Vikings Lesson 2: The Raid on Lindisfarne

One complete lesson from the Little Historians Vikings unit.

Big Question: Why did the raid on Lindisfarne shock Britain?

Pupils read a letter written weeks after the raid by a Northumbrian churchman who was not there, and ask what a furious eyewitness-at-one-remove can and cannot tell us. In the journal they meet the chronicle entry itself.

Pupils work two sources. The class investigates Alcuin’s letter of 793 together on the slides, in three steps: what can you see, what does it tell us, what can it not tell us.
Pupils then take the same three steps on their own in the journal, on the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle entry for 793.

The lesson follows the Little Historians six-stage framework: Time Travellers,
Big Question, Evidence Detectives, Discover, Prove It! and History Check.

Learning intention: to investigate what happened at Lindisfarne and why the raid shocked people across Britain.

WHAT IS INCLUDED

Lesson plan: the unit overview plus the one-page plan for this lesson
PowerPoint lesson, with a PDF copy for phones and tablets
Journal pages, including the unit Knowledge Organiser
Teacher answer sheet
Start Here guide
The Little Historians Framework, explained in full

Lesson 1 of this unit is free. Search for Little Historians Vikings free lesson.
The complete eight-lesson unit is in the Little Historians shop.

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