Ideas to liven up history lessons

Published on: 19 December 2022

The School of Life, authors of Big Ideas from History, have put together some teacher resources around the history curriculum. These are suitable for both primary and secondary schools, depending on the topic. These are their aims for the book:

Download the resource

Here are some of their ideas for history lessons, many of which you can use without the book.

Pre-history

Here are some suggestions for when the children are learning about pre-historic times:

Download the pre-history resource

The Middle Ages

A truly global approach to the medieval period can be richly rewarding:

Download the Middle Ages resource 

The Beginnings of the Modern World

From the people of the Americas who were colonised by European exploration, to the Renaissance cultural flourishing, there are many topics to explore in this period:

Download the Beginnings of the Modern World resource

Industrialisation

There are many themes relevant to today’s world that arose in the nineteenth century. Here are just a few:

Download the Industrialisation resource 

The Modern World

From voting to the influence of the media and advertising, modern society has a lot of issues to explore in class:

Download the Modern World resource

The Future

It’s always fun to explore what children think might happen in the future.

Download the Future resource