https://drive.google.com/open?id=17vx24q7lnIfjSo5hH3_1HxS915gwK1U4

Historical Skills	Historical Knowledge
Academic standard:  Year 9: Students interpret, process, analyse and organise information from a range of primary and secondary sources and use it as evidence to answer inquiry questions.  Year 10: Students process, analyse and synthesise information from a range of primary and secondary sources and use it as evidence to answer inquiry questions.	Academic standard:  The environment movement (the 1960s – present) – Significant events and campaigns that contributed to popular awareness of environmental issues

What does that mean? 

• Sources: History is the study of how we unravel the stories of the past. Sources are the way we fill in the context of those stories. Sources describe what happened, why they happened, when they happened, what people of the time thought about the events, and can discuss the implications of these events. 
• Primary Sources: A primary source is a first-hand material that stems (roughly) from the time period that the story is being told. For example, when Plutarch wrote of how “the sky being on fire near Naples”, and Pliny the Younger wrote about how locals were not particularly alarmed of the small earthquakes leading up to the explosion because they were so common are examples of primary sources. 
• Secondary Sources: Secondary sources are an additional step removed from the period – a ‘second-hand’ work that is the result of reconstructing and interpreting the past using primary materials as well as textbooks, and articles
• Sources as evidence: However cool actual sources from times gone by may-be, we can not assume that everything they tell us (or even everything that we think they tell us) is true, or that we are automatically able to interpret their contents and context correctly. They are, after all, made by people who were operating from their own contexts and understanding of the world around them. Our job as Historians is to keep a critical eye on the content and ask questions along the way. 

In everyday words

Questions you should ask yourself when you see a source: 

• What kind of source is it? 
  • Is this a primary source or a secondary source? 
• Who created this source? 
  • How did they gather that information?
  • Were they an eye witness or are they relaying information from elsewhere? 
  • Could they be biased? 
• What goal did the author have in creating the source? 
  • Did the creator want to tell a truthful story or could they be attempting to influence others?
• What context was the source created in?
  • The context of a source can change depending on when it was written. Something written by a Christian during the times where Christians were persecuted by the Romans is different than one when Christianity was the official religion of Rome. 

In context to Historical Knowledge:

Practice makes perfect

On-topic

For each of the following sources, answer all of the previous questions. 

(use the following google doc)

• Statement by Principal Deputy Press Secretary Speaks on the Soviet Nuclear Reactor Explosion 
• Radiation Hotspots of Chernobyl
• 
• Backgrounder on Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant Accident
• This is how a reactor explodes
• Chernobyl’s 1986 disaster
• Chernobyl: Assessment of Radiological and Health Impact

Questions: 

• What kind of source is it?  (primary or secondary)
• Who created this source? 
• What goal did the author have in creating the source? 
• What context was the source created in?

Now personalise:

Think of some sources of information that you’ve used to make a decision or to inform your worldview. This might be:

• The origins of COVID19
• Gamergate
• Equality of the sexes in the workplace
• The role of police in the community
• Memes
• Something from your personalised project

Your sources for your information can be anything, movies, images, posters, music, news articles, blog posts, etc.

Find 3 sources and ask the questions about sources for each of them:

• What kind of source is it?  (primary or secondary)
• Who created this source? 
• What goal did the author have in creating the source? 
• What context was the source created in?
• Could the author be biased in their position?

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