History GCSE Medicine Edexcel KT2 L5 Care Renaissance c1500–1700 (Fully Resourced).
This fully resourced lesson examines who provided medical care in the Renaissance and how hospitals changed after the dissolution of the monasteries. No textbook required.

Lesson content (step by step):

Do Now / 5-a-day starter: retrieval quiz on Renaissance developments so far, e.g. Paracelsus and iatrochemistry, common preventions, role of apothecaries. Students correct in full sentences.

Source starter: civic record on the re-endowment of St Bartholomew’s, Bethlehem and St Thomas’ hospitals to the City of London after the Dissolution. Prompt questions ask: What impact might this have on care and hospitals?

Reading and information input: teacher-led overview of the range of medical practitioners:

Physicians – still university-trained, but now required to be licensed.

Apothecaries – still preparing and selling remedies, often without formal training.

Barber-surgeons – basic surgery and external treatments.

Hospitals – increasingly secular, focusing on caring for the sick rather than only prayer.

Home care – women in the household still providing the majority of everyday treatment.

Comparison grid: students complete a structured table, recording for each type of care: Role, access, cost, how much had changed since medieval times.

Focused hospital task: detailed study of St Bartholomew’s Hospital — its re-foundation, charitable funding, and provision of treatment as well as shelter. Pupils evaluate how far this represented real progress.

Exam practice: 16-mark essay scaffold: “Hospital care had changed dramatically in the years c1500–1700 compared with c1250–1500. How far do you agree?”

Planning grid provided (agree/disagree factors).

Structure guidance (Intro – PEEL x3 – Conclusion).

Sentence starters and SPaG checklist included.

Plenary historian interpretation: Carole Rawcliffe’s claim that hospitals by the late 1500s had moved from being refuges for the poor to institutions giving genuine treatment. Students write a short response with evidence.