Module 2: Investigating history

Section 1: Investigating family histories

1. Working in groups to discuss families

When investigating the family, it is useful to first explore pupils’ understanding of what a family is and show them the diversity among families. Celebrating such diversity helps pupils feel better about themselves when they realise how different families can be. Case Study 1 and Activity 1 explore different ways to do this.

In the case study, the teacher encourages his pupils to work in small groups (see Key Resource: Using group work in your classroom) and to remember the rules that they have agreed for small-group discussions.

2. Modelling making a timeline

When studying past events, it is important to help pupils understand the passage of time and how things change from generation to generation.

Developing the ways that young pupils look at their family histories will help them link events together as well as put them in sequence. Resource 2: Another kinship chart provides a family tree that will help pupils see relationships between family members, e.g. their cousin is their mother’s or father’s sister’s or brother’s child.

3. Helping pupils explore their past

Helping pupils to develop their understanding of past and present takes time, and involves giving them a range of activities where they have to observe, ask questions and make judgements about what they find out.

How can they develop skills to help them think about how things change over time? Case Study 3 and the Key Activity use the wider environment to extend your pupils’ understanding of time passing and things changing.

Resource 1: Kinship chart

 Teacher resource for planning or adapting to use with pupils

A kinship chart shows how each person is related or connected to the others and their family or community. Different cultures have different ways of describing relatives.

Below is a simple kinship chart for Zambia.

Resource 2: Another kinship chart

 Teacher resource for planning or adapting to use with pupils

Resource 3: My timeline

 Teacher resource for planning or adapting to use with pupils

Maximise

Resource 4: Child labour in Africa

 Teacher resource for planning or adapting to use with pupils

What is child labour?

Child labour: all forms of work by children under the age laid down in the International Labour Organisation (ILO) standards (normally 15 years or the age of completion of compulsory schooling subject to some exceptions).

Worst forms of child labour: slavery, debt bondage, prostitution, pornography, forced recruitment of children for use in armed conflict, use of children in drug trafficking and other illicit activities, and all other work likely to be harmful or hazardous to the health, safety or morals of girls and boys under 18 years of age.

What is the situation of child labourers?

The ILO has recently estimated that some 246 million children aged 5–17 years are engaged in child labour around the world. Of these, some 179 million are caught in the worst forms of child labour.

Roughly 2.5 million children are economically active in the developed economies, 2.4 million in the transition countries, 127.3 million in Asia and the Pacific, 17.4 million in Latin America and the Caribbean, 48 million in Sub-Saharan Africa and 13.4 million in the Middle East and North Africa.

Workers under 18 face particular hazards. For example, in the US, the rate of injury per hour worked appears to be nearly twice as high for children and adolescents as adults.

Similarly, a survey of 13 to 17 year olds in Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden in 1998–99 revealed injury rates ranging from 3 to 19% of children working before or after school. In the developing countries, an ILO study found average rates of injury and illness per 100 children ranging from a low of 12% in agriculture (for boys) to a high of 35% (for girls) in the construction sector.

Africa has the greatest incidence of economically active children: 41% of children in the continent are at work.

On average, more than 30% of African children between 10 and 14 are agricultural workers.

In Rwanda, there are an estimated 400,000 child workers. Of these, 120,000 are thought to be involved in the worst forms of child labour and 60,000 are child domestic workers.

A recent survey by the Ministry of Public Service and Labour in Rwanda of children involved in prostitution in several large Rwandan cities found that 40% of child prostitutes had lost both of their parents, 94% lived in extreme poverty and 41% had never been to school.

In Tanzania, some 4,600 children are estimated to be working in small-scale mining.

In Tanzania, children as young as eight years old dig 30 metres underground in mines for eight hours a day, without proper lighting and ventilation – constantly in danger of injury or death from cave-ins.

The Government of Kenya has recently reported that 1.9 million children between the ages of 5–17, are working children. Only 3.2% of these children have attained a secondary school education and 12.7% have no formal schooling at all.

During the peak coffee picking season in Kenya, it has been estimated that up to 30% of the pickers are younger than 15.

According to the Government of Zambia, there are some 595,000 child workers in Zambia. Of these, 58% are 14 or younger and, thus, ineligible for any form of employment under the Employment of Young Persons Act.

It has been estimated that as many as 5 million children in Zimbabwe between the ages of 5 and 17 years are being forced to work in Zimbabwe.

An International Programme on the Elimination of Child Labour (IPEC) survey of children working in small scale mines in Madagascar showed that more than half (58%) were aged 12 or under, only a third had opportunities to learn skills and half came from families that were in a precarious economic situation with difficult living conditions.

Some 120,000 children under the age of 18 are thought to have been coerced into taking up arms as child soldiers, or becoming military porters, messengers, cooks or sex slaves in Africa.

Between 10,000 and 15,000 children from Mali are working on plantations in Côte d'Ivoire. Many of them are victims of child trafficking.

It is estimated that 50,000 children are working as domestics in Morocco.

In West Africa, an estimated 35,000 children are in commercial sexual exploitation.

Adapted from: Cornell University, Website

Reducing Child Labour in Tanzania through Education

In rural Tanzania, one out of three children between the ages of 10 and 14 work outside the family. They labor as farm workers, miners, domestic servants, and prostitutes, often under abusive and exploitive conditions.

Detrimental Working Conditions

Commercial agriculture in Tanzania employs large numbers of these youngsters. They provide much of the manual and machine-based labour on tobacco, coffee, tea, sugarcane, and sisal plantations. For example, in one area of the coastal region, 30 percent of the sisal plantation workers are children aged 12 to 14. They labour up to 11 hours per day with no specific rest periods, six days a week. Their wages are half that of adults, while nourishment and lodging are inadequate. Only half have completed primary school. Some plantations require as much as 14-, 16-, or even 17-hour work days. Mines and quarries also employ large numbers of youth who spend most of their days toiling above or below ground in very hazardous conditions. They risk injury from dust inhalation, blasting, mine collapse, flooding, as well as illness from silicosis.

Adapted from : Educational Development Centre, Website

Young girls are often lured away from their rural families with schemes that promise lucrative employment in towns and cities, only to be exploited as underpaid domestic servants that work as many as 16 or 18 hours per day. Domestic servitude in urban areas also make for an easy transition to child prostitution, which is a growing industry in Tanzania. As much as 25 percent of child prostitutes are former domestic servants.

Why Such Widespread Child Labor?

Poverty is one obvious reason for such widespread child labor in Tanzania. Over 50 percent of Tanzania's 36 million people live in extreme poverty, surviving on less than one US dollar per day. Many parents feel their survival is dependent on sending their children to work. Fortunately, income generation loan programs, also known as micro-credit disbursements, have had some success in giving families an economic boost.

Meanwhile, Tanzania's education system has drastically declined over the last 20 years due to funding cuts and teacher shortages. Currently, either no education is available or it is of such poor quality that it makes little sense for parents to send their children to school. Close to half the children are not enrolled, while the majority of those enrolled also work and are in constant danger of dropping out. If high quality education were made available, many more children would attend and fewer would enter the labor force. Education plays a critical role in combating child labor.

An Innovative Educational Strategy

To address this need for high-quality basic education, Education Development Center (EDC) and its partner, Research Triangle Institute (RTI), are key players in a program called Time-Bound Program on Eliminating Child Labor in Tanzania, which is funded by the US Department of Labor. EDC and RTI are establishing community learning centers in the 11 Tanzanian districts that have the highest incidence of child labor. 200 Interactive Radio Instruction (IRI) lessons for each of the first four grades will be developed in these centers. IRI is an innovative methodology that uses radio broadcasts that summon the participation of groups of listening students while their activities are facilitated by onsite teachers. The IRI curricula will include Swahili, mathematics, English, science, social studies, essential life skills, and navigating Tanzania's job market. International Labor Organization (ILO) and other NGOs are also identifying children who work, negotiating with employers, and bringing them to the community learning centers for their participation. When children complete the fourth grade, they will be assisted to integrate back into the formal school system or into a vocational program to prepare them for more stable, less dangerous work in the years ahead.

Adapted from: International Educational Systems, News, Website

Section 2: Investigating how we used to live

1. Gathering oral histories

Teaching history does not only involve facts about historical events, but also the development of pupils’ historical skills. As a teacher, you need give your pupils the opportunity to develop and practise these skills. The kinds of events you explore with your pupils will depend on their ages. With younger children, you will also take more of a lead in helping them find out and understand what happened.

In this part, pupils will conduct oral interviews with an older family member or another member of the community. The aim of the interview is to find out how different their own lifestyles and interests are, compared with those of people in the past. By showing pupils how to conduct an oral interview, you can help develop important skills – being able to see the value of oral history and being able to listen. (Read Resource 1: Oral history now to find out more about this valuable resource.)

Case Study 1 shows how one teacher introduced her pupils to the idea of using oral history to find out about the past. Read this before trying Activity 1 with your class.

2. Investigating a historical event

As well as using oral histories to find out about life in the past, you can use written records with your pupils.

In this section, we look at how different sets of records can help pupils build up their understanding of the past. In Activity 2 and the Key Activity, pupils explore written records of past events and conduct oral interviews with community members. How you organise and gather resources together is part of your role and advice is given on how you might do this.

3. Thinking critically about evidence

This part is intended to extend your ideas of how to help pupils use oral history as a resource for finding out about the past. You will encourage them to think critically about the validity and reliability of such evidence, and to compare oral testimonies of a historical event with written evidence of the same event. Investigating the similarities and differences in the two types of evidence provides an exciting learning opportunity for pupils.

Resource 1: Oral history

 Background information / subject knowledge for teacher

Resource 2: Possible interview questions

 Teacher resource for planning or adapting to use with pupils

Below are some questions to use with a visitor to find out about an event in the past or how they used to do things in the past. Areas you could explore include:

• growing food;
• traditional dress;
• traditional healing;
• building houses;
• education.

These three sets of starter questions will help you support your pupils in thinking of their own questions.

(1) Historial events

• What historical events took place when you were young?
• What did you wear when you went to a party or a wedding?
• Which event do you remember most?
• What do you remember about it?
• What happened? Tell me the story as you remember it.
• Who else was with you?
• Could I speak to them about this still?

(2) Games

• What games did you play when you were a child?
• How did you play these games?
• Who taught you to play these games?
• When did you play them?
• Where did you play them?
• What other activities did you enjoy?

(3) Growing food

• What vegetables and fruit did you grow?
• How did you grow them?
• Where did you grow them?
• What tools did you use?
• What did vegetables cost at the time?
• Where did you buy them? Which ones did you buy?
• What else did you eat that you liked?
• Do you still eat these foods?

Resource 3: Ugandan independence

 Background information / subject knowledge for teacher

The first Europeans to visit Uganda were the British explorers John Hanning Speke and James Grant when they were searching for the source of the Nile in 1862. They were followed by Samuel White Baker and Charles George Gordon commanding Egyptian troops.

The Anglo-American explorer Henry Morton Stanley, welcomed by Kabaka Mutesa I (reigned 1852–1884), reported the king's eagerness to understand Christianity. Soon both Protestant and Roman Catholic missionaries were working in Buganda. Within a decade the factions they created caused a civil war.

Once isolated, the region became, by 1890, a major object of the European nations’ scramble for African territory. Britain, after securing German recognition of its rights, moved to secure Buganda. Frederick Lugard, working for the British East Africa Company, ended the civil disturbances, and his successors used the Bugandan army to help conquer the other kingdoms and tribes. By 1896, a British protectorate administration had extended its authority over most of the region, and the name Uganda was adopted.

Final details concerning the administration of Uganda were settled by a series of agreements in 1900, the most comprehensive of which guaranteed special status to Buganda, including the continuation of its social and political system. Britain's almost 70 years of rule in Uganda was thus a centralised European bureaucracy superimposed on a federation of kingdoms and tribes. This worked well until the independence movements of the 1950s, when Buganda demanded separation from Uganda. Only after Kabaka Mutesa II was exiled for two years in 1953 was it possible to proceed with developing a united government.

After much experimenting, a federal constitution was promulgated in April 1962. The Uganda People's Congress won the elections, and Milton Obote became prime minister. Independence was granted in October 1962.

Resource 4: The exile of Ugandan Asians – a news report in 1972

 Background information / subject knowledge for teacher

Section 3: Using different forms of evidence in history

1. Thinking about the location of settlements

By looking at the local environment and the physical layout of the land, it is possible to think about why a community settled in a certain place.

Great Zimbabwe provides a good example. It is important that as a social studies teacher you understand a case like this, as it gives you the skills to relate these ideas to a number of different ancient African kingdoms and to your local setting. Using fieldwork, such as actual trips to a site, allows pupils to see for themselves why one place was chosen for settlement and why some developments survived longer than others.

Most settlements are where they are because the environment provides some kind of resource, such as water or trees, and/or the site provides protection from the elements and, in earlier times, from enemies. Villages and towns are often found near a stream or wood to provide water and wood for shelter and to burn for heat and cooking. By looking closely at your school’s local environment or your pupils’ home environment, whichever is easier, you can help them to begin to understand how settlements developed.

Maps from earlier times will show how a site has changed over time (this can build on the time walk activity from Module 2, Section 1).

2. Using mind maps to structure thinking about the past

In the past, cattle were always viewed as an important resource, and many farmers and communities still view cattle this way.

The purpose of Activity 2 is for pupils to investigate the traditional role of cattle in African societies using the local community as a source of information. They will then determine how much African farming societies have changed.

Case Study 2 and Activity 2 use mind mapping and a template to help pupils think about the task as they work together in groups to share ideas.

3. Fieldwork to investigate local history

One way to reconstruct how societies in the past lived is to analyse buildings, artefacts, sculptures and symbols found on sites from a long time ago.

In this part, pupils go on a field trip to a place of historical interest. If this is not realistic for your class, it is possible to do a similar kind of task in the classroom by using a range of documents, photographs and artefacts. Pupils can start to understand how to investigate these and fill in some of the gaps for themselves about what used to happen.

Resource 1: Great Zimbabwe

 Background information / subject knowledge for teacher

Great Zimbabwe, or ‘houses of stone’, is the name given to hundreds of great stone ruins spread out over a 500 sq km (200 sq mi) area within the modern-day country of Zimbabwe, which itself is named after the ruins.

The ruins can be broken down into three distinct architectural groups. They are known as the Hill Complex, the Valley Complex and the famous Great Enclosure. Over 300 structures have been located so far in the Great Enclosure. The types of stone structures found on the site give an indication of the status of the citizenry. Structures that were more elaborate were built for the kings and situated further away from the centre of the city. It is thought that this was done in order to escape sleeping sickness.

What little evidence exists suggests that Great Zimbabwe also became a centre for trading, with artefacts suggesting that the city formed part of a trade network extending as far as China. Chinese pottery shards, coins from Arabia, glass beads and other non-local items have been excavated at Zimbabwe.

Nobody knows for sure why the site was eventually abandoned. Perhaps it was due to drought, perhaps due to disease or it simply could be that the decline in the gold trade forced the people who inhabited Great Zimbabwe to look elsewhere.

The ruins of Great Zimbabwe have been a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1986.

More information can be found at https://en.wikipedia.org/ wiki/ Great_Zimbabwe

Resource 2: Pictorial map of Great Zimbabwe

 Teacher resource for planning or adapting to use with pupils

1. Find Great Zimbabwe.
2. Find the Zimbabwe Plateau. Why do you think the founders of Great Zimbabwe decided to build the settlement on a plateau?
3. What natural resources were found in and around the region of Great Zimbabwe?
4. Why were these resources important?
5. What other environmental factors may have contributed to the people’s decision to settle on the Zimbabwe Plateau?

Original source: Dyer, C., Nisbet, J., Friedman, M., Johannesson, B., Jacobs, M., Roberts, B. & Seleti, Y. (2005). Looking into the Past: Source-based History for Grade 10. Cape Town: Maskew Miller Longman. ISBN 0 636 06045 4.

Resource 3: A mind map about keeping cattle

 Teacher resource for planning or adapting to use with pupils

Resource 4: Cattle in traditional life – the Hima

 Background information / subject knowledge for teacher

Ankole (Nkole) is a large kingdom in southwestern Uganda, where the pastoralist Hima established dominion over the agricultural Iru some time before the 19^th century. The Hima and Iru established close relations based on trade and symbolic recognition, but they were unequal partners in these relations. The Iru were legally and socially inferior to the Hima, and the symbol of this inequality was cattle, which only the Hima could own. The two groups retained their separate identities through rules prohibiting intermarriage and, when such marriages occurred, making them invalid. The name Hima actually comes from early Cushitic cattle herders who invaded the Bantu farmers. Being the elite, they identified with the tall, darker Nilotic invaders who came later from the north, like the Bito. Both these invading peoples settled down and took up the language of the earlier Bantu people. The Hima gave their name to a form of the Bantu speech they, along with their relatives the Tutsi, learned from the Bantu they conquered.

The Hima provided cattle products that otherwise would not have been available to Iru farmers. Because the Hima population was much smaller than the Iru population, gifts and tribute demanded by the Hima could be supplied fairly easily. These factors probably made Hima-Iru relations tolerable, but they were nonetheless reinforced by the superior military organisation and training of the Hima.

The kingdom of Ankole expanded by annexing territory to the south and east. In many cases, conquered herders were incorporated into the dominant Hima stratum of society, and agricultural populations were adopted as Iru or slaves and treated as legal inferiors. Neither group could own cattle, and slaves could not herd cattle owned by the Hima.

Ankole society evolved into a system of ranked statuses, where even among the cattle-owning elite, patron-client ties were important in maintaining social order. Men gave cattle to the king (mugabe) to demonstrate their loyalty and to mark lifecycle changes or victories in cattle-raiding. This loyalty was often tested by the king's demands for cattle or for military service. In return for homage and military service, a man received protection from the king, both from external enemies and from factional disputes with other cattle owners.

The mugabeauthorised his most powerful chiefs to recruit and lead armies on his behalf, and these warrior bands were charged with protecting Ankole borders. Only Hima men could serve in the army, however, and the prohibition on Iru military training almost eliminated the threat of Iru rebellion. Iru legal inferiority was also symbolised in the legal prohibition against Iru owning cattle. And, because marriages were legitimised through the exchange of cattle, this prohibition helped reinforce the ban on Hima-Iru intermarriage. The Iru were also denied high-level political appointments, although they were often appointed to assist local administrators in Iru villages.

The Iru had a number of ways to redress grievances against Hima overlords, despite their legal inferiority. Iru men could petition the king to end unfair treatment by a Hima patron. Iru people could not be subjugated to Hima cattle-owners without entering into a patron-client contract.

A number of social pressures worked to destroy Hima domination of Ankole. Intermarriage took place despite prohibitions, and children of these unions (abambari) often demanded their rights as cattle owners, leading to feuding and cattle-raiding. From what is present-day Rwanda, groups launched repeated attacks against the Hima during the 19^th century. To counteract these pressures, several Hima warlords recruited Iru men into their armies to protect the southern borders of Ankole. And, in some outlying areas of Ankole, people abandoned distinctions between Hima and Iru after generations of maintaining legal distinctions that had begun to lose their importance.

Adapted from: Country Studies, Website

Cattle raising is still a prestigious occupation, generally reserved for people of Hima descent. A typical Hima herdsman will be out grazing his herd. His home is a group of huts. Before his marriage, he may share one with his mother, one is a kitchen, the others may belong to a brother with a wife and children. When the herdsman is to be married, his bride’s family select ten cows from his kraal. This is called okujugisa.

Ankole means ‘the land where milk and honey freely flow down the village paths’.

The Ankole cow is the symbol of the Mbarara district.

Adapted from: OK State, Website

The Ankole cattle are distributed from Lake Mobutu to Lake Tanganyika in eastern Africa. The original animals are thought to have been brought to northern Uganda by Hamitic tribes sometime between the 13^th and the 15^th centuries. The Ankole's susceptiblity to the tsetse fly forced the tribes and their cattle further south. The Hima or Bahima people settled on the shores of Lake Victoria in Uganda, Kenya and Tanzani. The Watusi or Tutsi people continued to Rwanda and Burundi with their cattle, some of which have spread to the lake districts of Zaire. All these groups select cattle based on horn size.

The small-uddered Ankole cows yield small amounts of milk but milking is an important ritual in some groups. A few groups use the cattle for work, none use them for meat. In general the animals are highly prized as status symbols, for ceremonial functions and not for their productivity.

Resource 5: The role of cattle – past and present

 Pupil use

Section 4: Understanding timelines

1. Building a timeline

Investigating a particular period in history, and trying to sequence events in the order in which they happened, will help pupils begin to see the links between events and some of the possible causes. Understanding the causes of change in our countries and societies may help us to live our lives better.

The purpose of this part is to explore how using timelines in history can be a useful way to divide time into more manageable ‘bits’, so that we know which ‘bit’ or period we are dealing with. This is particularly important when we are teaching history, because it is crucial that pupils understand the idea of change over time.

From an early age, pupils need help to sort and order events. As they grow and experience life, they can revisit activities like these ones, using more complex sequences and events.

(Section 1 in this module used timelines to explore family history. You might find it helpful to look at that section if you have not done so already, particularly if you are working with younger pupils.)

2. Introducing the concept of chronology

The study of time and the order in which events took place over time is called chronology. This part explores how you can help pupils understand this sequencing of events, the relationship between the order events happen and the outcomes. In using these activities with pupils, you will realise the importance this has on their understanding of the past.

3. Comparing African histories

Timelines can help us compare the similarities and differences in a series of events for different people, or different groups, or different countries.

For example, if your pupils drew timelines for themselves, there would be some events the same (starting school) and others different (birth of baby brother or sister for example).

Using timelines to compare the history of a variety of African countries during the time of moving to independence can help your pupils see common themes but also differences between their experiences.

Resource 1: Some important historical events since independence

 Background information / subject knowledge for teacher

• 1958 – Internal self-government is allowed.
• 1962 (1 March) – Uganda begins self-government, with Benedicto Kiwanuka as prime minister.
• 1962 (9 October) – Uganda gains independence after nearly 70 years of British rule.
• 1962 Milton Obote leads Uganda to independence but establishes a dictatorship.
• 1962 (25 October) – Uganda is admitted as a member state to the United Nations.
• 1967 (8 September) – A new constitution comes into effect, which makes Uganda a republic.
• 1971 (25 January) – A former private in the Ugandan army, Idi Amin, seizes power in a military coup and overthrows Milton Obote. Amin declares himself president for life. Amin kills anyone who opposes him or who is perceived as a threat. Estimates of over 300,000 people, mostly Christians, were killed.
• 1972 (4 August) – President Idi Amin begins a three-month-long process to expel from Uganda 50,000 Asians with British passports. Many left almost everything they owned behind to be pilfered by Amin's henchmen and handpicked supporters. People without one day’s experience in running a business were made business owners by Amin. Their lack of experience and understanding in business only lead to further decline of the economy of Uganda.
• 1972 (17 September) – It is announced in Uganda that Tanzanian forces (later reported to be Ugandan exiles who opposed Idi Amin's government) have crossed the border and captured three Ugandan towns before being driven out by Amin's troops.
• 1972 (18 December) – Idi Amin nationalises 41 foreign-owned farms and tea estates, of which 34 were British. This eventually leads to the expulsion of all foreign business interests from Uganda, the effects of which are still felt today.
• 1976 (27 June) – Palestinian extremists hijack Air France flight 139 in Greece with 246 passengers and 12 crew. The flight eventually lands at Entebbe Airport, as Idi Amin's government alone offers them safe passage.
• 1976 (3/4 July) – Operation Jonathan takes place. Originally known as Operation Thunderbolt, this was the Israeli commando raid on Entebbe Airport led by Jonathan Netanyahu (the only commando who was killed and for whom the operation was later renamed) to free Israeli highjack victims from Air France flight 139.
• 1976 (27 July) – After four years of tension with the government of Idi Amin, Britain broke off diplomatic relations with Uganda. It had been 30 years since the British government had taken such a drastic step against another country.
• April 1979 – Tanzania invades Uganda, unifying the various anti-Amin forces under the Uganda National Liberation Front and forcing Amin to flee the country; Yusufu Lule installed as president, but is quickly replaced by Godfrey Binaisa.
• 1980 – Godfrey Binaisa overthrown by the army and Milton Obote becomes president.
• 1985 – Obote deposed in military coup and is replaced by Tito Okello.
• 1986 (26 January) – After years of civil war in which hundreds of thousands are either killed or displaced, Yoweri Museveni's National Resistance Army takes power. Under his leadership, Uganda has steadily achieved economic growth, the rebuilding of the shattered infrastructure, a free press and judiciary, and peace in most parts of the country.
• 1993 – President Museveni restores traditional kings, but with no political power.
• 1995 – New constitution adopted but maintains ban on political activity.
• 1996 (9 May) – Uganda holds its first presidential election in 16 years and President Yoweri Museveni wins in excess of 78% of the vote.
• 1997 (20 June) – Death of John Akii-Bua, Uganda's only Olympic gold medallist. He won the 400-metre hurdles at the 1972 Munich Olympics.
• 1997 – Ugandan Peoples Defence Force (UPDF = army) helps depose Mobutu Sese Seko of Zaire, who is replaced by Laurent Kabila.
• 1998 – UDPF again intervene in Zaire (newly named Democratic Republic of Congo) to help rebels seeking to overthrow Kabila.
• 1999 (2 March) – Rwandan Hutu rebels kill eight foreign tourists (gorilla trackers at Bwindi Impenetrable Forest) they had kidnapped the day before. The US government later arrest threerebels for this crime in March 2003.
• 2000 (17 March) – Nearly 500 members of the cult Movement for the Restoration of the Ten Commandments die as a result of fire at Kanungu in southwestern Uganda. It is later discovered that as many as 500 others had been previously murdered.
• 2000 – Ugandans reject multiparty politics favouring a continuation of President Museveni's ‘no-party’ system.
• 2001 (March) – Uganda classifies Rwanda, a former ally in the war in the Congo, a hostile nation due to fighting in 2000 between the two countries' armies in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
• 2001 – President Museveni wins another term, over rival Kizza Besigye by 69% to 28%.
• 2002 (March) – Uganda signs agreement with Sudan seeking to contain the rebel group, Lord's Resistance Army (LRA), active along their common border. (The LRA wants to run Uganda along lines of biblical Ten Commandments. Led by ‘prophet’ Joseph Kony they have kidnapped thousands of children and displaced many civilians.)
• 2003 (May) – Uganda pulls last of its troops from eastern Democratic Republic of Congo and tens of thousands of civilians seek safety in Uganda.
• 2003 (August) – Former Ugandan dictator Idi Amin dies in Saudi Arabia.
• 2004 (February) – LRA rebels slaughter more than 200 displaced people in the north.
• 2004 (December) – Government and LRA rebels hold their first face-to-face talks, but there is no breakthrough in ending the insurgency.

Adapted from original source: http://www.ugandamission.net/ aboutug/ histimeline.html

Resource 2: The rise and fall of Idi Amin

 Background information / subject knowledge for teacher

1962 (1 March) – Uganda becomes a self-governing country under PM Benedicto Kiwanuka.

1962 (30 April) – Milton Obote takes over as prime minister of Uganda.

1962 (9 October) – Uganda becomes an independent state within the BritainCommonwealth.

1963 – PM Obote abolishes Uganda's status as a Commonwealth realm and replaces the post of governor-general with a figurehead presidency. Edward Mutesa, king of the Buganda region, is elected president in rigged elections.

1966 (2 March) – Milton Obote stages a coup against President Edward Mutesa and has himself declared president of Uganda.

1966 – President Obote of Uganda makes Idi Amin military chief of staff.

1966–1986 – For two decades, Ugandans live under the rule of Idi Amin and Milton Obote.

1971 (25 January) – Idi Amin leads a military coup that seizes power while President Obote is at a summit in Singapore. Obote seeks refuge in Tanzania.

1971 (2 February) – Idi Amin assumes power in Uganda.

1971 (20 February) – Major General Idi Amin Dada appoints himself president of Uganda.

1972 (4 August) – President Idi Amin gives some 50,000 Asians 90 days to leave the country following an alleged dream in which, he claimed, God told him to expel them.

1972 (18 September) – Thousands of Gujarati Indians begin arriving in Britain following their expulsion from Uganda by Dictator Idi Amin. Deprived of its business class the nation soon plummets into economic chaos.

1974 – The documentary film General Idi Amin Dada: A Self Portrait is directed by Barbet Schroeder.

1976 (27 June) – An Air France airbus is hijacked in Germany and taken to Uganda.

1976 (3 July) – Israel launches its daring mission to rescue 103 passengers and Air France crew members being held at Entebbe Airport in Uganda by pro-Palestinian hijackers.

1976 (4 July) – Jonathan Netanyahu, brother of Benjamin, leads and is killed in an Israeli raid called Operation Thunderball that rescues the hostages held at Entebbe Airport in Uganda. The raid frees all but three of the 104 Israeli and Jewish hostages and crew of an Air France jetliner seized by pro-Palestinian hijackers. 20 Ugandan soldiers, one Israeli officer, three hostages and seven hijackers died. The hijacking was linked to Carlos the Jackal, aka Ilich Ramirez Sanchez.

1976 (9 July) – Uganda asks UN to condemn Israeli hostage rescue raid on Entebbe.

1977 (16 February) – Janani Luwum, the Anglican archbishop of Uganda, and two other men are killed in what Ugandan authorities said was an automobile accident.

1977 – Henry Kyemba, a former Uganda minister in Idi Amin’s government, authored in exile A State of Blood, a description of his years as a minister under Amin.

1978 (30 October) – Ugandan troops attack Tanzania.

1978 - Uganda under Idi Amin goes on to annex a 700-square-mile section of Tanzania. President Nyerere sends Tanzanian soldiers and Ugandan exile volunteers to push back Amin's forces.

1979 (11 April) – Idi Amin deposed as president of Uganda as rebels and exiles backed by Tanzanian forces seized control. Amin flees into exile in Saudi Arabia.

1979 (3 June) Amin flees to Libya.

1980 – Elections in Uganda return Milton Obote to power.

2003 – Idi Amin dies in Saudi Arabia.

Adapted from original source: http://timelines.ws/ countries/ UGANDA.HTML

Resource 3: African timelines template

 Teacher resource for planning or adapting to use with pupils

Resource 4: Key events in the move to independence

 Background information / subject knowledge for teacher

Resource 5: Recording sheet

 Teacher resource for planning or adapting to use with pupils

Section 5: Using artefacts to explore the past

1. Discussing artefacts in small groups

Handling artefacts or looking at pictures of them provides a means for you to draw attention to both the factual aspects of history and the interpretation involved. Something that will help you in this work is collecting resources as and when you can. Often it is possible to find old utensils and artefacts from the home and in markets.

This part will help you to plan tasks for your pupils to think about how things that we use in our everyday lives have changed over time. For example, by looking at what we use for cooking now and what we used in the past, we can begin to think about how people used to live. We can compare utensils and, from this, speculate about what it would have been like to live in the past and use such artefacts. This will stimulate pupils’ thinking about themselves and their place in the local community and its history.

2. Welcoming visitors to enhance the curriculum

One of the purposes of teaching history to your pupils is to allow them to understand and discover their own and their community’s identity. As a social studies teacher, even of primary school children, you should always be looking for interesting ways of helping pupils understand this past, their history. Considering how local customs, everyday tasks and the objects used for them have changed helps builds this identity.

3. Interpreting evidence from artefacts

History is always about balancing subjective claims (peoples’ personal accounts and opinions) against objective (independent) evidence. When exploring artefacts, rather than oral or written evidence, the same balancing applies. There are definite things that can be said about a pot for example, i.e. its shape, what it is made of etc. Something like ‘what it was used for’ can only be speculation, based on what we use such pots for now. By looking at the pot carefully, consulting old drawings and paintings and talking to others, we can build up a more certain picture of how it was used.

This part explores ways of helping pupils question their thinking and understanding about artefacts.

Resource 1: Using artefacts in the classroom

 Background information / subject knowledge for teacher

The opportunity to handle actual artefacts is a unique experience. For some reason that no one is quite sure of, the act of touching an object, which obviously has its own history and story, inspires everyone. Pupils will inevitably be curious about the artefacts and this will naturally lead to good discussion.

Handling an artefact allows pupils to use their senses, develop questioning and problem-solving skills, strengthen their understanding of a period, and empathise with people from the past.

Resource 2: My artefact

 Pupil use