Interest and Entertainment:
In history we meet characters more extraordinary and varied than Shakespeare dared to invent, and tales of wonder and heroism that neither Hans Anderson nor Alastair Maclean could better. There is romance, adventure, intrigue and beauty. There are issues as subtle and complex as any that are dreamed of in our philosophy and devices beyond the wit of Heath Robinson. We deal with town and country, home and abroad, local and national, the spiritual and the material.
Useful Skills:
The effective use of indexes, libraries and catalogues.
Training in evaluation and selective judgement.
The ability to sythesise many books and sources into one coherent account.
The ability to present results clearly in prose and in graphic form.
The ability to construct a logical argument and solve a problem with detailed analysis.
Scepticism:
The world is full of people who want us to believe what they say. Politicians, journalists and advertisers are obvious examples. In general all those in authority, the rich and the powerful - and, of course, historians themselves. In order to be free in the modern world one must keep exercising ones mind in freedom, testing the pronouncements and the judgements of others. History gives training in the little piece of scepticism (not cynicism) needed to remain free in the modern world
Development as an individual
Theodore Zeldin once that "history is autobiography"; in other words, as one learns about other people one learns about oneself. As we study History we learn about the human race, we learn what it means to be a human being, we learn what human beings are capable of. We also learn to put ourselves - turn of the century Edinburgh prosperous middle class - in perspective. We realise that there have been intelligent, honest and good people in other ages who have not shared our prejudices, our attitudes, our ideas. So History teaches tolerance, flexibility, openness and awareness. To study History is to become a more complete human being.
The Strands of our History Course
We like to think that all our pupils become a little more grown up by studying history.
Knowledge and Understanding:
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Planning:
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Collecting Evidence:
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Recording and Presenting:
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Interpretation and Evaluation:
One should be sceptical but not cynical, and be able to see what is good proof and what is not. All our exams, at every level, include evaluation. |
The development of informed attitudes:
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Extended reading:
The first year of the A-level course includes some intensive practice of various reading techniques. The idea of teaching more efficient reading is that future generations of A-level pupils should read faster and better. |
Extended writing:
We have also introduced new techniques for teaching analytical writing, as a result of which pupils of all ages are pushing bits of paper round on tables, discussing orders of importance and discarding the irrelevant. |
No serious history teacher nowadays expects to separate the two.
At every level the skill of planning is developed. Juniors have to plan wall-charts or projects before producing a finished version. Seniors learn to structure essays. Good historical work is not produced by starting, and then ploughing on till time runs out!
Learning to use libraries is central to the course. Juniors recieve close guidance and use introductory exercises. Project-work puts those skills into practice. The Higher Extended Essay and the A-level Individual Study require research skills of a high order, as pupils use a range of libraries all round the city. Field work is also developed, from the Geits visit to Saint Andrews Castle, through the new GCSE topic on local history up to those pupils - usually one or two each year - who incorporate major archaeological evidence into their Individual Studies. 
Historians communicate their results and our pupils learn to do this with increasing effectiveness. Junior wall-charts and written exercises lead on to GCSE coursework, which leads on to Sixth form essays and the final Individual Studies, in which the best candidates make use of the full apparatus of scholarship to produce first-rate historical writing. A history essay is just as much a work of art as a poem or a piece of sculpture. 
The ability to assess the reliability of a source or a judgement requires training. .jpg)
Most history teachers regard every lesson as a PSD lesson. Questions of power, human rights, colonialism, peace, wealth, war, corruption, environmental abuse, bravery, poverty - all the timeless issues faced by free people as a democracy - come up week by week. Some parts of the course - for example the Third year course on Modern World Problems - foster them deliberately. But they arise daily, and are frequently discussed. 
History is very much a bookish subject, and we deliberately develop pupils abilities to handle books with pleasure and efficiency. The Junior Reading Book Scheme is an important part of this process.
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We are clear that education in language is very much part of our responsibility. Vocabulary and concepts are expanded and developed. Juniors are given time to write at length - imaginative reconstructions, story-telling, biographies and so on. They develop the confidence and fluency needed for senior essays. This page is: Edinburgh Academy / curriculum / history / index.htm
