Creative Transform (CT)
Digital timeline with embedded oral history audio
Each student builds a digital timeline of a 20th-century event by interviewing a family member or community member who lived through it (or watching an existing oral history recording). The timeline has at least eight events; each event has embedded student-recorded audio of the interview clip alongside textual context.
Tools: Sutori
Immersive 3D museum room curating a period
Each student builds a navigable 3D museum room curating a chosen historical period (e.g. medieval England, the Industrial Revolution, the inter-war period). The room contains at least six exhibit objects (real images placed in 3D space) with interpretive text the visitor reveals on tap. Visitors navigate freely through the room.
Tools: CoSpaces
Twine narrative through primary sources
Each student builds a Twine branching narrative based on primary sources from a chosen historical event (e.g. the Munich Crisis, the Suez Crisis, the Cuban Missile Crisis). The reader makes decisions at key moments; each decision branch reveals a different primary source the reader must interpret to continue. There must be at least three decision points and four endings.
Tools: Twine
Interactive Amplify (IA)
Artefact era sorting with class debate
The teacher posts twelve artefact pictures (mixing modern, Roman, Egyptian, medieval, prehistoric). Each pair sorts each artefact into one of four era columns on a class Padlet. The class scrolls the columns and the teacher highlights any artefact placed differently across pairs, asking those pairs to defend.
Tools: Padlet
Ancient civilisation pins on a shared map
Each pair is assigned one ancient civilisation (Egypt, Greece, Rome, Maya, Indus Valley, China). They drop two pins on a shared class map: one on the heartland of the civilisation, one on a place it traded with or influenced. They label each pin. The class scrolls the populated map and discusses how civilisations connected.
Tools: Google Earth
Mystery artefact prediction wall
The teacher posts a photo of one mystery artefact (e.g. a Roman strigil, a medieval thumb-shaped lock, an Anglo-Saxon brooch). Each pair posts a prediction of what it was used for, with reasoning, to a class Padlet. The class scrolls all predictions, the teacher reveals the artefact's actual use, and pairs reflect on which clues they noticed and missed.
Tools: Padlet
Source-pairing on the Magna Carta
Pairs receive two contemporary sources on the Magna Carta, one from a baron and one from a royal scribe. They highlight one fact and one bias in each, post both to a class Padlet, and in the plenary the teacher pulls out three contradictions between the sources for whole-class discussion.
Tools: Padlet
Interactive timeline of the Industrial Revolution
Each pair takes one decade between 1760 and 1840 and adds three events to a shared timeline (Padlet, Sutori, or a shared Google Doc with a date column). The class scrolls the resulting full timeline together; the teacher calls on three pairs to defend why their events mattered for the trajectory of industrialisation.
Tools: Sutori, Padlet, Google Docs
Voice-recorded source analysis on the Treaty of Versailles
Students listen to a 60-second extract from a contemporary German politician’s reaction to the Treaty. In pairs, they record a 60-second voice memo identifying two emotions in the speaker’s tone and the historical context for each. They submit the recording to the teacher.
Source-reliability vote with debate
The teacher posts a single primary source (e.g. a propaganda poster, a witness account, a speech extract). Students vote on Mentimeter for how reliable they think it is on a five-point scale. The class sees the spread, then in pairs writes a 30-second defence. The teacher calls one pair from each end of the spread to argue. The class re-votes.
Tools: Mentimeter
Causation factor weights on a shared diagram
Each student gets their own Jamboard frame with five named factors that contributed to a historical event (e.g. for the outbreak of WWI: militarism, alliances, imperialism, nationalism, the assassination). They drag each factor onto a 1-to-5 weight scale on the frame, justifying with a one-line note. The class scrolls all thirty frames and the teacher highlights factors that students weighted very differently.
Tools: Jamboard
Historians' interpretations comparison
The teacher posts three short extracts from different historians on the same event (e.g. the causes of the First World War as analysed by Fischer, Joll and Clark). Each student picks the interpretation they find most convincing and posts to a shared Padlet column with a two-sentence justification. The class scrolls the columns and the teacher draws out the contested points.
Tools: Padlet
Historiographical interpretations panel
The teacher posts three short extracts from named historians on the same A-Level event (e.g. for the origins of the Cold War: Kennedy, Gaddis, Lefler). Each student picks the interpretation they find most convincing, posts a 150-word defence on a class Padlet with citation, and reads three peers' defences before the plenary debate.
Tools: Padlet
Source-reliability vote with debate (A-Level)
The teacher posts a single primary source from the A-Level period. Students vote on Mentimeter for how reliable they find it on a five-point scale, plus a free-text reason. The class sees the spread, defends in pairs, debates, and re-votes after.
Tools: Mentimeter
Synoptic essay-plan peer feedback
Each student posts a 300-word essay plan for a synoptic A-Level question on their own page of a shared class Doc. Three named peers comment per plan, focusing on the strongest argument and the most arguable thesis. Students then revise based on three sets of feedback.
Tools: Google Docs
Interactive Transform (IT)
Live joint research on a shared event
A class partners with a class in a country directly involved in a chosen historical event (e.g. partition of India 1947 with an Indian school; the Gold Rush 1849 with a US school). Together they build a shared web page combining sources, photos and oral history from both countries. Each side contributes content; the other side responds and integrates.
Tools: Google Sites, Microsoft Teams
Cross-cultural source analysis with partner school
A class is paired with a partner-school class in another country (e.g. UK class paired with a German class for a topic on WWII; UK class paired with a US class for a topic on the Cold War). Both classes annotate the same primary source on a shared Doc, with each student tagging their nationality. The classes then debate where their national perspectives diverge.
Tools: Google Docs, Microsoft Teams
Real-time historical-debate competition
A class hosts a live debate competition on a contested historical question (e.g. who was responsible for the start of WWI?) with a partner school in a different country. Two teams of three argue different interpretations; native-school peers argue alternative interpretations. Teacher-judges on both sides give feedback; the class watches and votes on the strongest case.
Tools: Microsoft Teams
Passive Replace (PR)
BBC Black Death clip with Forms comprehension check
Year 7 are towards the end of their medieval England unit. Today is a 25-minute recap on the Black Death. The next lesson asks them to argue whether it was the most significant event of the medieval period. The teacher has chosen an eight-minute BBC documentary clip that covers symptoms, transmission and the social effects.
Students watch the clip on their iPads with headphones. The teacher pauses the projector at the end of the clip for a 90-second whole-class clarification (the difference between bubonic and pneumonic plague, the rough death toll). Students then answer ten MCQs on a Microsoft Form. The class results are reviewed in the last three minutes.
Tools: YouTube, Microsoft Forms
Tudor monarchs knowledge organiser self-quizzing
The Year 8 unit on the Tudors covers the six monarchs: Henry VII, Henry VIII, Edward VI, Mary I, Elizabeth I, with Lady Jane Grey as a footnote. The class needs to know each monarch's dates and three key events before the timeline assessment next week. Today's 20-minute lesson is self-quizzing on the unit knowledge organiser.
The organiser is a six-row Google Doc table, shared as view-only. Students cover the right two columns with a paper bookmark and work through the monarchs trying to recall each one's dates and events before revealing. They mark their own progress with a tick or cross next to each row in their books.
Tools: Google Docs
Causes of WW1 slide-deck recap before source work
Year 9 have been studying the causes of the First World War for three lessons. Today is a 25-minute recap before next lesson, when they will analyse a German political cartoon as a source. The teacher walks through a six-slide PowerPoint covering the four MAIN causes (Militarism, Alliances, Imperialism, Nationalism) plus the assassination as the trigger.
The deck is shared on the LMS. Each slide includes one date, one statistic and one image. Students follow on their iPads and copy a one-line summary of each cause into their exercise books. The teacher checks summaries by walking the room in the last five minutes.
Tools: PowerPoint
Lessons that look CT but are not
Useful counter-examples when you are checking your own lesson placement on the PICRAT grid.
This page is one of a growing set of PICRAT examples by cell, subject and key stage. Page maintained by Andy Perryer.