The Golden Age of Celtic Scotland: The achievements of Alexander III

The achievements of Alexander III 18/6/18 AIM – Learn how to apply what we know of Alexander III’s reign to place a source excerpt in its historical context. SUCCESS CRITERIA – Be able to explain why Alexander III’s reign of Scotland has been called a ‘Golden Age’. Be able to apply what we’ve learned and use it to answer a source contextualisation question. TASKS 1. Copy today’s aim and heading into your jotter. 2. Watch Neil Oliver’s History of Scotland, episode 2, 18.49 to 22.49 as a recap of Alexander III’s achievements. 3. Through class questioning, build up a brief mind-map of Alexander III’s achievements during his reign, noting it down as a quick guide in your jotter. 4. Go through today’s handout on how to apply what we know to answering a ‘how fully question’. Your teacher will lead you through it from the Smartboard. If you have access to highlighters, use them to annotate as we go through today’s content. 5. Complete the remaining section of the specimen ‘how fully’ question using your notes on Alexander III’s reign.

The achievements of Alexander III Recap with Neil!

The achievements of Alexander III So what do we now know about Alexander III’s achievements during his reign? I’ve forgotten everything! *gasp* Make a (brief) mind map outlining what we have learned so far. Our next step today is to learn how we can put this to use.

Source Contextualisation: ‘How fully..?’ Source A is from A. MacPhee, The Scottish Wars of Independence, 1286 – 1328. During his long reign, Alexander III’s achievements included a steady increase in the kingdom’s trade and economic wealth. Other countries around the North Sea regarded Scotland as a profitable trading partner and political ally. Ships built at Inverness were used to transport crusaders to the Holy Lands. Aberdeen was an important economic hub for the North Sea and Berwick prospered due to the wool industry. On the west boast burghs such as Renfrew, Glasgow and Ayr still had important links to Ireland exporting timber, hides, wool and fish. Scottish burghs formed the economic backbone of Scotland and under Alexander’s peaceful and secure rule they continued to provide significant support to the crown. Q1. How fully does Source A show why Alexander III’s reign of Scotland has been called Scotland’s ‘Golden Age’? 10 marks

SOURCE CONTEXTUALISATION: APPROACH ‘How fully does source…?’ This will be worth 10 marks. Up to 4 marks are available for linking info in the source to the question. Up to 7 marks are available for developing source points with relevant recall / providing relevant recall that is related to the question to set the source within its historical context.

Specimen answer (10 marks) Read the question, then the source. Using the words of the question, start your answer by making your judgement on the source, e.g. ‘Source A partly describes the reasons why Alexander III’s reign of Scotland has been called its Golden Age…’ Make FOUR points from the source. For each one, either paraphrase or quote the source and then explain the significance of your point, relating it back to the question. Then include up to SEVEN points of relevant recall. Be careful to explain the significance of each point and then relate it back to the question. Best practice is to take a new paragraph for each point you make.

Finding 4 relevant points from the source: Source A is from A. MacPhee, The Scottish Wars of Independence, 1286 – 1328. During his long reign, Alexander III’s achievements included a steady increase in the kingdom’s trade and economic wealth. Other countries around the North Sea regarded Scotland as a profitable trading partner and political ally. Ships built at Inverness were used to transport crusaders to the Holy Lands. Aberdeen was an important economic hub for the North Sea and Berwick prospered due to the wool industry. On the west boast burghs such as Renfrew, Glasgow and Ayr still had important links to Ireland exporting timber, hides, wool and fish. Scottish burghs formed the economic backbone of Scotland and under Alexander’s peaceful and secure rule they continued to provide significant support to the crown. Q1. How fully does Source A show why Alexander III’s reign of Scotland has been called Scotland’s ‘Golden Age’? 10 marks Task: highlight or underline FOUR pieces of evidence in the source which relate to the question.

Finding 4 relevant points from the source: Source A is from A. MacPhee, The Scottish Wars of Independence, 1286 – 1328. During his long reign, Alexander III’s achievements included a steady increase in the kingdom’s trade and economic wealth. Other countries around the North Sea regarded Scotland as a profitable trading partner and political ally. Ships built at Inverness were used to transport crusaders to the Holy Lands. Aberdeen was an important economic hub for the North Sea and Berwick prospered due to the wool industry. On the west boast burghs such as Renfrew, Glasgow and Ayr still had important links to Ireland exporting timber, hides, wool and fish. Scottish burghs formed the economic backbone of Scotland and under Alexander’s peaceful and secure rule they continued to provide significant support to the crown. Q1. How fully does Source A show why Alexander III’s reign of Scotland has been called Scotland’s ‘Golden Age’? 10 marks

Finding 4 relevant points from the source: Source A is from A. MacPhee, The Scottish Wars of Independence, 1286 – 1328. During his long reign, Alexander III’s achievements included a steady increase in the kingdom’s trade and economic wealth. Other countries around the North Sea regarded Scotland as a profitable trading partner and political ally. Ships built at Inverness were used to transport crusaders to the Holy Lands. Aberdeen was an important economic hub for the North Sea and Berwick prospered due to the wool industry. On the west boast burghs such as Renfrew, Glasgow and Ayr still had important links to Ireland exporting timber, hides, wool and fish. Scottish burghs formed the economic backbone of Scotland and under Alexander’s peaceful and secure rule they continued to provide significant support to the crown. Q1. How fully does Source A show why Alexander III’s reign of Scotland has been called Scotland’s ‘Golden Age’? 10 marks

Finding 4 relevant points from the source: Source A is from A. MacPhee, The Scottish Wars of Independence, 1286 – 1328. During his long reign, Alexander III’s achievements included a steady increase in the kingdom’s trade and economic wealth. Other countries around the North Sea regarded Scotland as a profitable trading partner and political ally. Ships built at Inverness were used to transport crusaders to the Holy Lands. Aberdeen was an important economic hub for the North Sea and Berwick prospered due to the wool industry. On the west boast burghs such as Renfrew, Glasgow and Ayr still had important links to Ireland exporting timber, hides, wool and fish. Scottish burghs formed the economic backbone of Scotland and under Alexander’s peaceful and secure rule they continued to provide significant support to the crown. Q1. How fully does Source A show why Alexander III’s reign of Scotland has been called Scotland’s ‘Golden Age’? 10 marks

Finding 4 relevant points from the source: Source A is from A. MacPhee, The Scottish Wars of Independence, 1286 – 1328. During his long reign, Alexander III’s achievements included a steady increase in the kingdom’s trade and economic wealth. Other countries around the North Sea regarded Scotland as a profitable trading partner and political ally. Ships built at Inverness were used to transport crusaders to the Holy Lands. Aberdeen was an important economic hub for the North Sea and Berwick prospered due to the wool industry. On the west boast burghs such as Renfrew, Glasgow and Ayr still had important links to Ireland exporting timber, hides, wool and fish. Scottish burghs formed the economic backbone of Scotland and under Alexander’s peaceful and secure rule they continued to provide significant support to the crown. Q1. How fully does Source A show why Alexander III’s reign of Scotland has been called Scotland’s ‘Golden Age’? 10 marks

Use this to build Specimen answer… Source A partly describes the reasons why Alexander III’s reign of Scotland has been called its Golden Age. (Judgement made) The source tells us that ‘Alexander III’s achievements included a steady increase in the kingdom’s trade and economic wealth’. This shows one of the main successes of Alexander and why his reign has been called a ‘Golden Age’ as he made Scotland wealthy. The long period of peace under his reign allowed merchants and trade to flourish, establishing his rule as a time of prosperity for Scotland. (1st mark for source content) Key: Point from source link back to question explanation of relevance/meaning

The source also tells us that the ‘ships built at Inverness were used to transport crusaders to the Holy Lands.’ This is an example of one of the trades building prosperity for Scotland to make Alexander III’s reign a ‘Golden Age’. Not only would the shipbuilders be bringing in money and jobs to the Inverness area, they would be providing the transport for Scots to make their mark internationally by taking part in the crusades. (2nd mark for source content) The source also tells us that the ‘Berwick prospered due to the wool industry’. This contributed to Alexander’s Golden Age as it is an example of how Scottish towns and cities prospered under his rule. Berwick became the main trading port for Scottish wool exports to the continent, becoming a thriving, wealthy city. (3rd mark for source content) Key: Point from source link back to question explanation of relevance/meaning

The source also tells us that the ‘Scottish burghs formed the economic backbone of Scotland and under Alexander’s peaceful and secure rule they continued to provide significant support to the crown.’ This was a key factor in building Scotland’s prosperity to make Alexander III’s reign a ‘Golden Age’. The taxes raised in the burghs of Western Scotland paid for Alexander’s building projects across the Kingdom, helping Scotland to develop and prosper. (4th mark for source content) However the source fails to give us all of the reasons why Alexander III’s reign has been called Scotland’s ‘Golden Age’. (Judgement made again…) The source fails to tell us that Alexander invested his profits into building new castles to defend Scotland. This helped to define his reign as a ‘Golden Age’ as he was a forward-looking King who invested wisely whilst times were peaceful and prosperous to protect the kingdom against the threat of future Viking attacks upon its coastline. (5th mark, this one for ‘recall’) Key: Point from source link back to question explanation of relevance/meaning

The source fails to tell us that… Task: Complete the rest of your answer to the 10 mark ‘how fully?’ question. Use the notes you took from our last lesson on Alexander III’s golden age, along with the mind map which we broke them down into earlier this lesson. Continue your answer following the pattern we’ve established so far. Homework: Complete your answer for our next lesson on ScotWars (Friday). Bring a set of highlighters, with four different colours, to future lessons (optional, but preferred).