This chapter focuses on changes in the first century and a half or so of early medieval Britain. By the end of the period, in the middle of the seventh century, numerous kingdoms of varying size and strength can be discerned. Their violent interactions are relatively well known; the situation at the period’s outset, however, is much more obscure. In this chapter we will look at the developments in North Britain, beyond the former Roman frontier, as well as in the south, noting the many points of contact and comparison. We will also consider the practicalities of how kings established themselves by using the material and symbolic trappings of power. We will focus on religious change, as well, for this was an important era in the spread of Christianity. And we will pay particular attention to Gildas, a British writer of (probably) the sixth century whose work, while contentious and opaque in many respects, continues to be the key textual source for Britain in this period.

This chapter looks at Britain’s place within the wider world of the early Middle Ages. Contemporary views tended to place Britain on the fringes, which made its people conscious of distance and difference when dealing with the rest of Europe. At the same time, they were also often eager to demonstrate their accomplishments to their neighbours. The chapter goes on to look more specifically at major channels of communication between Britain and other areas, with particular reference to how contacts were built between regions, individuals and institutions in ways that were often personal or transitory – meaning that Britain’s international connections were in a constant state of renegotiation. These major strands of contact look west to Ireland, east to Scandinavia and south to mainland Europe.

This chapter assesses aspects of early medieval society: how people actually lived and related to one another. It begins by looking at some of the overarching schemes – kinship, lordship and rank or status – before moving on to a series of specific, representative topics, including slavery, the status of women, sex and sexuality, and law, disputing and justice. These themes emphasise the contingency of early medieval society. There were relatively few hard and fast strictures, and plenty of room for negotiation depending on circumstances. The relatively formal-seeming sources often betray a rather less formal reality.

This chapter looks at how kings and their kingdoms worked, with particular reference to the limitations as well as the strengths of early medieval government. Kings operated in similar ways across Britain, especially in cultivating a special status grounded in rights and privileges, warfare and descent. But there were also important differences between regions and kingdoms that emerged through the early Middle Ages. Some, such as England, saw kings gain considerably in material power. In others, such as the Welsh kingdoms, royal power remained more circumscribed. These shifts need to be read not only from the king’s perspective, in terms of strength or weakness, but from others’ point of view: was it always a good thing to be subject to a strong, demanding king? Did weak kingship have its own advantages for the rest of society? To focus these points, the chapter then turns to a case study of one particularly well-known king, whose reign produced many examples of energetic and highly theorized kingship: Alfred the Great.

This chapter provides an overview of content and language integrated learning as a constantly evolving approach to learning and teaching in our multilingual and multicultural classrooms. Bilingual education was described by Cazden and Snow several decades ago (1990) as a ‘simple label for a complex phenomenon’. This complexity is evidenced by the different models that bilingual education encompasses on a global scale – for example, Garcia (2009) identified at least thirty-three different designations. Moreover, given the unprecedented movement of peoples, classrooms as multilingual and multicultural spaces are changing rapidly, with resulting ‘super-diversity’, (Vertovec, 2007, p. 1024) impacting at all levels on learning practices.

This chapter turns to what life was actually like in physical terms. It looks at where people lived and how they related to the landscape around them. We will consider population and the structure of rural society in terms of units and the obligations of different kinds of people or land. We will then go on a tour of four early medieval estates recorded in contemporary documents, and end up considering the dominant, central places that structured the surrounding territory.

In today’s globalised economy, we are told that the successful transfer of knowledge is more important than ever. Economic success largely depends on the skills of so-called knowledge workers to transfer knowledge successfully through acquiring, assimilating and processing a constant stream of information in ways which are contextually relevant, meaningful and appropriate (Kale & Little, 2011; Eppler & Burkhard, 2004). Since these processes and trends not only affect an ever increasing part of the workforce but have spread pervasively across all aspects of life, it has become vital for societies to prepare all learners adequately for the challenges of living in a globalised and digitised economy of unprecedented levels of interconnectedness, and to help them become creative, responsible global citizens. However, in our current world, the chasms between societies on a global scale appear to be widening, with increasing numbers of people moving across national, cultural and social boundaries. It is therefore imperative that diversity is factored into our education approaches, not as a problem per se but as means of disrupting thinking and enriching what happens in our classrooms.

Britain in the century and a half running up to the millennium saw severe challenges, as its existing parts were conquered (or nearly so) by vikings, underwent radical internal change, or both. For these reasons the period is one of sharp contrasts. Crisis led into consolidation for two of the major powers in Britain, England and Alba, which emerged as the island’s superpowers in the tenth century. In this chapter we will look first at the vikings, who brought an important and dynamic new element to Britain when they raided, fought and settled. Subsequent sections will consider England, Alba and the Welsh kingdoms, including neighbouring units that were eventually incorporated by them, such as Strathclyde and Bamburgh.