Accessible History resources for secondary age students of all abilities but with lots of challenge too - differentiation from the top-down.
All resources created by an experienced HoD at a 11-18 non-selective secondary school.
Aiming for fair prices - costs reflect the effort behind the resource. For everything with a price tag there should be a free resource on the same topic or theme to show the standard / style etc before you buy. Hope this makes sense.
Accessible History resources for secondary age students of all abilities but with lots of challenge too - differentiation from the top-down.
All resources created by an experienced HoD at a 11-18 non-selective secondary school.
Aiming for fair prices - costs reflect the effort behind the resource. For everything with a price tag there should be a free resource on the same topic or theme to show the standard / style etc before you buy. Hope this makes sense.
No. 1 Christmas Quiz 2023!
Christmas quiz for younger secondary students - specifically designed for KS3 (if you want a quiz for older students please have a look at my alternative - Christmas Quiz No.2!).
Music round? Check! Sport round? Check! Science questions? Check! A bit of geography? Check! Movies? Covered!
A mixed bag of a quiz, see summary of rounds at the bottom, and tried to cover as many bases as possible over ten rounds. Lots of multiple choice questions and answers follow after each round.
Hope it helps at the end of term!
Rd. 1 -Christmas Geography
Example: In Canada, Santa has been given his own postcode - ‘HOH OHO’. True or false?
Rd. 2 - Christmas History
Example: In the court of King Henry II (1154-1189), what unusual form of entertainment did a jester called Roland perform for the king every Christmas?
a. Farting
b. Burbing
c. Picking his nose
Rd. 3 - Name that creature (that is loosely connected to Christmas)!
Example: In The Simpsons, what is the Simpson’s family dog called?
Rd. 4 - Christmas Sport
Example: In ten pin bowling a ‘turkey’ is the odd term for how many strikes in a row?
Rd. 5 - Christmas Movies
Example: In the film Elf, Buddy says elves stick to four main food groups: candy, candy canes, candy corns - and what else?
Rd. 6 - World Christmas! Match the tradition to the correct country.
Example: Hide your broom! People hide brooms as they believe witches come out on Christmas Eve looking for brooms to ride on! (Norway)
Rd. 7 - Christmas Music!
Example: In the song The Twelve Days of Christmas, what did a true love give on the 6th day of Christmas?
a. 6 pipers piping
b. 6 drummers drumming
c. 6 geese-a-laying
Rd. 8 - Collective nouns! Match the collective noun to the correct Christmas animal.
Example: A caravan or train of… (Camels)
Rd. 9 - Christmas Science & nature
Example: Which scientist, born on Christmas Day, discovered the law of gravity? Clue: He saw an apple fall from a tree!
Rd. 10 - Christmas Potluck
Example: What colour was Santa’s suit until Coca Cola rebranded him in red?
Part 2 of a very straightforward presentation on how Britain gained controlled of India. However, the second part offers more analysis of the methods used by the British to gain & consolidate control over India.
The aim of the presentation was to build on the ideas covered in part 1 whilst the worksheet was created so that all my GCSE students could explain in some detail how & why the British expanded their empire in India.
The worksheet covers a range of factors (Sepoys, Robert Clive, fighting the French, a belief in imperialism, instability within the Mughal empire & a lack of unity between different Hindu princes…) and very simply differentiates the evidence (one-star for ‘straightforward’ through to three-stars for ‘think about it carefully’) so that all students can quickly see the challenge offered by each idea and choose their starting point accordingly. A key gives the worksheet a simple focus - categorise the reasons Britain gained controlled under themes such as force, negotiation & greed. There is also space for students to think of their own categories.
Lastly, the presentation tries to take students beyond the core textbooks by bringing in a couple of thoughts from Sashi Tharoor’s brilliant book ‘Inglorious Empire’.
Suitable for many GCSE History specs:
AQA GCSE History: Britain: Migration, empires and the people: c790 to the present day (an option in Section A of Paper 2 - Thematic studies).
Edexcel GCSE History. Probably not essential but offers perspective to issues within the ‘British America, 1713–83: empire and revolution’ unit (a period study option in Paper 2) and would help more able students understand what the British were up to in India as a comparison to the colonisation of north America.
OCR GCSE History A. Links to the section on the growing trade with India and China and role of the East India Company within the Paper 3 British depth study - Impact of Empire on Britain 1688–c.1730.
OCR GCSE History B - Schools History Project. Links to the Early Modern Britain c.1500–c.1750 section within the Paper 1 thematic study - Migrants to Britain, c.1250 to present; difficult to do an overview of ‘the growth in world trade’ without mentioning India & EIC.
Christmas Quizzes 1 & 2
Christmas Quiz 1: For younger secondary students - designed for KS3.
Christmas Quiz 2: For older secondary students - designed for KS4 and above
Both quizzes are mixed bags, see summary of rounds at the bottom, and tried to cover as many bases as possible over many rounds. Lots of multiple choice questions and answers follow after each round.
Hope it helps at the end of term!
Quiz 1 example questions…
Rd. 1 -Christmas Geography
Example: In Canada, Santa has been given his own postcode - ‘HOH OHO’. True or false?
Rd. 2 - Christmas History
Example: In the court of King Henry II (1154-1189), what unusual form of entertainment did a jester called Roland perform for the king every Christmas?
a. Farting
b. Burbing
c. Picking his nose
Rd. 3 - Name that creature (that is loosely connected to Christmas)!
Example: In The Simpsons, what is the Simpson’s family dog called?
Rd. 4 - Christmas Sport
Example: In ten pin bowling a ‘turkey’ is the odd term for how many strikes in a row?
Rd. 5 - Christmas Movies
Example: In the film Elf, Buddy says elves stick to four main food groups: candy, candy canes, candy corns - and what else?
Rd. 6 - World Christmas! Match the tradition to the correct country.
Example: Hide your broom! People hide brooms as they believe witches come out on Christmas Eve looking for brooms to ride on! (Norway)
Rd. 7 - Christmas Music!
Example: In the song The Twelve Days of Christmas, what did a true love give on the 6th day of Christmas?
a. 6 pipers piping
b. 6 drummers drumming
c. 6 geese-a-laying
Rd. 8 - Collective nouns! Match the collective noun to the correct Christmas animal.
Example: A caravan or train of… (Camels)
Rd. 9 - Christmas Science & nature
Example: Which scientist, born on Christmas Day, discovered the law of gravity? Clue: He saw an apple fall from a tree!
Rd. 10 - Christmas Potluck
Example: What colour was Santa’s suit until Coca Cola rebranded him in red?
Quiz 2 example questions…
Rd. 1 -Christmas Geography
Example: In which country do people traditionally eat KFC for Christmas dinner?
a. USA
b. Japan
c. South Korea
Rd. 2 - Christmas History
Example: In 1647 Christmas festivities were banned in England. Who was the 17th Century ‘Grinch Who Stole Christmas’?
Rd. 3 - Christmas Sport
Example: American sprinter Wilma Rudolph (see the Christmas link!?) won three gold medals at the 1960 Olympic Games in Rome. What colours are the Olympic rings?
Rd. 4 - Christmas Movies
Example: Name one of the bumbling burglars in Home Alone.
Rd. 5 - Collective nouns. Match the collective noun to the correct Christmas creature.
Example: An aurora or celebration of … polar bears.
Rd. 6 - Christmas Music
Example: Who first released ‘‘All I Want for Christmas Is You” in 1994?
Rd. 7 - Christmas Science & Nature
Example: What is the only element in the periodic table which has no letters in common with “Christmas Present”?
Rd. 8 - Christmas Potluck
Example: If you were born on Christmas Day, what is your star sign?
Rd. 9 - Christmas Maths
Example: There are 60 baubles on a Christmas tree. Their colors are red, gold, and green. 1/3 of the marbles are green and 1/4 of the marbles are gold. How many red baubles are there on the tree?
