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...

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...

May is Local History Month, a time to celebrate the stories and heritage of the past that is all around us. So much of history is often discussed through big events and on a national scale – kings, queens and prime ministers – which can often make it seem distant...

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 Historical Association Secondary Committee have put together a Historical Fiction list for teachers to use with their students. It is designed to help history teachers to inspire students of all ages in secondary school to read historical fiction for pleasure and also to get better at doing history.  Historical...

On Saturday 30 March 2019, a bright spring day, 21 students gathered at Windsor Castle for the Historical Association Great Debate final. The 21 finalists had already successfully won their local heats from across the UK and now they stood in the historic vaulted Vicar’s Hall, St George’s House, a stone's throw...

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...