At Forest View, pupils begin to develop their sense of the past from an early age through the Early Learning Goals. Children in EYFS are guided to make sense of the past through identifying similarities and differences between then and now and by looking at the lives of them and people around them. Grandparents are invited into school during the ‘All about Me’ Autumn topic to share photographs of themselves when they were younger and to discuss what life was like for them. Visits to the local library also enable children to collect a range of books suited to their topic.  

In Key Stage 1, pupils develop their understanding of chronology, including looking at changes within living memory and also significant people and events beyond living memory.

In Key Stage 2, units are taught on a rolling programme and are carefully scheduled so that they build on what has been taught before helping to develop the children’s chronological understanding. This includes studying Britain’s past and a series of studies about Civilizations around the world.

Forest View believes that by developing children’s historical skills, children will have an understanding of the past and how nations have changed, how empires have risen and fallen and the impact the past has on our life today.

Pupils follow a cross curricular, topic based approach to History. There is an emphasis on child-led mind mapping at the start of a topic which helps children take ownership of their learning to create an engaging topic where the children’s interests and previous learning are catered for.

At Forest View, History aims to develop the following key skills:

• An understanding of chronology
• Knowledge and understanding of events in the past.
• Historical interpretation
• Historical concepts – such as continuity and change, similarity, difference and significance.
• Historical enquiry skills.

We aim to develop children’s historical skills by providing a fun and varied curriculum, including the use of trips, visitors, artefacts and a range of primary and secondary sources of evidence.  We also aim to develop an understanding of local history to broaden the children’s understanding of where they live.

• EYFS, KS1 and KS2 identify people, places and events through stories and texts that are linked to the history element being taught.
• Trips and/or visitors develop real-life experiences for the children to build the children’s curiosity about the past and help develop a broad and balanced curriculum.
• EYFS and KS1 have role-play areas in the classroom.
• The children use a range of digital technologies and a variety of sources of evidence to develop their understanding of the past.
• Pupils are provided with a range of activities including learning beyond the classroom where appropriate.
• Other key historical people/events, e.g. Bonfire night, International day of women and girls that are not included in main historical units are discussed across the school in assemblies.

• Through work scrutiny and pupil conferencing-children enthusiastically discuss their learning in History.
• Through Showcase events and learning walks to see the range of historical work on display.
• Some lessons will result in an independent task recorded in books. 
• Some lessons will result in group or class learning tasks.  These will be recorded on See Saw. 
• Children will have a deeper understanding of their own place in the world and the impact past events, people and societies has on our life today.