If you are looking for an interesting way of offering pupils overviews or of looking at the concept of significance, then you might find the accompanying PowerPoint helpful. The theme is the changing nature of how we are ruled and is best tackled at the end of the KS3 course looking back retrospectively. Pupils are given images of 10 coins which they have first to sequence without help, and then match to captions. Coins cover rule by the Romans, the Saxons, the Normans (with evidence of Viking influence) through to Cromwell’s commonwealth with no monarch’s head on the coin. Later coins open up discussion on the Hanoverians and the Imperial role as well as the creation of the Irish Free State, concluding with the Euro. The principal part of the activity focuses on the inferences pupils can draw from each coin. Clues are given to help pupils work things out for themselves and there are answers for you too!!
