Topic title: What was the significance of the Silk Roads?
Year group: 7
When taught: January to February
What are we learning?
• What the Silk Roads were;
• What was traded on the Silk Roads;
• What the impact of religion was on the Silk Roads;
• What the impact of war was on the Silk Roads;
• How disease spread along the Silk Roads, with a focus on the Black Death;
• Why Baghdad was important and how it compared to western European cities.
Why is this important to know?
• It is important to understand the global interconnectedness of the Middle Ages and to understand the global context of the medieval British history we have been studying already in Year 7.
• Learning about medieval Baghdad helps us to compare and contrast medieval cities in different places.
Where does this link into our past and future learning?
• Looking at the spread of Christianity (and other religions) as well as conflict between religions – like in our learning about the crusades in our last topic.
• Studying the history of the Middle East will be useful background knowledge for our first topic in Year 8 which looks at terrorism through time and why there is conflict in the Middle East.
• Understanding of the spread of knowledge along the silk roads will be useful context for our GCSE topic ‘Health and the People’ where we look at Christian and Islamic influences on medieval medicine.
How will we be assessed on this topic?
• The end of topic assessment will be a ten minute knowledge test (including some multiple choice questions, some non multiple-choice questions, a chronology task and a key word task).
• This topic will also be assessed in the end of Year 7 exam.
What makes a strong piece of work in this topic? What are teachers hoping to see?
• PEEL paragraphs to explain the significance of the Silk Roads;
• Linking learning from each lesson to the big topic question;
• Understanding the concepts of similarity and difference (between Britain and the wider world);
• Use of key words regularly (see below).
What key words are there in this topic?
• Globalisation: When different parts of the world become more and more connected.
• Misconception: A view or opinion that is incorrect because based on faulty thinking or understanding.
• Silk Roads: A network of routes that linked people, trade, knowledge, and religions. They stretched from Europe in the West to China in the East.
• Trade: The action of buying and selling goods and services.
What can I try if I want to stretch and challenge myself on this topic?
• Study more about the experiences of life on the Silk Roads in different parts of the world and at different times – what comparisons and contrasts can you make between life on the Silk Roads in those different places and at those different points in time?
What wider reading can be done on this topic?
• Peter Frankopan’s book – The Silk Roads: The extraordinary history that created your world
• The Black Death – The Intimate Story of a Village in Crisis, 1345 – 1350 (available in the Aird library)
• BBC clips
Supporting document/links:
• Knowledge organiser students will be given at the end of the topic to revise for the end of topic assessment.
