Move Me On is a regular feature in Teaching History (TH) designed to offer practical help to all those involved in training new history teachers. Each one presents a specific problem or challenging situation related to a history trainee’s development.

Two responses outlining possible ways forward are suggested for each problem – each written by different school-based history mentor or other experienced teacher educator. 

Move Me On – problem addressed:	TH issue	Year
Struggling with essential management issues, which means that his excellent teaching ideas tend to be dismissed	193	2024
Uses examples of diverse experiences in the past to generate student interest, but with no analytical focus	192	2023
Approach to using sources in history lessons is always as the focus of exam-style questions	191	2023
Doesn’t see any need to take questions about historical significance beyond a focus on consequences	190	2023
Does not recognise the need to engender a sense of puzzle or curiosity in his students	189	2022
Struggling to reconcile the very different emphases placed on teacher talk by different history teachers within the department	188	2022
Places a huge emphasis on getting students’ knowledge secure, but provides little scope for them to use it in analysis or argument	186	2022
Struggling to see beyond the tightly regimented teaching strategies adopted in their previous school	184	2021
Sees no reason to include Black or Asian British history in his lessons	183	2021
Thinks that substantive knowledge is all that matters	182	2021
Navigating the challenges of learning to teach history with visual impairment	181	2020
Feeling unprepared to start as an NQT because training was interrupted by Covid-19 school closures	180	2020
Supporting new history teachers in a lockdown	179	2020
Trainee regards all observation as assessment	178	2020
Is struggling to use questioning effectively	177	2019
Is worried about how to deal with his own dyslexia in the classroom	176	2019
Isn't paying enough attention to why particular topics and approaches have been included within the department's schemes of work	175	2019
Finds that the activities he devises tend to involve him, rather than his students, doing all the real thinking and processing of information	174	2019
Finding it difficult to teach the GCSE thematic study	173	2018
Thinks he can simply rely on the textbook for his own subject knowledge development	172	2018
The extent to which history trainees should be encouraged – or even allowed – to make use of existing lesson plans	171	2018
Is struggling to adapt to new ways of working in his second placement school	170	2018
Is struggling with the planning of a local history enquiry	169	2017
Is worried that he is not gaining enough experience of planning and teaching exam classes	168	2017
Doesn’t really understand her students’ frames of reference and the difficulties that many of them have in making sense of the particular historical phenomena she is teaching them about	167	2017
Is struggling to get the pitch right in teaching topics at GCSE that the school previously taught to Year 7	166	2017
Capturing student interest vs. sense of period: in her concern to capture students’ interest tends to present people in the past as weird and wonderful aliens	165	2016
Is getting very confused about the concept of similarity and difference	164	2016
Concern to encourage students to think for themselves is leading to some very ahistorical thinking	163	2016
Is finding it difficult to judge how much or what kind of reading he should expect of his students	162	2016
Doesn't really notice and respond effectively to what the lesson she has just taught reveals about students' knowledge and understanding	161	2015
Is so interested in the history that he’s teaching that he gets caught up in interesting digressions or overwhelms the students with complexity	160	2015
Would like to wean students off the use of writing frames	159	2015
Is struggling to model tasks effectively for students	158	2015
Feels she hasn’t got enough ways of getting knowledge across to the students before they can do something with it	157	2014
Treats ‘Assessment for Learning’ as a though it is a bolt-on extra unconnected to his learning objectives	156	2014
Tends to treat differences between historical interpretations simply as matters of opinion	155	2014
Is having problems providing sufficient challenge for the higher attainers within his mixed ability groups	154	2014
Is struggling to sustain an emphasis on developing historical knowledge and understanding in teaching about genocides	153	2013
Is worried about how to teach meaningful overviews	152	2013
Seems to have reached a plateau in her development as a history teacher	151	2013
Is given very little freedom to learn how to plan	150	2013
Is uncertain how to provide appropriate support for certain students without restricting what they can achieve	149	2012
Is using Bloom’s taxonomy in very mechanistic ways to plan lesson objectives and think about progression in history	148	2012
Finds the analogies that she’s using to make historical ideas meaningful end up distracting or confusing the students	147	2012
Is constantly anxious about whether he knows enough to be able to start planning	146	2012
Is very uncomfortable with any kind of sustained story-telling	145	2011
Has come to define GCSE teaching in terms of a diet of practice exam questions	144	2011
Tries to tackle everything at once	143	2011
Keeps just making assumptions about his students' thinking	142	2011
Wondering how to approach teaching the Holocaust, especially with her ‘difficult’ Year 9	141	2010
Worried about getting students to generate their own enquiry questions	140	2010
Difficult to teach about change and continuity in meaningful ways	139	2010
Uncertain about his Year 7 teaching in a competency based curriculum	138	2010
Regards her PGCE assignments as an unhelpful distraction from the real business of learning to teach	137	2009
Struggling to teach elite politics/international relations (believing history should be about ordinary people)	136	2009
Not sure where to draw boundaries when handling sensitive issues	135	2009
Getting enough A-level experience	134	2009
Alienating students by relying too much on teacher talk	133	2008
Already the best teacher in the department	132	2008
Trainee’s mentor is struggling to know how to help him learn to plan independently	131	2008
Would love to generate much more productive small group talk and worthwhile class discussion but can’t work out how to manage it	130	2008
Feels out of his depth teaching controversial issues	129	2007
Keen to find ways of recognising and recording students' progress and achievements without resorting to 'levels'	128	2007
Using PowerPoint as anything more than glorified chalk and talk	127	2007
Setting worthwhile homework	126	2007
Lack of conceptual clarity – i.e. lacks subject knowledge (disciplinary understanding)	125	2006
Teaching Local history	124	2006
Teaching KS3 only once a week – how to build effective relationships and worthwhile enquiries	123	2006
Catering for different learning styles (as answer to differentiation)	122	2006
Teaching outside subject area	121	2005
Teaching Citizenship	120	2005
Teaching EAL students	119	2005
Can’t find connection between fun and serious learning	118	2005
Putting her ideas into practice	117	2004
Having problems with his mentor	116	2004
Class already know all about World War 1	115	2004
Teaching history of medicine at GCSE	114	2004
Getting pupils to really care about what happened in the past	113	2003
Has problems with his subject knowledge	112	2003
Having problems with differentiation	111	2003
Confused by KS3 strategy	110	2003
Pressured into using styles she is uncomfortable with	109	2002
Reconciling sources and stories	108	2002
Doesn’t see point of teaching to those who find history difficult	107	2002
Teaching AS level	106	2002
Teaching historical interpretations	105	2001
Establishing lesson goals	104	2001
Department’s approach to sources is not improving pupils’ understanding of evidence	103	2001
Securing progression in historical understanding	102	2001
Finding Literacy a burden	101	2000
Deciding on lesson objectives	100	2000
Struggling with just about everything	99	2000
Struggling with marking and assessment	98	2000
Having difficulty evaluating own lessons	97	1999
Struggling with language register - getting pitch right	96	1999
Becoming frustrated with A level	95	1999
Struggling to find questioning style to develop pupils’ thinking	94	1999
Not making progress in use of ICT	93	1998
Problems with teaching causation	92	1998
Work with historical sources lacks focus	91	1998