L.P. Hartley famously stated that ‘the past is a foreign country, they do things differently there.’ The more time I spend in history classrooms the more I agree. I would go further, I don’t just think the past is a foreign country, I also think that history to many students[…]
Revision / re-visiting information to make it stick is hugely important. Revising knowledge regularly will help your students remember better. Fact. To help with this process why not play Weimar Germany revision Jenga in your classroom? The resources are available here for you to download. If you want to find out how[…]
I must admit that it is only this year, after 20 years of teaching that I have felt comfortable being a’teacher in role’. I don’t know why, but before I started working with Neil Bates this was something that I shied away from. But on my first day working at[…]
As you can tell we are very keen on using games for the history classroom. Why? Because games are fun. Here is our guide to using Connect 4 to make knowledge stick. Whilst upstairs talking to the MFL team in our school I stumbled across ten Connect 4[…]
Make Knowledge Stick: Odd One Out Recently I have been working really hard to ensure that my GCSE students can recall information over longer periods of time. This is something that I admit, I never really used to think about. I would just teach in an enquiry based way and[…]
The best professional development I have ever had is to work alongside a creative colleague. Just by sitting down for 20 minutes and discussing your lessons for the next day can inspire ideas, or it can reveal fab teaching strategies that you never thought of. In my career I have[…]
Here is your 7 step guide to Jenga for the history classroom. This is a great idea for revision or for cementing that key knowledge that needs to be remembered. The idea is simple. Kids play jenga and revise / learn. It really is all about having fun and learning. What[…]
It is probably out of fashion at the moment to suggest such crazy ideas as kids having fun in your lessons. Playing the peasant farming game? Don’t be so ridiculous – where is the evidence of exceptional progress by all in the first 10 minutes your SLT may well cry![…]
We use this simple technique to check and cement learning and to deepen thinking. Playing games in the history classroom can be fun. We love ‘Prove it’ and ‘Challenge it’. As you probably know we are unashamed users of cards in lessons. Why? Well, this is because, if the cards[…]
Games in the history classroom: The wall of misconception. This is a great idea to use as a mini plenary to check learning in a fun and active way. The class needs to be armed with knowledge for this activity to work. You may have taught them does Richard the[…]
At the time of writing I have been working with a difficult year 9 class. I have just taken them over and they needed to be more engaged as they struggle to listen at the start of a lesson. In my experience this is a come problem for schools that[…]
I am an old cynic – new ideas in teaching pah! For my sins that used to be my initial view when I saw a new idea presented to me by colleague who doesn’t teach our noble subject. But then I was introduced to this idea by an RE colleague. It must[…]
