History Resource Cupboard – lessons and resources for schools

History Resource Cupboard - lessons and resources for schools

assessment

Assessment at Key Stage 3: The problems

Ever since I started teaching, assessment at Key Stage 3 has proven to be a thorny issue. National Curriculum levels were introduced way back in 1995. And, they were contentious, to say the least. Their abolition in 2014 should have been celebrated. Yet, according to the brilliant annual HA survey,[…]

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Using enquiry to succeed at 9-1 GCSE history

Reading

I think I might be out of fashion.  Come to think of it, on a sartorial level I have never been in fashion. But that is a digression. You see I have always been an advocate of enquiry based history. I gardened in Michael Riley’s enquiry garden way back in[…]

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The problem with exam questions and teaching to the test

Exam desks

Over the last year I have been working hard creating resources for the new GCSEs. This has led me to look really carefully at many things: different topics, the details of the content, and the assessment approaches of the new GCSEs on offer. These exam questions can be predictable. Fact.[…]

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Strategies to improve grades in GCSE source evaluation

Labour isn't Working

After marking our mock exams a few years ago something struck me. Our students were often failing to get high marks on questions about source evaluation (this was the source paper for OCR Modern World). After closer analysis of examiners reports, mark-schemes and student responses, I realised that we needed some[…]

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Effective marking

Marking

Effective marking by Pam Canning Every half term I say I won’t do it, and every half term I do. And I can’t be the only one. I left all of my marking until the last minute, and spend the last 3 days trying to give meaningful feedback to 50[…]

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Games the history classroom: The wall of misconception

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[…]

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Assessment without levels – a few thoughts

Before I discuss assessment without  levels and give you a few  thoughts, let me let you into a little secret. One that I have kept close for long time. I haven’t given an individual piece of work a national curriculum level for about 15 years! In that time I have[…]

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Assessment without levels – a few thoughts

Let me let you into a little secret. One that I have kept close for long time. I haven’t given an individual piece of work a national curriculum level for about 15 years! In that time I have been praised in Ofsted inspections for giving high quality feedback and having[…]

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The view of the Secret History Teacher: Red, amber and grrrrrrrrrr.

Here is our new blog feature. Rather than have me or Neil post our thoughts, we have asked a secret history teacher to tell us how it is for them at the chalk-face in 2013. Here is the first post. Enjoy. Red, amber and grrrrrrrrrr. You know the feeling, staring at the[…]

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Old fashioned thinking about assessment

It is official: schools are assessment crazy! I recently spoke two teachers who told me that where they teach they have to get their students to produce a levelled piece of work every two weeks!! How mad / crazy / ill informed / laughable / depressing * is that!  Where[…]

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Better the devil you don’t know?

When it comes to levels and history I have always had, what some might describe as a clear point of view. Put simply, the levels for history are an absolute nonesense and are not worth the paper they are written on. Marking one piece of work against a level is an[…]

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What is good assessment practice at Key Stage 3?

There appears to be widespread agreement among teachers, academics and researchers about what good assessment practice is. However, someone somewhere seems to have forgotten to mention this to Senior Leaders who are desperate for data they can use to measure progress. Often the data they are using to measure history[…]

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