test the unit on Power in the Early Modern Period. It tests your students’ core knowledge from this unit of work. Use it alongside an end product from one of the enquiries in this unit to provide you with assessment information about your students substantive and[…]
Download this free knowledge-rich plan for a 5 enquiry study into Ordinary Lives in the Early Modern Period. This fits into our coherent Key Stage 3 curriculum. The free downloadable scheme provides you with the core knowledge each lesson delivers and the first-order concepts / key terms each lesson will[…]
This enquiry helps students to develop an overview understanding of some of the key features of ordinary people’s lives during the early modern period. It uses a print from the time entitled ‘Tittle-tattle; or, the several branches of gossiping’ (a print from 1640 that is best known for making fun[…]
This enquiry challenges students to improve upon a one-dimensional museum exhibition on ‘Elizabeth I and her people’. First, they develop their knowledge of the Elizabethan poor. Students then organise information about the lives of the poor in Elizabethan England and they consider why historians have disagreed so much about the[…]
Download this knowledge organiser for this unit focusing on ordinary lives in the Early Modern Period. The unit is centred around the question: To what extent did ordinary lives get better in the period 1500 to 1750? This knowledge organiser provides your students with the core substantive knowledge they will[…]
This enquiry takes a quote from writer Daniel Defoe (of Robinson Crusoe fame!) about the state of England’s economy at the start of the 18th century. Defoe (pictured left) claims that Britain was ‘the most flourishing and opulent country in the world’ – and students need to work out the[…]
Students go through the process of reaching and refining their hypotheses as they consider new evidence, ultimately working out that Temperance Lloyd was accused of the crime of ‘witchcraft’ and sent to hang! The enquiry shifts focus halfway through, as students begin to consider why women like Temperance were accused[…]
This lesson follows on from the ‘Why was Temperance Lloyd executed in 1682?’ lesson, exploring some of the reasons for the rise in accusations of witchcraft in the 17th century. Here the focus is on the experiences of women in Scotland, because Scotland saw many more witchcraft trials than England[…]
This approach gets to the heart of the power of history as a subject.
Download this substantive knowledge test the unit on Ordinary Lives in the Early Modern Period. It tests your students’ core knowledge from this unit of work. Use it alongside an end product from one of the enquiries in this unit to provide you with assessment information about your students substantive[…]
