Worked example · History · Year 10
DCF: Data and computational thinking → Data and information literacy
A secure Year 10 response, annotated to show which success criterion each part meets. It is also your answer key. Totals: 40 people in 1921 and 27 in 1939, a fall of 32.5%. Coal mining falls from 19 (47.5%) to 5 (18.5%); out of work rises from 1 (2.5%) to 4 (14.8%). 16 people transferred out, 13 of them to England (81.3%). The key idea: the fall in mining jobs shows up less as people out of work on the street and more as people who have gone.
| Group | 1921 | 1939 |
|---|---|---|
| Coal mining | 19 | 5 |
| Other paid work | 4 | 6 |
| Out of work | 1 | 4 |
| Home duties (unpaid) | 15 | 10 |
| Retired or unable to work | 1 | 2 |
| Total | 40 | 27 |
1921, other paid work: Gwen Evans (shop), Olwen Thomas (dressmaker), Arthur Hughes (railway), Mair Rees (teacher). Out of work: Owen Rees the son (tinplate). 1939, coal mining: John Morgan, Emrys Morgan, Thomas Lewis, Frank Powell, Isaac Griffiths. Out of work: William Jenkins, Dai Thomas, Morgan Davies, George Powell.
Every person is in exactly one group, the rules are applied the same way in both years (a miner who is out of work counts as out of work), and the totals check against the lists. Evidences criterion 1.
| Group | 1921 % | 1939 % |
|---|---|---|
| Coal mining | 19 ÷ 40 = 47.5 | 5 ÷ 27 = 18.5 |
| Other paid work | 4 ÷ 40 = 10.0 | 6 ÷ 27 = 22.2 |
| Out of work | 1 ÷ 40 = 2.5 | 4 ÷ 27 = 14.8 |
| Home duties (unpaid) | 15 ÷ 40 = 37.5 | 10 ÷ 27 = 37.0 |
| Retired or unable to work | 1 ÷ 40 = 2.5 | 2 ÷ 27 = 7.4 |
| Percentage change, 1921 to 1939 | (27 − 40) ÷ 40 × 100 = −32.5% | |
Percentages are correct to 1 decimal place and each year adds up to 100%. Percentages are used, not raw numbers, because the two years have different totals. The chart has a title, a labelled axis, a key, and the bars for each group side by side so the change is easy to see. Evidences criterion 2.
(a) 16 people transferred out. 13 went to England: 5 to Slough, 3 to London, 3 to Coventry, 1 to Oxford and 1 to Dagenham. 13 ÷ 16 = 81.3%. Of the other 3, 2 went to Cardiff and 1 to Canada. Most moves happened after 1927, and the whole Price family followed Idris to Slough, which suggests people went where family had already found work.
(b) 19 of the 40 are still on the street in 1939. Of the other 21: 16 moved away (Source B), 4 died (the burials) and 1, Patrick O’Brien, is unknown because he was not a chapel member. 19 + 16 + 4 + 1 = 40.
Uses a second source to explain a change in the first, and checks that every person is accounted for. Evidences criterion 3.
| Claim | Verdict and evidence |
|---|---|
| 1. Most people were out of work by 1939. | Not supported. Only 4 of 27, 14.8%, are out of work. Even among men it is 4 of 16, 25%. But this hides the 16 people who left, many probably because there was no work. |
| 2. Coal mining stopped being the main paid work. | Supported. Mining fell from 19 people (47.5%) to 5 (18.5%). In 1939 there are 6 people in other paid work, more than the 5 in mining. |
| 3. The street lost people much faster than Wales. | Partly supported. The street fell 32.5% from 1921 to 1939; Wales fell only 2.4% from 1921 to 1931 (2,656,474 to 2,593,332). But this is not a fair comparison: different years, only people aged 14 and over on the street, and Wales includes towns that grew. It is closer to the Rhondda, where about 50,000 people left, over 30% of its 1921 population. |
Every verdict is backed by figures, and claim 3 is judged carefully: the pupil notices that the two figures do not measure the same thing. Evidences criterion 4.
(a) First, it is one street of 40 people, so it cannot represent the whole of Wales; rural Wales and the growing towns were very different. Second, there is no record of the street in the worst years of the early 1930s, because the 1931 census returns were destroyed, and by September 1939 the war was starting to create work, so the Register may make things look better than in the early 1930s. Third, the records hide some people: women’s work is mostly “home duties”, children under 14 are left out, and the chapel book misses anyone who was not a member, like Patrick O’Brien.
(b) The records show that the Depression broke the link between the community and the pit. Coal mining fell from 47.5% of people aged 14 and over in 1921 to 18.5% in 1939. The biggest effect was not people out of work on the street, only 14.8%, but people leaving: the street shrank by 32.5%, and 13 of the 16 who moved went to England, mostly to new factory towns such as Slough. However, this is one invented street, so it illustrates the pattern rather than proving it for Wales.
89 words. The conclusion answers the question directly, uses three figures, links unemployment to emigration as the specification does, and ends with a judgement about how far the evidence goes. Evidences criteria 3 and 5.