Our Approach to History

At Neasden Primary, History will be taught through the following lenses:

  • Invasion (Exploration in KS1)

  • Trade (Inventions in KS1)

  • Empire (Travel in KS1)

  • Law and justice

These are golden threads that run through the curriculum across the primary phase and pupils progress through these strands from introduction to a deep understanding.

The EYFS curriculum provides the building blocks to allow pupils at the beginning of Year 1 to access this curriculum. Pupils will gain significant knowledge of all aspects of the Historical National Curriculum, this knowledge is defined into 2 types – substantive knowledge and disciplinary knowledge.

Substantive knowledge explains what the children will learn and is detailed in the grid below.

Disciplinary knowledge details the way in which the children will learn the substantive knowledge is progressive though the school and identified for each year group. Disciplinary knowledge will be taught, reactivated and developed every term, through each unit and is detailed in the table at the end of this document.

For more information regarding the National Curriculum for History, please click here.

When our children leave Neasden Primary School as Historians they will:

  • have a coherent knowledge and understanding of Britain’s past and that of the wider world.

  • have curiosity to know more about the past.

  • be able to ask perceptive questions, think critically, weigh evidence, sift arguments, and develop perspective and judgement.

  • understand the complexity of people’s lives, the process of change, the diversity of societies and relationships between different groups, as well as their own identity and the challenges of their time.

Further Information: