A few days ago, I wrote a blog responding to the DfE’s interim curriculum and assessment review. In it I expressed deep concerns that there was too little critical evaluation of concepts like 'knowledge-rich' and 'mastery learning', which continue to do enormous damage to meaningful teaching in subjects like history. One of the key places I see these concepts impacting is on the framing of historical enquiries in the classroom. They therefore strike at the very heart of history teaching itself.

In 2023, over a decade after the Gibb-Gove reforms began, Ofsted reported on the picture of history in schools. In their report, they noted that in too many schools, “pupils’ knowledge of history was disconnected or superficial” and “in most schools, pupils had misconceptions about how historians and others study the past and construct their accounts” (Ofsted, 2023, n.p.). The report further noted that "the teaching of disciplinary knowledge in key stage 3 was overly influenced by leaders’ interpretations of GCSE examination requirements. In most schools, pupils learned disciplinary knowledge that was either directly or indirectly connected to particular GCSE question types" (Ofsted, 2023, n.p.). These issues should also be seen alongside the common criticism that history is increasingly overloaded with content and a growing perception that it is inaccessible for lower attaining pupils, especially those with SEND. Meanwhile other reports suggest pupils from Global Majority backgrounds are significantly less likely to choose to study history beyond age 14, due to its perceived irrelevance in their lives (Atkinson et al., 2018). This is a travesty on a national scale.

Done well, school history has enormous potential to empower all young people to think critically about the world around them. It can help them to:
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• Understand themselves and others.
• Explore common and unique human experiences across time.
• Engage with- and understand the importance of- truth processes.
• Develop their own ideas and make meaning of the past in local, national, global, and of course personal contexts. 
• Embrace uncertainty and complexity in safe and meaningful ways (Dawson 2018). 

 
One of the key tools history teachers have used to empower young people through history lessons is historical enquiry, and specifically the enquiry question. Indeed, Ofsted’s research review noted the importance of historical enquiry in curriculum planning and pedagogical decision making, and even Michael Young (2016), whose work was so central to the Gibb-Gove reforms, has written about the importance of historical enquiry as a vehicle for 'powerful knowledge'. However, the meaning of enquiry itself in the context of the history classroom seems to be changing, to the point where is is being robbed of its potential to deliver on the goals of empowering young people through history education.

Enquiry as empowerment
The concept of historical enquiry has been embedded in school history teaching in  

On Tuesday morning I managed to set aside some time to read the DfE’s interim curriculum and assessment review. It is a report so seemingly uncontroversial, that even Nick Gibb struggled to find problems with it when interviewed on the Today programme. Yet, as I reflected on it, I found it more and more troubling. I mean, it’s even made me dust off my login and blog for the first time in ages. It’s not so much what the report says, but what remains unsaid that worries me. Let me explain. 
 
What is said?
On the whole, I found the report to be measured and sensible. There are no sweeping claims about teacher blobs or Marxist teachers destroying the education of children. Nor does it make wild claims about a system in crisis, or the need for radical change. In fact, there is a welcome, if cautious, recognition of the challenges faced by pupils with SEND, and of the need for a slimmed down curriculum, even if it is unclear how these things will be addressed. There were even some nods buried deeper down in the document that there might be some appetite for a broadening of what curriculum entails.