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The standard response of any historian in almost every case is: it's not that simple. The challenge, of course, is the tension between exploring questions to their full complexity and ambiguity on the one hand and the fact that we know that you [teachers] only have one period ... and have a lot of things to cover. That's a really hard thing to reconcile. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article explores how history teachers can more productively teach students how to engage with primary resources. It discusses the importance that primary resources hold in history education and examines how pre-service teachers can better familiarize themselves with effective methods for training students how to use these documents. It explores how historians engage with primary resources and offers a methodology for teaching primary resources in a year-long middle or high school level history course.

In the article the author discusses how Wikipedia works and how teachers can effectively use it in the classroom. The main problem with electronic encyclopedias is with the accuracy of the information. Since Wikipedia is maintained by volunteers rather than by qualified historians, the information can sometimes be inaccurate. The article notes that since Wikipedia use has greatly increased and has seen increased use by scholars and teachers, history teachers should find ways to use it in the classroom. The author describes the benefit of having students prepare and submit articles to Wikipedia.

This article discusses the importance of reading effectively and knowing how nominal groups function in history discussions to understanding history in school. The use of nouns and nominal groups in history textbooks is examined to show how they can be confusing in history discussions, especially for those learning the English language and students with limited experience in the use of academic language. The author explains how she found that students reading history textbooks need to understand how historians construct the historical accounts in order to learn properly.

The article explores how history teachers can teach history using the experiences of the unimportant or ordinary people of the past despite the paucity of records left by ordinary people. It emphasizes the importance for teachers to cope with the shortage of writings from ordinary people when teaching history in order for students to know that history was not made solely by people in power. Information is presented on the efforts of historians to produce works highlighting the concerns of the common people. It suggests investigating the findings of social histories written recently to be able to examine previously unused primary sources.