Year 11 History

Course Overview

Term 1
Students will gain an understanding of the expansion of human groups across the globe and the interactions between existing and newly arrived populations that occurred. Through examining the voyaging of the Vikings from Scandinavia to North America, and later that of Columbus and the Conquistadores from southern Europe to Latin America, the stories that accompanied these voyages and the encounters with indigenous peoples will be studied to draw different perspectives from the same events.

Term 2
Students will gain an understanding of mythology in ancient Greece and Rome and how it reflects ideas and values of the Classical World. Students will examine stories, festivals and religious practices in ancient Greece and Rome through different forms including art and literature. Students will also compare and contrast mythology from ancient Greece, Rome with Maori mythology.

Term 3
Students will gain an understanding of the contesting for power through both a local and an international case study. The Northern War in the Bay of Islands and the Russian Revolution will be examined to demonstrate how these were of significance for local communities and, in different ways, globally with historian James Belich’s claim that the Northern War was where the first modern use of trench warfare took place while, in Russia, an ideology that would deeply influence much of the twentieth century was unleashed.

Term 4
Concepts of colonisation and national identity will be studied through two case studies located in Asia. The Chinese ‘century of humiliation’ centred around the Opium Wars are contrasted in the following century with Indian independence using the non-violent methods of their revered leader, Mahatma Gandhi. Aotearoa New Zealand’s own earlier non-violent resistance at Parihaka will be taught alongside those of Gandhi in India.