Questioning and preparation for teachers of history

When history education researchers discuss historical inquiry they describe a process of asking questions about and investigating human experience using skills and concepts from history and the social sciences. Classroom teachers often see inquiry quite differently. As noted in Teaching History for the Common Good, purpose has a great deal to do with how (or whether) teachers implement practices as challenging as historical inquiry. Purpose alone, however, cannot prepare a teacher to conduct instructional practices for which their own experience as learners has ill-prepared them. Questioning, for instance, is an often over-looked feature of historical inquiry. Too often teachers do not see questions as opportunities to engage students in reflective, disciplined inquiry—using historical skills and concepts to build a deeper understanding of the world or encourage civic engagement. Rather, their purposes focus more on motivating students to learn content covered on a test. As a result, teachers tend to be less interested in students building evidence-based interpretations than in whether students got the “right” answer for a test. Drawing on a number of studies that examine this and other challenges involved in formulating questions that motivate and sustain historical inquiry, this paper argues that teachers must themselves learn skills, concepts and content so deeply that inquiry initiated by historically compelling questions becomes normal practice

Theory and Research for Developing Learning Systems

When history education researchers discuss historical inquiry they describe a process of asking questions about and investigating human experience using skills and concepts from history and the social sciences. Classroom teachers often see inquiry quite differently. As noted in Teaching History for the Common Good, purpose has a great deal to do with how (or whether) teachers implement practices as challenging as historical inquiry. Purpose alone, however, cannot prepare a teacher to conduct instructional practices for which their own experience as learners has ill-prepared them. Questioning, for instance, is an often over-looked feature of historical inquiry. Too often teachers do not see questions as opportunities to engage students in reflective, disciplined inquiry-using historical skills and concepts to build a deeper understanding of the world or encourage civic engagement. Rather, their purposes focus more on motivating students to learn content covered on a test. As a result, teachers tend to be less interested in students building evidence-based interpretations than in whether students got the "right" answer for a test. Drawing on a number of studies that examine this and other challenges involved in formulating questions that motivate and sustain historical inquiry, this paper argues that teachers must themselves learn skills, concepts and content so deeply that inquiry initiated by historically compelling questions becomes normal practice

Agency and Identity : How Research Informs Teaching for the Common Good

As argued in Teaching History for the Common Good, the measure of a democratic society lies in the degree to which its members learn to exercise individual and collective agency in informed, intelligent, and humane ways and to demand the same from national and global institutions. One way in which teaching history can advance democratic aims involves the exploration of the historical roots of democratic dilemmas with particular attention to analyzing the differential agency available to individuals, groups and institutions in responding to such dilemmas. This paper draws on an on-going research project to explore the ways in which personal and aspirational identities support students’ deeper engagement with history. Students’ more nuanced understandings of how the past influenced the present led to interest in and concern for the power citizens have to shape those influences.Presentations in Hiroshima and Tokyo, Japan May 27-June 3, 201

Camera! Action! Collaborate with Digital Moviemaking

Broadly defined, digital moviemaking integrates a variety of media (images, sound, text, video, narration) to communicate with an audience. There is near-ubiquitous access to the necessary software (MovieMaker and iMovie are bundled free with their respective operating systems) and hardware (computers with Internet access, digital cameras, etc.). This easy access, along with the open-ended nature of digital movies, presents powerful opportunities to design student-centered, inquiry-based history projects. Engaging students as digital directors can not only help them develop historical questions and select and evaluate sources relevant to those questions, but can frame (literally and figuratively) and present historical interpretations. In this article, the authors discuss how they examined the impact of this kind of experience on children\u27s historical thinking and learning through a digital moviemaking project in a fifth grade social studies classroom. In this project, much of the content learning and narrative construction took place prior to working with the technology. On the other hand, the technology did seem to shape students\u27 use of sources in interesting ways. One unanticipated outcome of this project was that all the students in the class were able to participate in meaningful ways. Lessons learned during the implementation of this project, challenges for the educator, and concerns that surfaced along the way are also discussed

Fanny Copeland and the geographical imagination

Raised in Scotland, married and divorced in the English south, an adopted Slovene, Fanny Copeland (1872 – 1970) occupied the intersection of a number of complex spatial and temporal conjunctures. A Slavophile, she played a part in the formation of what subsequently became the Kingdom of Yugoslavia that emerged from the First World War. Living in Ljubljana, she facilitated the first ‘foreign visit’ (in 1932) of the newly formed Le Play Society (a precursor of the Institute of British Geographers) and guided its studies of Solčava (a then ‘remote’ Alpine valley system) which, led by Dudley Stamp and commended by Halford Mackinder, were subsequently hailed as a model for regional studies elsewhere. Arrested by the Gestapo and interned in Italy during the Second World War, she eventually returned to a socialist Yugoslavia, a celebrated figure. An accomplished musician, linguist, and mountaineer, she became an authority on (and populist for) the Julian Alps and was instrumental in the establishment of the Triglav National Park. Copeland’s role as participant observer (and protagonist) enriches our understanding of the particularities of her time and place and illuminates some inter-war relationships within G/geography, inside and outside the academy, suggesting their relative autonomy in the production of geographical knowledge

Handbook of Research in Social Studies Education

This handbook outlines the current state of research in social studies education-a complex,dynamic.vii,402 hal ;,24c