“One small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind” is one of the most famous sentences of the 20th century, and it was about science and exploration not conflict – or was it? For centuries humanity has stared at the Moon and attributed to it portents of good...

Historical romances are not always confined to fiction and flights of fancy – sometimes they actually occur within our own communities. The real-life romantic story of two young people separated by war was uncovered by Sue and Peter Mowforth who revealed the experience of their parents in a talk to the...

The end of June 2019 marked the centenary of the formal ending of the First World War. 11 November 1918 was only the Armistice – it needed a peace treaty to truly end the war. The Treaty of Versailles between the Allies and Germany was signed on 28 June 1919:...

We knew the line-up of speakers was good, we knew that the historic city of Chester was a great choice, we knew the hotel would be welcoming, we knew we were going to cover around 2,000 years’ worth of history from the Romans to the current day in two days...

This month it will be the 75th anniversary of the D-Day landings in Normandy. That courageous and astounding action was one of the key turning points that led to the end of the Second World War and the defeat of Nazism. The further in time we move from that day...

Connecting Classrooms through Global Learning was an international programme supporting teaching and learning about global issues, running from 2018 to 2020. It was funded by UK Government with the British Council, in partnership with the Geographical Association. Historical Association and several other Subject Associations are involved too. Connecting Classrooms buillt on...

Read The Historian 141 The intention for this edition of The Historian was to raise the profile of local history by exploring some new approaches, or at least some new emphases. You will find that these include my attempt to expand from my original conditioning, as an ‘adherent’ of W.G...

Dear Sir, We were collectively pleased to note the emphasis that has been given to good subject knowledge within the Government's Recruitment and Retention strategy and in the accompanying Early Career Framework. We wholeheartedly agree that developing teachers’ subject knowledge early in their career is essential for developing their expertise as quickly...

Books, books, books – we’ve been surrounded by books in the HA office and what is more, we’ve been relying on other people to tell us about them. Yes, it’s been Young Quills reviewing time. From the start of this year pupils and students around the country have been delving...

Books, books, books – we’ve been surrounded by books in the HA office and what is more, we’ve been relying on other people to tell us about them. Yes, it’s been Young Quills reviewing time. From the start of this year pupils and students around the country have been delving...

It is important that Ofsted responds to teachers' and schools' concerns and thoughts and updates its procedures. That is a key reason why we have been happy to draw together the thoughts of the history teaching community to the recent Ofsted public consultation. Much of what they are proposing to...

Structure pervades our professional lives. From timetables to exam specs; from paragraph cohesion to causal mind maps; from boxing-match debates to formal moots, we spend a lot of time organising ourselves or our students into useful patterns. Even our lessons which exist on the edge of chaos require a lot...

The Stephen Lawrence Trust was formed to provide a positive legacy to the senseless racially-motivated murder of Stephen Lawrence. This 22 April, the date of Stephen’s birthday, will be the inaugural national Stephen Lawrence Day. Every school in England has received a free information pack, including a personal letter from...

For the past ten years, the Historical Association (HA) has worked with the University of Oxford and Reading University to carry out in-depth research on the state of history teaching in schools. These reports have informed decision-makers at the highest level, notably government, Ofsted and examination boards. The reports also...

It seems we can’t escape the word ‘curriculum’ these days. The start of the year has brought us Ofsted’s new draft inspection framework, currently out for consultation. There is a new focus on the substance of education: what gets taught and how it gets taught. At first glance, there is...

This month Ofsted have issued a consultation on their new inspection framework entitled Education inspection framework 2019: inspecting the substance of education.  Over the past few years, the Historical Association’s surveys into history in English secondary schools have been showing how some schools have reduced opportunity and entitlement to study...

It sometimes seems to those of us living in Scotland, Ireland and Wales that our histories have no importance to anyone beyond our borders and when Americans, and others around the world, say ‘England’ when they actually mean the ‘United Kingdom’, it is hard not to bristle. Contributors to this...

Over the years the HA has done a lot to explore and raise awareness about LGBT history.  So for this year we thought it was about time that we pulled some of the information together so that you can find out more and, if you wish, present it to others....

The latest edition of HA News includes full details of the 2019 Annual Conference programme in one of England's oldest cities – Chester, as well as news from the world of history education, an obituary of former HA President Donald Read (1930-2018), the centenary of the Nuneaton Branch, updates on Young Quills and the Great Debate, HA tours,...

For the 2018–19 season, the Nuneaton Branch of the HA is celebrating its centenary. Founded in 1919, by 1921 there were 78 members. In 1924, members went on a ‘charabanc’ tour of Leicestershire churches, ending at Fenny Drayton, where they joined in the celebrations for the tercentenary of the birth...