Our Curriculum Aims:

‘Knowledge will bring you the opportunity to make a difference’ 

Claire Fagin (First woman to serve as President of an Ivy League University)

If Fagin is correct, then it is imperative that we at AGSB provide a History curriculum which is knowledge-rich, accessible to all and appropriately challenging for all.  It should therefore be inclusive and reflect the diversity of Modern Britain and our school community.  At the same time, History is at its most engaging, and students think most critically, when there is a sense of story within which they can make complex connections and embrace complex realities.  With that in mind, we aim within our programme of study:

• To provide a knowledge-rich curriculum, framed around 5 key historical concepts, which develop subject-specific knowledge that help students on their way to mastering the study of History
• To provide a global curriculum which helps students understand Britain’s changing role
• To provide an inclusive curriculum which integrates diverse histories into the story of Britain’s and the world’s past
• To provide a coherent overarching narrative across each key stage
• To provide a curriculum which encourages students to embrace contested legacies so that they may demonstrate ever more nuanced understanding of complex realities  

We hope that, by achieving these aims, we will enhance students’ cultural capital and, therefore, their ability to make a full contribution to society as active citizens enable them to successfully navigate, and thrive in, our complex twenty-first society.  The role of History in this respect has been effectively encapsulated by Penelope Corfield, a Historian and Educational Consultant based at Royal Holloway: 

‘History is inescapable. It studies the past and the legacies of the past in the present. Far from being 'dead', it connects things through time and encourages its students to take a long view of such connections.  All people and peoples are living histories, so understanding the linkages between past and present is fundamental for a good understanding of the condition of being human. That, in a nutshell, is why History matters. It is not just 'useful', it is essential for rooting people in time.'

The 5 key historical concepts, around which we frame our curriculum, are:

Power & the People                Conflict & Tensions                 Nations & Empire

Migration                    Legacies & Perspectives

Our final key concept, legacies and perspectives, emphasises that History is about interpretation.  As Napoleon put it, ‘History is merely the version of past events that people have decided to agree upon.’  Orthodoxies are there to be appropriately but critically and creatively questioned and challenged.  We promote that mindset through our debating and public speaking competitions, through our domestic and overseas curriculum enrichment visits and most importantly through our core business in the classroom.  If our students really appreciate Napoleon’s remark, and its implications, by the time they leave us, we will have gone some way to achieving our aims.