Can teaching schoolchildren about Britain’s role in the transatlantic slave trade remain optional?

Britain’s transatlantic enslavement of Africans and much of its imperial history sits as non-statutory content in the national curriculum in England. Photograph: Kath Viala

I often think back to my years as a secondary school history teacher, and to what I was and wasn’t able to teach. History is a foundational subject in England, taught to children from the age of five to 14 to build critical thinking, weigh evidence and help pupils understand the world they’ve inherited.

The key stage 3 national curriculum, covering ages 11 to 14, states that pupils should understand how “Britain has influenced and been influenced by the wider world”, including a historically grounded understanding of empire.