Discovering local histories

Improving the delivery and teaching of Welsh History in the New Curriculum for Wales.

Led by the School of History, Archaeology and Religion, the purpose of this project was to better understand how primary school teachers deliver local history as part of the new Curriculum for Wales, and to share with them research techniques, approaches and database resources used by professional historians.

A key objective of the project was to uncover the challenges teachers face in teaching local Welsh history and to showcase the resources available for teaching local history.

This ambition was achieved through running four workshops with a group of six primary school teachers in south Wales to capture their experiences of teaching local history. Feedback revealed the need for additional resources and guidance to engage children in their learning of local history.

Following further workshops with school teachers and primary school children, the focus shifted to co-designing a teachers’ toolkit for teaching local history.

Enhancing history teaching

Rather than designing one-off lessons, the project sought to upskill and empower teachers to utilise different resources to embed local history into their schemes of work and to help them transform and enhance their history teaching practice.

A new toolkit of teaching resources was trialled with Ysgol Bro Sannan Year 6 pupils based in Bargoed in the Rhymney Valley.

Alongside teacher feedback, student feedback was a particularly important element of the project. Pupils reported that they had obtained a better and more sympathetic knowledge of their local area, that they felt more connected to and proud of their local community, and that they felt they had developed stronger bonds with family members and neighbours by sharing newfound historical knowledge of their local area.

Teachers involved in the project reported an enhanced knowledge of and greater confidence in teaching local history. Several participating schools have changed the way local history is taught across the school after using our toolkit.

Next steps

Following this pilot, and subject to further funding, we hope to widen the remit, scope and impact of the toolkit to benefit the primary school sector in Wales and expand a version into the secondary schools through engagement with the Welsh Government.

Contact

For more information about this project, contact: