-
Library and Information Studies
Continuing Professional Development
Please note: the HA is not responsible for the content of external websites, and we cannot guarantee that all information on this page is current.
University College LondonMA/Postgraduate Diploma in Library and Information StudiesIf you want to progress in library or information work, you need a professional qualification, normally chartered...
Library and Information Studies
-
What Have Historians Been Arguing About... the impact of the British Empire on Britain?
Teaching History feature
The murder of George Floyd during the summer of 2020 and the ongoing ‘culture war’ in Britain over the legacy of the British Empire have reignited interest in imperial history. This focuses, in particular, on the question of the empire’s impact on Britain itself: on how the act of conquering...
What Have Historians Been Arguing About... the impact of the British Empire on Britain?
-
Recorded webinar: Dealing with the issues from lockdown in the primary history classroom
Webinar
In the last 12 months many pupils have missed significant chunks of school and importantly a significant chunk of their history learning. In this special one-off webinar we discuss some of the issues we are all facing. What does catch up in history look like? How helpful is this terminology?...
Recorded webinar: Dealing with the issues from lockdown in the primary history classroom
-
The Bigger Picture: Curriculum Overview
HA Primary Subject Leader Area
In this piece Stuart looks at the ‘bigger picture’ of curriculum overview and how, through careful curriculum mapping and the exploration of key trends, topics can be structured to fit together within a wider chronological narrative. He provides practical approaches and examples, as well as discussing historical concepts that occur in...
The Bigger Picture: Curriculum Overview
-
Learning history through the lens of artefacts
Primary History article
Lindsay Marshall is a primary school teacher and subject leader for history in a primary school on the Wirral. She has embedded the use of artefacts throughout her school’s curriculum. In this article Lindsay outlines the importance of allowing children to ‘get up close and personal’ with history in order...
Learning history through the lens of artefacts
-
What Have Historians Been Arguing About... medieval science and medicine?
Teaching History feature
The phrase ‘medieval science’ may seem nonsensical. ‘How can... a synonym for “backward”,’ the editors of The Cambridge History of Science Volume 2 ask rhetorically, ‘modify a noun that signifies the best available knowledge from the natural world?’ To answer their question, we must rethink our assumptions, both about the...
What Have Historians Been Arguing About... medieval science and medicine?
-
Recorded webinar: Histories of Indigenous peoples of North America
Article
Any study of the intercultural relationships between the Indigenous peoples of North America and British settlers usually focuses on the differences that resulted in disputes and violence. However, on closer examination, the interaction also involved the exchange of ideas and the forging of alliances, which required diplomacy and respect for...
Recorded webinar: Histories of Indigenous peoples of North America
-
Objects and objections: getting critical about using artefacts in primary history
Primary History article
Jenny uses her experience and expertise from a school committed to using museum education to outline ways in which artefacts can be used effectively in primary settings. This article is based on practice at Langley Heritage Primary Academy. She outlines some of the challenges and how practice was refined, including actual...
Objects and objections: getting critical about using artefacts in primary history
-
Processes, Chronological Understanding & Planning
Primary Expert Podcasts
In this podcast Dr Hilary Cooper, Professor of History and Pedagogy at the University of Cumbria, looks at why teachers and students seem to enjoy primary history and discusses processes of enquiry, chronological understanding and planning a topic. 1. Ofsted Report History for All published in 2011 said that: "history taught in schools...
Processes, Chronological Understanding & Planning
-
Planning for historical understanding a conceptual framework
Article
Planning for historical understanding a conceptual framework:
Responding To The Rose Report Through The Lens Of The Cambridge Review.
Introduction
At last we have Children, Their World, Their Education: Final Report and Recommendations of the Cambridge Primary Review, (Alexander 2009). This is an independent study funded by the Esmee Fairbairn Trust,...
Planning for historical understanding a conceptual framework
-
Cunning Plan… to teach about environmental history in the medieval period
Teaching History feature
As an undergraduate, following a traditional history course, I was surprised and intrigued, one sunny summer day, to find myself reading about sunspots and studying graphs of solar activity. My reading list for an essay on the social and economic history of the fourteenth century included the work of historians...
Cunning Plan… to teach about environmental history in the medieval period
-
Building historical thinking together: breathing new life into mini whiteboards
Teaching History article
Formative assessment, in particular Assessment for Learning, created waves in classrooms in the early 2000s. Mini whiteboards, with pen and cloth, became popular and remain part of the toolkit in some classrooms. Teachers work hard to assess the learning of all students in a class, rather than just those who...
Building historical thinking together: breathing new life into mini whiteboards
-
Why we need to teach about the history of trees and woodland...
Primary History article
Michael Riley highlights the importance of educating children about the history of trees and woodland. He explores the potential of primary history to develop an understanding of our changing relationship with trees. The article shows how a focus on trees and woodland could enhance an existing history study, and suggests...
Why we need to teach about the history of trees and woodland...
-
Virtual Branch recording: The Women's World Committee against War & Fascism
Connected and Competing Activisms
How did a group of women activists with varied ideological backgrounds construct several important campaigns against fascism in the interwar period? How did this Women's World Committee against War and Fascism (Comité Mondial des Femmes contre la Guerre et le Fascisme) undertake effective humanitarian and propaganda work and forge extensive...
Virtual Branch recording: The Women's World Committee against War & Fascism
-
Hearing the call to arms: Herbert Douglas Fisher
Historian article
The intellectual aristocracy of late Victorian and early Edwardian Britain constitutes a Venn diagram of familiar names – the Stracheys and the Stephens, the Wedgwoods and the Darwins, the Keynes and the Trevelyans. These affluent, upper middle-class pillars of public life espoused a secular, liberal view of the world. Their depth...
Hearing the call to arms: Herbert Douglas Fisher
-
Triumphs Show: The BeBold Network
Teaching History feature
In April 2019, I was in a bit of a rut. My enquiry questions and lesson sequences seemed stale. I felt like I had been at my school for too long. To mix things up, I secured a new role for September at a start-up school.
Full of excitement, I...
Triumphs Show: The BeBold Network
-
Welcome to HA Membership
Information
We are delighted to welcome you as a member of the Historical Association. By joining you’ve become part of a vibrant subject community made up of thousands of different people with a shared interest: history!
Whether you want to gain access to high quality teaching support, undertake training to help...
Welcome to HA Membership
-
‘What is history?’ Africa and the excitement of sources with Year 7
Teaching History article
Many history departments choose to begin their Year 7 curriculum with an introduction to the nature of history and the processes in which historians engage as they develop, refine and substantiate claims about the past. In this article, Adbul Mohamud and Robin Whitburn report on an such an introductory unit, designed with a specific focus on the history...
‘What is history?’ Africa and the excitement of sources with Year 7
-
What difference has the opening (and closing) of archives after 1991 made to the historiography of the Cold War?
Twentieth-century history
Prior to the East European revolutions of 1989, and the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, commentators outside the region were largely reliant on printed material collected by specialist research libraries, informal rrangements with contacts ‘behind the iron curtain’, information that could be gleaned from visits to the region, and...
What difference has the opening (and closing) of archives after 1991 made to the historiography of the Cold War?
-
Lesson sequence: Life in a Medieval Village - taster lesson
Article
This series of lessons has been designed to make gaining knowledge of medieval rural life engaging for students and to teach them how good historical fiction is constructed. Students learn how to write a story about life in the fourteenth-century Suffolk village of Walsham and to do so successfully they...
Lesson sequence: Life in a Medieval Village - taster lesson
-
Lesson sequence: Life in a Medieval Village
Article
The first lesson of this sequence is available free to all secondary members here.
This series of lessons has been designed to make gaining knowledge of medieval rural life engaging for students and to teach them how good historical fiction is constructed. Students learn how to write a story about life in...
Lesson sequence: Life in a Medieval Village
-
Teaching Year 8 pupils to take seriously the ideas of ordinary people from the past
Teaching History article
Jacob Olivey wanted Year 8 to know that ordinary people in the nineteenth century constructed their own identities. In this reflection on how his practice developed in his training year, Olivey illustrates the importance of using historical scholarship in choosing foundational knowledge to teach. He shows how he used that...
Teaching Year 8 pupils to take seriously the ideas of ordinary people from the past
-
How can we teach about medieval Britain in primary schools?
Primary History article
There is no question that the medieval period (no matter what timespan it claims) offers plenty of fascination for the primary pupil. It also allows some continuity with the period up to 1066 which forms the bedrock of the Key Stage 2 history curriculum. With opportunities to cover the medieval...
How can we teach about medieval Britain in primary schools?
-
The ripple effect: reaching new readers
Historian article
Philip Browne tells the story of his continuing journey with an eighteenth-century sea captain.
My book had been published and for the first time I held a copy in my hand. A warm sense of achievement and relief washed over me. My work was done. Now with a little encouragement from...
The ripple effect: reaching new readers
-
Support Us
Information
As a charity the HA is completely independent of any government or statutory support, so we rely heavily on the work of volunteers (branch officers, workshop leaders and contributors to our publications). We also need donations and legacies to develop new resources and to help ensure everyone can access great...
Support Us
