Curriculum Intent
Our Curriculum Intent is for pupils to know more, do more and learn more.
A guiding principle of CUSP History is that pupils become ‘more expert’ with each study and grow an ever broadening and coherent mental timeline. Specific and associated historical vocabulary is planned sequentially and cumulatively from Year 1 to Year 6 to help make sense of subject specific words. At Trinity, we encourage our pupils/Historians to be curious learners who are inquisitive, ask questions and think hard. CUSP History seeks to empower pupils to ask relevant historical questions as well as begin to answer them using substantive and disciplinary knowledge
CUSP History draws upon several powerful sources of knowledge – this is our view on CUSP History:
1. Substantive knowledge - this is the subject knowledge and explicit vocabulary used about the past. Common misconceptions are explicitly revealed as non-examples and positioned against known and accurate content. Misconceptions are challenged carefully and in the context of the substantive and disciplinary knowledge. In CUSP History, it is recommended that misconceptions are not introduced too early, as pupils need to construct a mental model in which to position new knowledge.
2. Disciplinary knowledge – this is the use of that knowledge and how children construct understanding through historical claims, arguments and accounts. We call it ‘Working Historically.’ The features of thinking historically may involve significance, evidence, continuity and change, cause and consequence, historical perspective and contextual interpretation. Content infused and adapted from HA – Teaching History 179 and 180, 2020.
3. Historical analysis is developed through selecting, organising and integrating knowledge through reasoning and inference making in response to our structured questions and challenges. We call this ‘Thinking historically’.
4. Substantive concepts, such as invasion and civilisation are taught through explicit vocabulary instruction as well as through the direct content and context of the study.