Enrichment activities, such as study trips both inside the UK and abroad, are a key aspect of successful departmental practice and one which OSFTED will look for. History is more fortunate than most in the scope that it offers for such visits and the number of countries and sites available. Nothing will bring alive the impact of the Great War more than personally reading the epitaph on the grave of one its dead or standing on one of its battlefields.

Museums offer the opportunity to see, and, in some cases, handle the artefacts of history. Many Living History museums offer the opportunity to walk the reconstructed streets of previous centuries, such as Kirkgate in York, or a reconstructed trench at Vimy Ridge. Nothing can bring home more chillingly the stark horror of the Holocaust than a visit to one of its death camps or, in the case of Anne Frank, the home of one of its youngest victims.

What was like to be imprisoned in the cell of Nelson Mandela or Al Capone or French resistance fighters the night before their execution? Theorising about these situations in the sanitised environs of the classroom is one thing. Being in them is another.