A GCSE Lesson on how Antisemitism escalated between the years 1933-41 in Nazi Germany using the incredible diaries of Victor Klemperer to exemplify what happened. Students start the lesson looking at different propaganda pieces targeting different minority groups, which leads to a discussion of why the Nazis persecuted specific minorities in the first place. Their focus is then directed specifically onto how Jews are increasingly persecuted throughout 1933-41. Students then have to try to match up the diary extracts to the year they think they were from and theorise about the nature and progression of Antisemitism and persecution in Nazi Germany. This is then finalised by creating their own chronology of Klemperer’s life, with lots of discussion along the way about what the extracts show us about persecution in Nazi Germany and what the key years and turning points are in the treatment of the Jews.

A nice self contained lesson where the students debate the qualities of a good leader, and then apply their ideas to the profiles of the contenders to the throne in 1066 to decide who they think would make the best leader - a classic lesson! This is a very versatile lesson - you can do the activites within the lesson, or you could change and adapt the profiles to suit your class - making top trumps for each of the contenders is always fun!

A fun lesson in which the students try and draw out the comparisons between Brexit and the Reformation in 1534. All built around an FT article (pretty challenging- there is a lower ability version that I created but it’s still a challenging read) from which the students draw comparisons. They then have a go at running a “Tudor Brexit” campaign, arguing for either remaining in the Catholic Church or Leaving it.

A lesson for Year 8 about why there was a witch craze in England after the 17th century - resources pinched from various locations as well as my own work; it may be nice to add a source activity in there too!