Transform your history classroom
ActiveHistory provides interactive simulations, self-marking quizzes, lesson plans, worksheets and multimedia activities designed by full-time history teacher Russel Tarr.
Build and deliver complete history courses with resources for classroom teaching, remote learning and independent study - from multimedia lectures to interactive games and historical simulations.
World History teaching resources for the high school classroom: lesson plans, worksheets, quizzes and simulation games for KS3, IGCSE, IB and A-Level teachers.
Recommended for Grade 6 (age: 11-12)
The Worst Jobs in History: Medieval
This activity can be used as a stand-alone lesson, homework assignment or as part of a broader unit on "Was life Good or Bad during this particular period?". The worksheet has basic activities for a 30 minute lesson, and extension tasks that could be followed up later.
The Origins of the Calendar
Students design their own calendar, designed to illustrate the origins of the names of the months of the year (I usually set this as a Christmas Holiday homework so the calendar is going to be useful for a whole year!)
Creating a Family Tree
Students create their own family tree after analysing that of The Simpsons cartoon characters.
A History of Masks
Since the COVID pandemic, face masks have become familiar to all of us. In this investigation, students will learn how face masks have been used throughout history, all over the world, for all sorts of weird and wonderful reasons.
Recommended for Grade 7 (age: 12-13)
The Worst Jobs in History: Early Modern
This activity can be used as a stand-alone lesson, homework assignment or as part of a broader unit on "Was life Good or Bad during this particular period?". The worksheet has basic activities for a 30 minute lesson, and extension tasks that could be followed up later.
Street Detectives! - History through Local Road Names
The names given to our roads and streets provides a rich source of potential for local history projects. Students can research the events and people commemorated in these names to engage in some open-ended history that is not constrained by a particular topic, theme or period. The following example uses Google Maps to make this an interactive, collaborative project, but there is no reason why paper-based maps could not be used instead.
Design a Virtual Museum
During the COVID-19 lockdown period I got my students to collaborate on a "Virtual Museum" containing items from around their homes.
It worked well and is something which I'll now do regularly as a standalone project - you may be interested in trying a similar thing out with your own classes.
Recommended for Grade 8 (age: 13-14)
Design a Historical Road Trip!
In Summer 2024, I conducted a road trip around Europe. In the process of putting together the overall itinerary, and individual itineraries for certain cities like this one for Vienna, I learned a great deal about the history of the places I visited.
With this in mind, I started off my IBDP History course that September with a simple induction project in which students were challenged to design a historical trip, complete with an advertising brochure and Google Earth itinerary.
Statues and History
This unit ties in particularly well with a study of the Civil Rights movement, but can be treated as a standalone unit. Should monuments of controversial historical figures be removed, or does this make us victims of history rather than subjects who can understand and engage with it?
The Worst Jobs in History: Victorian
This activity can be used as a stand-alone lesson, homework assignment or as part of a broader unit on "Was life Good or Bad during this particular period?". The worksheet has basic activities for a 30 minute lesson, and extension tasks that could be followed up later.
The Bilston Cholera Epidemic
A complete project pack for a 5-hour unit.
ActiveHistory Mysteries!
A series of engaging "Historical Mysteries" designed to develop skills of question formulation, deduction, research, groupwork and essay writing. Using a range of visual and written "clues", students piece together a genuine historical mystery and work towards an independent conclusion. Worksheets and markschemes included Choose from:
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