Diversifying the Secondary History Curriculum - The story continues ..

Create Sheffield are working with Sheffield secondary schools, as well as Sheffield Museums, to jointly explore ways of diversifying the secondary history curriculum. 

Image by Andy Brown

Our initial work has highlighted to us just how complex and important a task it is - for you as teachers, and for us all in Sheffield - to engage young people in a history curriculum which often doesn’t match their heritage, lived experience or interests. At the start of the project we thought that the outcome might be some kind of physical or digital resource or project but instead we need to support and grow the knowledge, skills and dedication of teachers wanting to do it differently. 

Our new way forward is as follows:

1. To gather as a group of people interested in the diversification of the history curriculum. These meetings will take place half termly, mainly online. The intention of the sessions would be to:

• develop and support a group of teachers from Sheffield secondary schools who share an interest in the diversification of the history curriculum.
• grow our collective knowledge and understanding about decolonising the curriculum, including marginalised, hidden      and forgotten narratives. We will do this by including guest speakers at each event from both schools AND from heritage organisations - as both are rewriting narratives. 
• bring together a resource for Sheffield that uses the Outside Narration exhibit at Graves Gallery as a provocation.

2. Create Sheffield will signpost to all the brilliant heritage and cultural projects happening around the city linked to challenging and changing the historical voices we hear. Create Sheffield will also offer opportunities for speakers from both the education and heritage sectors to present to the group. There will be time for teachers to share their experiences.

3. The group will meet in person at the Graves Gallery on Wednesday June 28th from 4-6pm to experience Outside Narration, the Keith Piper exhibition. In Keith Piper’s own words: “‘Outside Narration’ encourages us to ask questions about history, to consider who and what is remembered and taught and to ask what might be missing from this story”.  We propose that this artwork could be used as a provocation with secondary history students.

4. Create Sheffield will continue to create and gather online resources to support the collective learning of the group. The intention is that these are shared resources that anyone can add to and use.

5. The Outside Narration provocation, together with the online resources, will be trialled in secondary schools in Sheffield in the Autumn term 2023. The online group will continue meeting during this period to support each other and, from their experiences, co-create a virtual resource that can be used to inform teaching in the future.

We very much hope you will join this group and come on this learning journey with us!

Sign up for the online CPD and teacher support session here. 

Sign up for the CPD at Graves Gallery here.