At Nodehill we believe that learning about the past should be both enjoyable and stimulating. It is not really just   about learning dates, names, facts and figures. It is about becoming curious about the past and wanting to ask questions about what makes us the society we are today. It is about understanding the way human beings work and how life and the world around us never stands still. History can help develop so many skills. It can help us to evaluate and analyse information we are given. It helps us understand and deal with bias and misinformation. It can help us put together and develop reasoned arguments and conclusions. Studying history develops our communication skills and ability to present information accurately.

The National Curriculum says...

The importance of history

History fires pupils' curiosity about the past in Britain and the wider world. Pupils consider how the past influences the present, what past societies were like, how these societies organised their politics, and what beliefs and cultures influenced people's actions. As they do this, pupils develop a chronological framework for their knowledge of significant events and people. They see the diversity of human experience, and understand more about themselves as individuals and members of society. What they learn can influence their decisions about personal choices, attitudes and values.In history, pupils find evidence, weigh it up and reach their own conclusions. To do this they need to be able to research, sift through evidence, and argue for their point of view - skills that are prized in adult life.

What do we study at Nodehill?

Education on the Isle of Wight has been going through a turbulent time lately and the decision was taken to restructure the curriculum for the possibility of a two-year KS3 in history (the Island is currently running a two-year KS3 for the core subjects) in collaboration with our main feeder high school. Therefore, we have begun to teach some units that have originally been in Year 9, such as the First World War, and we have also had to adapt some units form KS3 to teach in Year 6, such as the British Empire. The current history curriculum at Nodehill roughly follows the timetable below. All pupils complete formative assessments for each unit.    

	Year 5	Year 6	Year 7	Year 8
Autumn Term	Ancient Greece	The Victorians	Medieval Life	The English Civil Wars
Spring Term	Tudor Explorers	The Victorians/ The British Empire	The French Revolution	The Glorious Revolution
Summer Term	The Home Front	Britain since 1945/John Lennon	Black Peoples of the Americas/ Images of an Age	The Suffragettes/The First World War

We support all our pupils through banded classes and differentiated learning activities. The department has build up strong links with Carisbrooke Castle Museum Education Service and we have been able to utilise their expertise and resources in our lessons, including hands-on artefacts sessions in Year 6 and hands-on sessions at Carisbrook Castle for Year 7.

We offer more able, gifted and enthusiastic pupils the opportunity to take part in enrichment days. These have included visits to local sites of historic interest, such as Brading Roman villa, and a visit to see the conservation and heritage management work undertaken by English Heritage at Osborne House. The department is currently planning a joint History-Citizenship visit to the Houses of Parlaiment in July for selected Year 8 pupils. 

We currently organise day visits for Year 6 to Osborne House and Year 7 to Carisbrooke Castle each year and the school offers a joint History and Geography residential visit (currently) to Dorset where we visit, amongst other attractions, HMS Victory and Corfe Castle.