Year3/4 Historybased unit Settlers! Stone Age to Iron Age (3 to 4 weeks)

Topic overview – children will begin learning about the chronology of British history through a study of developments in early civilisations. They will learn about changes in the way people lived, farmed and what they believed through these periods. For example:

  • Neolithichunter gatherers – Skara Brae
  • Bronze age religion, travel and technology – Stone Henge
  • Iron age hill forts: tribal kingdoms, farming, art and culture.

They will make a simple animation showing one of these changes and apply early methods to designing and creating a shelter.

History skills

Milestone 2 / Milestone 3/4 / Milestone 5/6
• Observe or handle evidence to ask questions andfind answers to questions about the past such as: What was it like forpeople? What happened? How long ago?
• Use artefacts, pictures, stories, online sources anddatabases to find out about the past.
  • Photographs
  • Books
  • First hand evidence (what people say)
  • Place events and artefacts in order on a timeline.
  • Label time lines with words or phrases such as:past, present, older and newer.
  • Use words and phrases such as: a long time ago,recently, when my parents/carers were children,years, decades and centuries to describe thepassing of time.
  • Describe historical events.
  • Describe significant people from the past.
• Recognise that there are reasons why people inthe past acted as they did. / •Use more than one source of evidence for historicalenquiry in order to gain a more accurateunderstanding of history.
•Suggest suitable sources of evidence for historicalenquiries.
•Place events on atime line using dates.
•Understand the concept of change over time,representing this, along with evidence, on a timeline.
•Use dates and terms to describe events.
•Give a broad overview of life in Britain fromancient until medieval times. (by the end of year ¾)
•Describe the social, ethnic, cultural or religiousdiversity of past society.
•Describe the characteristic features of the past,including ideas, beliefs, attitudes and experiencesof men, women and children.
Use appropriate historical vocabulary tocommunicate, including:
• dates
• time period
• era
• change
• chronology. / •Describe the main changes in a period of history(using terms such as: social, religious, political,technological and cultural).
•Understand the concepts of continuity andchange over time, representing them, along withevidence, on a time line.
•Use dates and terms accurately in describingevents.
•Understand that no single source of evidencegives the full answer to questions about the past.
•Use sources of evidence to deduce informationabout the past.
•Use appropriate historical vocabulary tocommunicate.

DT skills

Milestone 2 / Milestone 3/4 / Milestone 3
• Design products that have a clear purposeand an intended user.
• Make products, refining the design as workprogresses.
Explore objects and designs to identify likesand dislikes of the designs.
• Suggest improvements to existing designs.
• Explore how products have been created.
• Use materials to practise drilling, screwing,gluing and nailing materials to make and strengthen products. / • Design with purpose by identifyingopportunities to design.
•I make realistic plans to achieve my aims.
•I think ahead about the order of my work, choosing appropriate tools, equipment, materials, components and techniques.
•I clarify my ideas using labelled sketches and models to communicate the details of my designs.
• Make products by working efficiently (suchas by carefully selecting materials).
• Refine work and techniques as workprogresses, continually evaluating the productdesign.
• Choose suitable techniques to constructproducts or to repair items.
•I join materials to make products using both permanent and temporary fastenings.
• Strengthen materials using suitable techniques.
• Identify some of the great designers in allof the areas of study (ie. Neolithic builders) to generate ideas fordesigns.
• Improve upon existing designs, giving reasonsfor choices.
• Disassemble products to understand howthey work. / • Combine elements of design from a range ofinspirational designers throughout history,giving reasons for choices.
• Make products through stages ofprototypes, making continual refinements.
•generate ideas by collecting and using information.
•I take the views of users’ into account when designing my products.
•I produce step-by-step plans.
•I communicate alternative ideas using words, labelled sketches and models showing that I am aware of the constraints of my design.
• Develop a range of practical skills to createproducts (such as cutting,drilling and screwing, nailing, gluing, fillingand sanding).

ICT skills based on Switched on Computing‘ Weanimators/ we are bug fixers’

change context to ‘cave men’

Milestone 2 / Milestone 3/4 / Milestone 5/6
  • Correct one off errors in a programme
  • Input a simple programme to control a movement, colour or sound.
/
  • Create an algorithm for an animated scene
  • Write a programme in scratch to create the animation
  • Put the block of scratch script together
  • Create sound, graphics and back drop
  • Correct mistakes in a range of programmes then apply to own animation.
  • Correct mistakes in the animation (bug fixes)
/
  • Use the repeat block to create the illusion of movement
  • Think logically to detect and correct errors
  • Publish animations
  • Glean ideas from other people’s work on scratch website
  • Explain how a programme has been debugged and how this has improved it.

Music – run recorders alongside this topic – one streamed lesson across phase per week – use charanga recorder unit.

SCRATCH skills – some will be applicable in this unit.

Milestone 2 / Milestone 3/4 / Milestone 5/6
Motion / • Control motion by specifying the number ofsteps to travel, direction and turn. / • Use specified screen coordinates tocontrol movement. / • Set IF conditions for movements. Specifytypes of rotation giving the number ofdegrees.
Looks / • Add text strings, show and hide objects andchange the features of an object. / • Set the appearance of objects and createsequences of changes. / • Change the position of objects betweenscreen layers (send to back, bring to front).
Sound / • Select sounds and control when they areheard, their duration and volume. / • Create and edit sounds. Control when theyare heard, their volume, duration and rests. / • Upload sounds from a file and edit them.Add effects such as fade in and out andcontrol their implementation.
Draw / • Control when drawings appear and set thepen colour, size and shape. / • Control the shade of pens. / • Combine the use of pens with movementto create interesting effects.
Events / • Specify user inputs (such as clicks) tocontrol events. / • Specify conditions to trigger events. / • Set events to control other events by‘broadcasting’ information as a trigger.
Control / • Specify the nature of events (such as asingle event or a loop). / • Use IF THEN conditions to control events orobjects. / • Use IF THEN ELSE conditions to controlevents or objects.
Sensing / • Create conditions for actions by waiting fora user input (such as responses to questionslike: What is your name?). / • Create conditions for actions by sensingproximity or by waiting for a user input (suchas proximity to a specified colour or a line orresponses to questions). / • Use a range of sensing tools (includingproximity, user inputs, loudness andmouse position) to control events oractions.
Variables and lists / • From Year 3 onwards. / • Use variables to store a value.
• Use the functions define, set, change, showand hide to control the variables. / • Use lists to create a set of variables.