Teaching GCSE History: The History of Medicine

Schools have been teaching this topic for over 35 years now. No matter how innovative the textbooks, we all need to use fresh approaches from time to time. The new 2016 curriculum with its different, British, emphases gives us this opportunity. You’ll love the quality of the resources and the way they have been used in novel ways. Whole lessons are spent exploring a German painting showing surgery in 1890, working out whether Jenner and Fleming deserve their reputations, and investigating who should appear on the front page of a medical textbook written in 1500.

Outstanding Lessons

Fun anachronism-spotting activity set in 1796, for GCSE History of Medicine

Most anachronism activities used in schools are the rather naff ones put before Y7 pupils in an introduction to What is History. You know the sort of thing: Roman soldiers wearing wrist watches. This activity is...

Read more

SMART TASK: History of medicine Renaissance physicians; Is the artist taking the piss?

In this short activity students are shown two contrasting images of a physician inspecting a patient’s urine. Students have to guess the provenance and date. It transpires that they are 250 years apart. Does this mean then that no progress was made in the way...

Read more

SMART TASK: Medieval medicine. What can we work out from the picture?

A smart task based on an original idea from Lorna Hunter, of Swanmore Technology College.

This deceptively simple example of a familiar technique takes students from the known to the unknown. They begin by annotating all they can see in the picture, available on...

Read more

SMART TASK Revision: name your best squad

To help students remember who the key individuals were in the history of medicine, you might like to present them as members of two opposing football teams.... [private] Team A is clearly the best squad of 11, perhaps with a couple of substitutes. The ‘second team’ would be the next...

Read more

SMART TASK: Why was there so much opposition to Jenner’s ideas on vaccination in the 19th century?

This is a short, fun SMART task.  All the instructions are on the PowerPoint presentation.  Start with slide 2 which sets the puzzle, a paradox.  If Jenner was so highly regarded and his ideas paved the way for the eventual eradication of smallpox, why then...

Read more

SMART TASK Key Stage 4: GCSE SHP Medicine: 18th century surgery

This quick activity asks students to explore the detail in Rowlandson’s cartoon called ‘Amputation’.  They score one mark for each of the 10 labelled examples of relevant detail and 3 marks each for good inferences.  If they can explain the purpose of the cartoon they...

Read more

Penicillin: From discovery to world-wide use? Who should take the credit?

Students have to divide a $100 million bequest to those people who did most to develop penicillin. But in what ratio? Should Fleming get it all? What about the Oxford team, Florey and Chain, even Heatley? Students create a living graph to show the turning...

Read more

Teaching the new GCSE thematically: 10 approaches that really work

Now that all schools have to teach a thematic study I thought I’d share my experience of observing hundreds of GCSE SHP lessons over almost 20 years. I have distilled them down to just my top ten. They don’t claim to be unique ideas; they...

Read more

Teaching the History of Medicine

As you all know, the trick with teaching this course is to marry a strong contextual knowledge with an understanding of the various factors that had a positive and a negative impact on change. Concepts of progress and regress need to be looked at over...

Read more

Changes in surgery; late 19th century: a puzzle. Can students use all the contextual clues to work out when it was painted?

This lesson was kindly provided by Barbara Seymour who trialled it when she was Head of History at John Hunt of Everest School, Basingstoke: This lesson follows on from the teaching of the key changes /discoveries in the nineteenth century. Students had visited the Old Operating...

Read more

Who mattered most in medieval medicine? Who would you have on your textbook front cover from 1500?

One way of getting students to think about change and continuity in medieval times is to show them textbooks that were used at the end of the period. Instead of revealing all their secrets, you tease out the ideas from the students. This really tests...

Read more

How did Snow make the breakthrough with cholera?

This lesson focuses on problem-solving. Instead of simply telling students how clever Snow was, or showing them a video explaining his breakthrough, students have to see if they can spot the connections Snow made. Only when they have tried is the answer revealed.  Methods such...

Read more

The impact of the theory of the four humours on medicine: the case of the three tadpoles!

This lesson was conceived, taught and evaluated by Simon Harrison, when he was an Advanced Skills Teacher, Swanmore Technology College in Spring 2007. Students have to consider ways of representing people's beliefs in the  4 humours as they developed over time and then attempt a...

Read more

Who deserves to be remembered as the inventor of vaccination: Jenner or Jesty?

During this enquiry students work in two teams one using textbooks and websites to put forward the traditional claim that it was Jenner, the other using a wallet of resources to prove that it was Jesty.  Following a brief debate, students have to work out...

Read more

Vesalius’ claim to fame. Using the B.A.D formula to prepare for a BBC interview

The BBC is making a documentary on Renaissance medicine in which they have devoted two minutes to the work of Vesalius. Unfortunately, their Vesalius expert is ill and they thought it would be a neat idea to ask two well-informed students to stand in. Their...

Read more

Prehistoric Medicine: Getting your GCSE course off to a great start

This lesson was taught by Mike Herrity when Head of History at Wildern School, Hedge End, near Southampton. On an OFSTED inspection the lead inspector pronounced the lesson quite outstanding and was so convinced of the quality that she saw no more history lessons after...

Read more

SMART TASK: GCSE questions on Renaissance Medicine

Using Zones of relevance to answer two possible questions on Renaissance Medicine.

Have you ever despaired of GCSE history students who answer the question they want to answer rather than the one that was actually set? I think I may have a partial solution. Using the...

Read more