Teaching Ancient War and Peace: Setting new agenda for primary, secondary and tertiary education
The Visualising War and Peace project, based at the University of St Andrews, is organising a series of online consultations plus an in-person workshop in 2025 to explore current practice and future opportunities in the teaching of ancient war and peace, across primary, secondary and tertiary education sectors.
The online consultations are designed to offer those unable to travel in person to St Andrews an opportunity to share their views on current practice and future pathways. They will lay important foundations for the in-person workshop in St Andrews, where anonymised digests
of the consultation sessions will be shared to inform discussion.
Teachers in primary, secondary and tertiary education and academic researchers in Classics pedagogy and related fields are all invited to contribute, in as many ways as they are able.
To register for any of the sessions, please complete this form.
N.B. Each online consultation will have a particular focus (as outlined below), but they all overlap and discussions will be responsive to the issues raised by participants.
Online consultation 1: Weds 29th January 2025, 1-2pm: Teaching Ancient War – current approaches, what works well, what could be different?
• Where/when is ancient war taught in your curriculum?
• How does ‘war’ get defined?
• Which wars/which aspects of war do you focus on? Who takes centre-stage?
• What/who determines that (e.g. staff-choice, exam requirements, available
sources/textbooks?)
• What are the strengths of the current approach?
• What are the challenges/gaps/things you would like to change?
Online consultation 2: Mon 24th February 2025, 1-2pm: Teaching Ancient War’s Aftermath – current approaches, what works well, what could be different?
• Where/when is the aftermath of ancient warfare taught in your curriculum?
• Which aspects of war’s aftermath (e.g. political developments, economic issues,
physical/mental trauma, forced displacement, etc) get discussed?
• What/who determines that (e.g. staff-choice, exam requirements, available
sources/textbooks, teaching traditions, contemporary events?)
• What are the strengths of the current approach?
• What are the challenges/gaps/things you would like to change?
Online consultation 3: Weds 26th March 2025, 4-5pm: Teaching Ancient Peace and Peacebuilding – current approaches, what works well, what could be different?
• Where/when is ancient peace or peacebuilding taught in your curriculum?
• How do ‘peace’ or ‘peacebuilding’ get defined? (e.g. interstate conflict resolution, the
absence of violence, physical rebuilding, personal healing, inner wellbeing?)
• Which examples/aspects of peace or peacebuilding do you focus on? Who takes
centre-stage?
• What/who determines that (e.g. staff-choice, exam requirements, available
sources/textbooks?)
• What are the strengths of the current approach?
• What are the challenges/gaps/things you would like to change?
Online consultation 4: Mon 28th April 2025, 1-2pm: learning about ancient and modern war and peace in dialogue
• Do you draw connections between ancient and modern war/peace in your teaching?
• How can ancient and modern conflict/peace histories best inform each other?
• What are the challenges?
• What are the opportunities?
• What structures or resources would need to change to facilitate more of this?
• What can Classical Studies/Classics/Ancient History learn from approaches to
teaching war/peace in other subject areas?
• How can Classical Studies/Classics/Ancient History help inform the teaching of
war/peace in other subject areas?
In person workshop: 2pm Weds 30th April – 12noon Fri 2nd May, University of St Andrews: the programme of speakers will be advertised in February.
Via a series of short papers (15 minutes, each followed by plenary discussion), we will explore the following themes across primary, secondary and tertiary education sectors, both within the UK and internationally:
• Current practice/trends in teaching ancient war/warfare (and their effects)
• Current practice/trends in teaching ancient peace/conflict resolution (and their effects)
• Examples of good practice in teaching war/peace (within or beyond Classics, ancient or
post-antiquity) and their effects
• Teaching practices beyond the classroom (e.g. in the museum setting, tourism etc)
• The influence of popular culture (e.g. gaming, fiction) on students’ learning and/or
teaching practice
• Creative pedagogies for teaching ancient war/peace
• Diversifying voices/sources/themes for teaching ancient war/peace
• Relating ancient war/peace teaching to modern contexts (challenges and opportunities)
• Future goals for teaching ancient warfare and peace differently (desirable learning
outcomes, assignment/assessment opportunities, skill-building, interdisciplinarity…)
• Future challenges for teaching ancient warfare and peace differently (training
requirements, resource needs etc, assessment issues, etc…)
For further information about the project, please see here.