New IB DP History Guide: Exciting dilemmas

Teachers are redesigning history courses just as students decide which IB Individuals and Societies courses to select. The changes to the Subject Guide are an added twist for experienced IB History teachers. Redesign requires careful consideration of content, concepts, and skills. The new course guide offers greater flexibility and opportunities to develop deeper understanding. This blank canvas can be exciting. It can also be daunting.

How can teachers make the “just right” choices?

Create throughlines and themes

Weaving a throughline into your course using chronology or themes helps students build schemas for understanding continuity, change, context, and significance.

In this approach, a teacher could design their course to pair Focused Study 1 - Independence and Identity in Kenya and Haiti (Paper 1) - with a Thematic Study like Conflict (Paper 2). This approach helps students deepen their understanding by exploring ways in which identities can lead to conflict, as well as ways in which conflict can contribute to changing identities.

Check out Pearson’s new Independence and Identity and Conflict titles as possible resources.

Design inquiry cycles with greater flexibility, greater depth

The new Guide – with first assessments in 2028 – offers greater flexibility because it values depth of historical inquiry over quantity of content coverage.

This responsive change from the IB comes after feedback from history teachers who were faced with daunting amounts of content knowledge that often sacrificed meaningful inquiry-based teaching in favor of content coverage.

Course redesign means breaking bad habits of coverage in order to embed true IB inquiry cycles.

For instance, many schools have long taught Authoritarian States (20th Century). Many examiners have remarked about the percentage of Paper 2 essays that traditionally feature analysis of Adolf Hitler and Nazi Germany.

Rather than retreading legacy units, the new course reenvisions a unit called Authoritarian Rule (1750 to present). This is an invitation for teachers to reframe and deepen inquiry by moving beyond authoritarian rule = dictators to consider other models such as military juntas, colonial authoritarianism, and independence leaders. This approach raises complex questions about whether authoritarian states can be benevolent.

In the new course, teachers could develop a common class inquiry highlighting the rule and policies of Mao Zedong and Deng Xiaoping in China. A second inquiry cycle could invite small groups of students to investigate German imperial rule in Namibia, Fidel Castro in Cuba, and Sukarno in the Dutch East Indies.

Check out what's covered in the new Pearson History for the IB Diploma Programme student book series.

Assessments are not a course

Building true inquiry cycles is a reminder that assessments are not a curriculum. Course redesign is an opportunity to move beyond mindsets like, “I’m teaching Paper 2 right now.”

There is a real temptation to teach Papers 1, 2, and 3 in that order. Prioritising test prep rather than content, concepts, and skills can be attractive, especially if teachers are short on planning time. It is also a missed opportunity.

For example, analysing sources – a Paper 1 skill – can be taught and reviewed even while teaching Paper 2 and Paper 3 content. Retraining workshops, professional networks, and the months between now and first teaching in August 2026 provide an opportunity for intentional design that might mean papers are taught out of numerical order. The key question: is it a purposeful decision meant to invite learners to deeper understanding of historical thinking?

Assessments are a key part of measuring success; but assessments are not the course. Year 1 IB DP History is a time to develop historical thinking, connections to Theory of Knowledge (TOK), and historical debates. As you move through Year 2, then test-taking strategies might take a greater priority. Designing an intentional progression is key to developing the well-rounded IB learners who will be the globally-minded ethical leaders of the future.

Above is an example Skills box in Pearson’s Authoritarian Rule book. This can be used to teach or review skills assessed on Paper 1 while teaching Paper 2 content.

In conclusion

The new IB DP History Subject Guide offers greater flexibility and opportunities to develop historical thinking skills. The blank canvas can be exciting or daunting. This blog highlights considerations that can be part of intentional course redesign.

It is also a reminder that there are fantastic resources to help design the “just right” course for students at your school.

Further reading

Learn more about the new History for the IB Diploma Programme resources from Pearson.