History · Year 13

Active learning ideas

Good Friday Agreement (1998)

Active learning helps Year 13 students grasp the complexity of the Good Friday Agreement by moving beyond textbook accounts to experience the negotiations firsthand. Simulations and debates let students test compromises, while timelines and jigsaws build chronologies and policy details students often flatten into oversimplified narratives.

• National Curriculum Attainment Targets
• A-Level: History - The Troubles: Northern Ireland, 1968-1998
• A-Level: History - British-Irish Relations

• 35–50 min
• Pairs → Whole Class
• 4 activities

Activity 01

• Hexagonal Thinking
• 50 min · Small Groups

Role-Play: Negotiation Simulation

Assign roles to students as unionist leaders, Sinn Féin negotiators, UK and Irish officials, and mediators. Provide briefing sheets with party priorities. Groups negotiate compromises over two rounds, then present agreements to the class for critique.

Analyze how the multi-party negotiations leading to the Good Friday Agreement succeeded in overcoming decades of violent conflict in Northern Ireland.

Facilitation Tip

In the Role-Play: Negotiation Simulation, assign roles at least two days before so students can research their positions and prepare talking points linked to real historical documents.

What to look for

Pose the question: 'Was the Good Friday Agreement a definitive resolution to the Troubles or a pragmatic truce?' Facilitate a class debate where students must use specific clauses of the Agreement and historical evidence to support their arguments, representing different stakeholder perspectives.

• Analyze
• Evaluate
• Create
• Self-Awareness
• Relationship Skills

Activity 02

• Jigsaw
• 45 min · Small Groups

Jigsaw: Key Compromises

Divide class into expert groups on power-sharing, decommissioning, and cross-border bodies. Each group analyzes sources and prepares teaching points. Experts then regroup to teach peers and assess overall viability.

Explain the key constitutional compromises embedded in the Agreement,power-sharing, decommissioning, cross-border bodies,and why they proved acceptable to all parties.

Facilitation Tip

During the Jigsaw: Key Compromises, use a numbered heads together structure so every group member knows the same compromise well enough to teach it to peers.

What to look for

Provide students with a short excerpt from a speech by a key negotiator (e.g., John Hume, David Trimble, Tony Blair). Ask them to identify one constitutional compromise mentioned or implied in the speech and explain its significance for achieving peace.

• Understand
• Analyze
• Evaluate
• Relationship Skills
• Self-Management

Activity 03

• Formal Debate
• 40 min · Whole Class

Formal Debate: Resolution or Management?

Split class into two teams to argue if the Agreement resolved Troubles' causes or merely managed them. Provide evidence packs. Teams prepare, debate with timed rebuttals, and vote on persuasiveness.

Evaluate the extent to which the Good Friday Agreement resolved the underlying causes of the Troubles or merely provided a framework for managing them.

Facilitation Tip

For the Debate: Resolution or Management?, provide a shared evidence bank and require students to cite specific clauses or events when making arguments.

What to look for

Present students with a list of key terms (e.g., power-sharing, decommissioning, cross-border bodies). Ask them to match each term with its definition and then write one sentence explaining how that term contributed to the success or challenges of the Good Friday Agreement.

• Analyze
• Evaluate
• Create
• Self-Management
• Decision-Making

Activity 04

• Hexagonal Thinking
• 35 min · Pairs

Timeline Stations: Pre- and Post-Agreement

Set up stations with sources on 1990s peace process milestones and 2000s implementation challenges. Pairs rotate, noting continuities and changes, then create a class timeline.

Analyze how the multi-party negotiations leading to the Good Friday Agreement succeeded in overcoming decades of violent conflict in Northern Ireland.

Facilitation Tip

At Timeline Stations: Pre- and Post-Agreement, rotate groups every 8 minutes and give each station a one-sentence summary prompt to focus observations.

What to look for

Pose the question: 'Was the Good Friday Agreement a definitive resolution to the Troubles or a pragmatic truce?' Facilitate a class debate where students must use specific clauses of the Agreement and historical evidence to support their arguments, representing different stakeholder perspectives.

• Analyze
• Evaluate
• Create
• Self-Awareness
• Relationship Skills

A few notes on teaching this unit

Experienced teachers approach this topic by treating it as a case study in negotiated governance rather than a triumphalist history. They avoid framing the Agreement as a single leader’s victory, and instead emphasize interdependence between parties, institutions, and external mediators. Research shows that when students role-play multiple stakeholders, they better recall how power-sharing, decommissioning, and cross-border bodies fit together and where tensions remained.

Successful learning looks like students confidently explaining why the Agreement succeeded where earlier efforts failed, identifying trade-offs in its compromises, and evaluating its lasting impact on Northern Ireland’s politics and society. Evidence should come from primary sources, role-play reflections, and timeline connections.

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Watch Out for These Misconceptions

• During the Role-Play: Negotiation Simulation, watch for students who assume the Agreement ended violence immediately.

  Use the simulation debrief to highlight persistent violence by tracking real events like Omagh 1998 or IRA decommissioning delays, which groups then plot on their timelines.

• During the Role-Play: Negotiation Simulation, watch for students who credit Tony Blair alone with the Agreement.

  Assign roles that include Irish Taoiseach Bertie Ahern, US Senator George Mitchell, and Sinn Féin leader Gerry Adams to spotlight shared credit and interdependence.

• During the Debate: Resolution or Management?, watch for students who claim the Agreement fully resolved sectarian divisions.

  Require each debater to cite post-1998 flashpoints like flag protests or Brexit border concerns, making the debate hinge on evidence rather than assumptions.

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Methods used in this brief

• Hexagonal Thinking
• Jigsaw
• Formal Debate