Search

This study explores how the ideology of racial individualism—which prioritizes an understanding of racism as individual wrongdoing—becomes embedded in the curriculum and discourse of the middle school social studies classroom and becomes embedded in the curriculum and discourse of the middle school social studies classroom to shape the racial socialization of students shapes the racial socialization of students. I provide a case study of one teacher's combined English and U.S. History class, drawing on data from classroom observations, teacher interviews, student work, and classroom artifacts. The analysis shows how racial individualism was the dominant narrative to frame racism from the colonial period to the present day. I argue that this racial ideology reproduces white racial innocence, including the innocence of individual white people in creating and participating in racist systems and the innocence of the United States as a white nation. Moreover, I show how racial individualism allows white students to appear as anti-racists while creating unsafe conditions for Students of Color to engage in honest dialogue about race. The study thus advances existing scholarship on color evasion in education by illuminating how young adolescents negotiate racial individualism in their everyday classroom interactions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using discourse analysis, this article traces the persistence of eugenic ideology through the narrative structures of world history in the California Department of Education's history/social science K-12 framework. This article excavates the hidden depths at which scientific racism has become embedded into the curriculum and asks, "How do eugenic beliefs continue to shape world history in schools?" Analysis revealed the persistence of eugenic beliefs in how civilization, modernity, reason, and intelligence are articulated and circulated across grades six, seven and ten. This study's application of discourse analysis serves as a useful tool in continuing to improve curricular frameworks beyond static narratives that reproduce outdated ideologies of race and human development. The study directs social studies education toward helping students confront history's scientific overlaps with eugenics, as well as recognizing how eugenic ideology persists today. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study is an exploration of how U.S. middle school students interacted with different topics in world history, and how their specific understandings of topics were connected to both sociocultural and instructional contexts. I observed two world history classrooms in a Midwestern Catholic school for 10 months and conducted task-based group interviews on 6 topics with 66 students. Findings indicate that students interacted differently with different topics, and their understandings of the given topics aligned with prior conceptions, situated in their sociocultural contexts, and teacher instruction in a complicated process. At times, the teachers' instruction accommodated students' prior conceptions, strengthening their misunderstandings. Certain instructional strategies also evoked students' awareness of their current contextual values, such as democracy, human rights, and nonviolence, hindering them from rationally understanding different contexts in history. There were times, however, when the teachers' intentional instruction overshadowed prevailing discourses, allowing students to successfully construct new understandings. From these findings, I argue that to be prepared for the world of their future, U.S. students need to go beyond the parameters of their sociocultural contexts and develop a comprehensive understanding, both nationally and globally, of the world. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article engages with three commonly traversed social studies topics—depictions of violence and death from the French Revolution, during the Vietnam War, and regarding U.S. histories of racial segregation—through the lens of Achille Mbembe's necropolitics (i.e., political and social machinations of power that determine who lives and who dies). In particular, this article theorizes how specific necropolitical concepts (e.g., necropower, the living dead, and slow death) can be a generative and powerful form of analysis for social studies educators and their students that exposes intersecting complexities between life, death, political alliance, and power. While this article argues that social studies curriculum is replete with undertheorized moments of death and underutilized opportunities to engage with death, this scholarship is guided by the questions: "What place is given to life, death, and the human body (in particular the wounded or slain body)? How are they inscribed in the order of power?" The overall aim of a necropolitical engagement is to foster a deeper understanding of why/how death continues to disproportionately come into being again and again for specific, targeted peoples. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article presents a critical analysis of moral judgment in history education using the case of Cecil Rhodes as an example. For this purpose, I first examine the arguments for and against passing judgment on past actions given by historians, historical philosophers, and history education researchers. Second, I take a close look at the ways students approach moral issues in history and identify the shortcomings in these approaches. Then, I propose three cognitive acts students must perform to fully understand their historical positionality as a moral evaluator: (1) distinguishing between moral values and factual beliefs, (2) examining the consensual statuses of moral values and factual beliefs, and (3) evaluating the reliability of one's own belief-forming processes. These cognitive acts, though mentioned in the literature in various contexts, have not been systematically analyzed in relation to moral judgment in history education. In the end, I argue that by performing such acts, students will be able to triangulate their position as a moral evaluator relative to the historical actor and his or her contemporaries and understand the epistemic status of their moral judgment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since the early 2000s, the use of the term presentism has rapidly increased in both the historical discipline and public discussions of history. Most recently, presentism has been widely discussed and debated in articles about the pulling down and defacement of statues in countries around the world inspired by the 2020 Black Lives Matter protests. Many of these discussions reveal a lack of clarity and understanding about presentism's complex nature. Given how important this concept is to the historical discipline, and how often the term is being used in academic, political, and cultural discourses, we believe presentism warrants further attention and discussion from history educators. This article aims to rethink the place of presentism in history education by considering how historians define and categorize common types of presentism, examining key arguments for and against presentism, and analyzing how history educators have approached it. We conclude by making the case that presentism is a necessary and potentially productive concept for history education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Becoming activists for racial justice: A renewed purpose for learning about the past in K-12 education: Teaching history for justice: Centering activism in students' study of the past, by Christopher C. Martell and Kaylene Stevens, New York, Teachers College Press, 2021, 176 pp., $34.95 (paperback), ISBN: 9780807764756 Finally, Martell and Stevens's book incorporates real world examples of teachers who have successfully engaged in the work of teaching history for justice, a beneficial inclusion for teachers new to this pedagogical approach. Martell and Stevens's book would be a powerful read for both preservice and in-service teachers in elementary and secondary education. [Extracted from the article]

This article discusses the false dichotomy between criticality and historical inquiry. We argue that adding "critical" to "historical inquiry" can be interpreted as something distinct, instead of integral, to historical inquiry. It can normalize the idea that historical thinking is not critical, which, in turn, upholds the illusion that historical inquiry research is not inherently ideological or political. It inadvertently reifies a false dichotomy that silos historical inquiry scholarship into two camps: one that is deemed political because it directly engages in criticality and another that is deemed apolitical because it claims objectivity. We make three assertions: historical inquiry is already critical; history education research and critical scholarship share common commitments; and historical thinking should embrace the tension and other forms of knowledge as necessary to developing as a field. We conceptualize this tension as a space of possibility that repairs the marginalization of and centers Black, Indigenous, Latinx, and Asian American knowledge. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We live in an era of rapid technological change. Not only must citizens contend with social problems presented by new and more invasive technologies, but they must also make sense of older technologies that can be viewed as natural to the world. We sought to answer the question, how is technology included and framed in K–12 content social studies standards? Through coding, we identified 984 references where students are expected to learn about technology in the K–12 social studies standards of 10 states. Overall, the standards showed a preference for broad labels and neutral or positive framing, with technology often serving as a vehicle to explain social phenomena or economic growth. Production technologies were most frequent, but there was wide variance in the particular technologies referenced by each state. Even when technology was referenced, it often was not the primary focus of the standard's content. Standards rarely framed technology with critical perspectives for inquiry into collateral, unintended, and disproportionate effects. We draw on technology criticism to offer a technoskeptical framework that educators and scholars can use to question narratives of technological progress and encourage collateral thinking about the consequences of technologies for human societies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent theories of historical consciousness focus on the role narration plays in contemporary people's attempts to give meaning to the past and orient their practical life as citizens. This article examines the need for probing students' historical ideas and for developing narrative competence as a way to engage them critically in contested memories of the collective past so as to expand their historical consciousness beyond memory and cultural traditions. Relying on a narrative approach, this study surveyed 635 French Canadian students from different regions of Canada. Canada, a multicultural state made up of nations-within (French, English, Indigenous), represents an interesting case for studying young citizens' representations of the collective past in a highly diversified society. This study offers new results on how these learners think about national history in the 21st century, and it discusses the implications for the development of narrative competence as a way to bridge the divide between the "cultural curriculum" and "historical thinking." We argue that history educators need to take more seriously students' narrative ideas if they truly want to have a lasting impact on their historical learning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Growing polarization in European societies has changed not only political landscapes but also public debates about the past, which has, in turn, had an impact on the way history is taught and talked about in schools. This article explores how these trends are experienced by history educators across Europe and asks which issues history educators perceive to be controversial and sensitive and how they approach the prejudices they frequently encounter when addressing controversial and sensitive issues. Based on focus group discussions with 33 participants from 25 European countries, the article identifies three different forms of prejudice and describes how the focus group participants tried to undermine nationalism, counter xenophobia and fight anti-Semitism. Interpreted from a practice theory perspective, the examples shared by the focus group participants indicate that teaching strategies from the disciplinary approach "toolbox" can help to undermine nationalist stereotypical thinking if they are fine-tuned to the interests and emotions of the learning group and that history teaching routines shaped by the disciplinary approach need to be interrupted on occasion in order to reflect on and deconstruct xenophobic or anti-Semitic prejudice. Overall, the article argues that history teachers need to be aware of the affective dimension of historical learning, including underlying or open prejudices held by students, in order to support the teaching of democratic education goals such as respect and openness to cultural otherness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article reports on the impact visits to community-based museums in a divided society, Northern Ireland, had on young people's historical, political, and cultural understanding of the commemorated past. It examines the responses of two student groups, one predominantly Protestant and the other Catholic, to two museums, each presenting its own community's perspective on one contentious aspect of Derry/Londonderry's past. Data were collected through observation, focus groups, and semi-structured interviews from students, teachers, and museum staff. In the emotive environments of the two museums, findings indicated that community background remained important in shaping responses, but critical thinking allied to personal engagement with testimony and artifacts, particularly related to the recent, contentious past, was also influential. In one group, the experience was powerful in causing affective disruption, which challenged established positions, but in the other, it largely consolidated existing norms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This mixed-methods study explored the factors secondary history teachers use to determine historical content for their classrooms and the degree of perceived control in decision-making. Through a survey (N = 260) and follow-up interviews (n = 23), we found that secondary history teachers in the United States ranked historical significance most highly in their curricular decision-making, but the extent to which teachers felt they were able to exert control over curricular decisions was influenced by required assessments and other contextual factors. Nevertheless, many teachers also prioritized student interest and relevance when choosing historical content. Interviews revealed complexity in teachers' thinking and additional context-specific (dis)incentives (e.g., fear of controversy) regarding curricular choices. Implications for teacher education and policy are emphasized. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores the processes by which Chilean female feminist public high school students used political and historical narratives and symbols during the feminist movement of 2018. It analyzes how these particular usages were crossed by affective intensities that worked to produce students' political subjectivities as collective and agentic. This affective work was produced with other members of the school community and sometimes was met with anger, policing practices, and desires to exclude students from particular historical narratives. The data for this article were produced within a yearlong critical ethnographic study on the processes of production of high school feminist students' gender and political subjectivities in Chile, which included participant observation, testimonios interviews, art-based collective testimonios workshops, and analysis through affect theory. The findings show the types of historical and political narratives and symbols used by students, what affective intensities that crossed these symbols did to the students' political subjectivities, and the conflicts these intensities produced within the school community. The article concludes by examining how these findings might open new questions within the field of social studies education research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Teachers' beliefs about skills play a significant role in how they teach those skills. Similarly, students' mastery of a skill is influenced by their ideas about its value and what the performance of the skill exactly entails. In this study, 10 history teachers and 17 students in secondary school (age 16–17) were interviewed about their beliefs about historical empathy, objectives, and teaching strategies. The results show that the participants primarily saw historical empathy as a skill that can be learned. As main elements of historical empathy, they named contextualization, awareness of their own positionality, personal connection, and historical imagination. Inviting an eyewitness, visiting a historic site, and classroom discussions were considered particularly effective teaching strategies. Most teachers reported that they did not provide explicit instruction. Most teachers and students connected historical empathy to empathy in daily life. Extending this connection could be a significant way to work on citizenship competences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A recent report by the Southern Poverty Law Center revealed that many history teachers avoid or minimize conversations about race for fear they will trigger "racialized conflict." This silence should raise alarms, as we know that race and racism permeate the lived experiences of teachers and students and inevitably surface in historical discussions. In this article we use a racially charged moment from a middle school discussion of the New Deal to propose three interpretive frames that might support teachers in navigating moments of racial stress in history discussions. We understand interpretive frames to be schematic lenses that guide teacher perception, interpretation, and action in classrooms, and we propose three frames—disciplinary literacy, critical literacy, and racial literacy—that respectively address the historical, structural, and psychosocial dimensions of race and racism. We apply each frame to the classroom incident to illustrate how each might help teachers respond to moments of racial stress. Ultimately, we argue that these interpretive frames represent a suite of mutually reinforcing tools that might be leveraged by teacher educators to help teachers anticipate racial stress and turn paralysis to pedagogy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This exploratory case study examined how two teachers used a comparative approach to teach genocide histories in a Holocaust Literature elective course. Through interviews and observations, we studied how the teachers guided students in comparing genocides as well as how they used survivor testimonies in their instruction. We found that teachers engaged in three types of comparison throughout the unit under study: defining genocide as the basis of comparison, discussing similarities and differences, and expanding students' knowledge of genocide beyond the Holocaust. The teachers set up their classrooms as safe places for learning about genocide as difficult history, yet they did not shield their students from its horrors. Additionally, they encouraged their students to take action against genocide outside of the classroom. This study adds to the limited empirical research on teaching comparative genocide and has implications for curriculum design and teacher education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article, we examined how high school teachers talked about people in history lessons and how they engaged in or shunned multiperspectivity aspects as they talked about people who lived in the past. Based on an analysis of 40 hours of observations of 5 different classes in 3 Jewish high schools in Israel according to the constructive-interpretive method, we found that in most of the lessons observed, few references were made to specific individuals. At the same time, many teachers talked about people in history by referring to generic people, to general categories of people, or by using personification. Using examples, we discuss the educational significance of the different ways history teachers talk about people in history through the prism of multiperspectivity as an aim in history education. We conclude that discussing the connections between the practice of talking about people in history lessons and multiperspectivity may contribute to teachers' awareness of another way they can promote multiperspectivity in class. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study reports five Dutch expert history teachers' approaches to multiperspectivity in lessons on three topics varying in moral sensitivity (i.e., the Dutch Revolt, Slavery, and the Holocaust) and their underlying considerations for addressing subjects' perspectives in different temporal layers. The lessons were observed and videorecorded, and the teachers were interviewed. Lessons were analyzed using a theoretical framework in which three different temporal layers of perspectives were distinguished, each with its own educational function. Teachers addressed multiple temporal layers and functions of multiperspectivity in almost all of their lessons. However, teachers' focus on temporal layers and function differed between lessons. Four categories of considerations for or against introducing specific subjects' perspectives were found: functional, moral, pedagogical, and practical. Moreover, teachers engaged in "normative balancing," meaning that not all perspectives were perceived as equally valid or politically desirable, showing where multiperspectivity ends. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores the relationship between the philosophy of ethics, history education, and young people’s historical ethical judgments. In the last two decades, “ethical judgments,” which focus on making decisions about the ethics of historical actions, has been acknowledged as a second-order historical thinking concept in history education. Despite the expectation that history students should make reasoned and critically thoughtful historical ethical judgments, this aspect of history education is under-emphasized and under-theorized. In addition, the limited research available indicates that history teachers’ and students’ ethical judgments are often oversimplified because they focus on the conclusion about the rightness or wrongness of an action over the thought processes involved in arriving at a justified position. Using refugee migration as an example of historical and contemporary controversy, we consider how the philosophy of ethics could enlarge the “ethical” in ethical judgment and offer history education a rich conceptual lens through which to explore making ethical judgments in, and about, the past. We argue that the kinds of questions, concepts, and lines of argument ethicists explore could better inform students’ historical ethical judgments by illuminating the contested landscape upon which ethical judgments rest. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While the conceptual work on critical pedagogy is undeniably rich, few empirical studies have examined its applications in K-12 classroom settings and impacts on students. Based on ethnographic research in 2 public 11th grade U.S. History classrooms with critical teachers, this article describes 3 pedagogies that enhanced students’ critical consciousness and agency to act on the world: naming, questioning, and demystification. These pedagogies emerged via dialogical relations between each teacher and her particular students, in 1 particular time and place. Thus, they are not presented as models to be applied elsewhere but rather as generative examples that educators can use to consider critical pedagogy in their own contexts. In addition, the study reveals how a standards-based U.S. History curriculum—constraining though it may be—can play a role in emancipatory pedagogy. Through centering instruction on students’ immediate social realities, but tying these to historical antecedents, including histories of oppression and resistance, the teachers empowered their students to name and question contemporary hegemonic forces. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The teaching of historical time is an important aspect in elementary school curricula. This study focuses on the effects of a curriculum intervention with “Timewise,” a teaching approach developed to improve students’ understanding of historical time using timelines as a basis with which students can develop their understanding of historical phenomena and periods. The study, in which 16 teachers from grade 2 (ages 7–8) and from grade 5 (ages 10–11) participated, represents the first curriculum intervention on the understanding of historical time in elementary schools in the Netherlands. The effects were measured in a quasi-experimental pre-/post-test design. Mixed model linear analyses showed that for both grade 2 and grade 5, students in the experimental condition (N = 396) scored significantly higher on the post-test than students in the control condition (N = 392), with a medium effect size. Implications for the teaching of historical time in elementary school and in teacher training are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

History education scholars have recognized the need for test validity research in recent years and have called for empirical studies that explore how to best measure historical thinking processes. The present study was designed to help answer this call and to provide a model that others can adapt to carry this line of research forward. It employed think-aloud protocols with 12 high school history students to explore whether selected multiple-choice items from a new test of historical thinking—theHistorical Thinking Test(HTT)—elicit the intended aspects of historical thinking among high school history students and whether these new items elicit these constructs at higher rates than items from extant standardized history tests. Data revealed that HTT multiple-choice items did, to varying degrees, elicit aspects of historical thinking and that HTT items elicited the intended aspects of historical thinking at higher rates than selected multiple-choice items from extant standardized tests. Yet the HTT items also elicited construct-irrelevant reasoning, which weakens an argument for their use as measures of historical thinking. Implications for history testing and the efficacy of multiple-choice items as measures of historical thinking are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Guided by critical discourse analysis, this study analyzes how ancient civilizations are constructed in high school history textbooks used in Quebec, Canada. The findings suggest that the narrative generally ignores 2-way intercultural exchanges. The narrative is also Eurocentric, silencing sub–Saharan Africa’s contributions and nonmaterial influences of non-Western civilizations, such as ancient Near Eastern influences on the Judeo–Christian monotheistic tradition. Such depictions normalize a dominance paradigm that sanctions the supremacy of particular civilizations, religions, or groups. Students need to develop a reflective historical consciousness that is conducive to intergroup dynamics based on respect for diversity. Thus, in studying ancient civilizations, they should be encouraged to interrogate their own worldviews, explore the interdependence of human civilizations, and engage with omitted counternarratives, alternative chronologies, and periodization. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Adolescent learners stand to benefit when history teachers center their practice on investigating open-ended questions, interrogating evidence, and constructing persuasive arguments. Taking up this kind of teaching requires professional development (PD) experiences that are sustained, subject-specific, learning-focused, and collaborative and that provide participants with opportunities to try out, discuss, and rethink new teaching practices in an intellectually nourishing environment. Yet such experiences and the history teaching that demands them can be stifled by accountability mechanisms that discourage both. Using Hochberg and Desimone’s theoretical framework for PD in accountability contexts, this comparative case study addresses how 2 teachers experienced the confluence of situational factors and facilitators in their efforts to adapt and enact PD-supported history teaching practices that conflicted with high-stakes state- and district-level accountability pressures. I suggest that PD in historical investigation and interpretation must deliberately and transparently reconcile the school-contextual constraints that challenge its effectiveness on practice. Findings also underscore divergent interpretations of what ends PD in accountability contexts ought to serve and how it should serve them. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using a multiple case study design, I examine how public high school students (n = 17) make sense of narratives about defining events with which they have specific heritage connections. Focusing on 3 groups of students (Hmong, Chinese, and Jewish) studying 3 heritage events (respectively, the Vietnam War, Modern China, and the Holocaust), this article addresses the following research question: How do students in public schools construct narratives of those events with which they have aheritage connection? Findings indicate that students appreciate, benefit, and learn from the inclusion of heritage histories in their high school classrooms; they can engage in complex historical thinking about subjects that may hold heavy emotional weight; and emotion can facilitate student engagement with heritage histories. Importantly, including these histories in the official knowledge of the classroom legitimated the stories and demonstrated to the students that their own and their families’ pasts are an important part of history. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using an analytical framework based on the concept of historical distance, this article explores how Dutch history teachers and educators navigate between the past and the present when making curriculum decisions on the sensitive topic of the Transatlantic Slave Trade and Slavery. Four history teachers and 2 museum educators were selected on the criteria of ethnicity, professional context, and student audience. They were interviewed twice, using open questions and a task-based design directed at 14–15-year-old students of various cultural backgrounds. Two conclusions are drawn: (1) the curriculum decisions of the selected participants can be interpreted as configurations of historical distance, which are the result of interactions between various types of knowledge, values, and beliefs. Some participants make a distinction between their own personal distancing and the curriculum decisions they take, while others do not or are unsure about deciding, and (2) curriculum decisions are difficult to predict. Some teachers and educators have a preference for certain distancing approaches but do not always follow it, depending on the historical sources they are dealing with. The conclusion discusses how research on history teaching can be facilitated by a deeper comprehension of the decisions teachers and educators make as navigators of historical distance. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

An important goal of history education is to promote the student’s ability to perform historical perspective taking (HPT). HPT refers to the ability to understand how people in the past viewed their world at various times and in various places to explain why they did what they did. In this study, we assessed a sample of 15- and 16-year-old pre-university students (n = 170) to determine their ability to contextualize the actions of people in the past. Subsequently, we explored their reasoning (n = 36) to uncover their contextualization process. The results of this mixed methodology study indicate that most of the students in the sample performed well when engaging in HPT. Moreover, protocol analysis identified the different reasoning strategies that students employed to successfully perform HPT. The results of this study provide insight into history instruction regarding HPT and into strategies for designing valid and reliable HPT tasks. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Mendez v. Westminster, a case about 1940s Mexican American school segregation, is a new vehicle for including Mexican Americans into U.S. history classrooms. This study explores how a class of primarily Mexican American students, who because of their heritage might develop a personal connection to the case, made sense ofMendez. The findings suggest thatMendezis subsumed under the larger Black Civil Rights narrative and stripped of its unique aspects. The inclusion of Mexican Americans into the history narrative is contingent on their story being analogous to the Black experience. Consequently, students learn an oversimplified understanding of Mexican American discrimination and race/ethnicity. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article centers on a theoretical discussion of how use of history can be addressed as a distinct concept, analytically and pedagogically. The point of departure is the field of history education research in the Nordic countries where the concept has become a term to denote the space of action between historical consciousness and historical culture. The concept is introduced and the relationship between “history” and “use” is investigated further from a phenomenological perspective. Use of history is conceptualized ashow people actively use the historical culture available to them. Through communication, they explain, build, and transform identities and societies. It is also suggested that use of history is a 3rd aim for history education. In addition to supporting students’ content knowledge and abilities to think historically, this article advocates the need to identify and analyze the role and function of history in contemporary life as an aspect of learning history. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Compared to other groups of color, Asian Americans and their perspectives have rarely been given attention in curriculum studies. This article seeks to address the gap in the literature. It uses AsianCrit, a branch of critical race theory, as a theoretical lens to analyze and explicate common patterns across various states’ scripting of Asian American experience in their U.S. history standards. Informed by AsianCrit, the article describes and troubles invisibility and consequent messages about Asian Americans and their experience in the story of the United States told from state U.S. history standards. The study suggests the benefit of AsianCrit as a theoretical, methodological tool to read and disrupt racism embedded in curriculum scripting of U.S. history. The study also adds a new knowledge to the long-held scholarship on inclusion and representation of historically marginalized groups in official school knowledge. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The article reviews the website Stanford History Education Group: Charting the Future of Teaching the Past, by Stanford History Education Group, available at sheg.stanford.edu.

The history and heritage of slavery and the trans-Atlantic slave trade are sensitive topics in The Netherlands. Little is known about the ways in which students attribute significance to what is presented as heritage, particularly sensitive heritage. Using theories on historical significance, we explored how students attributed significance to the history of slavery and its remnants while engaged in a heritage project that presented this history and these remnants as Dutch heritage. Using questionnaires, interviews, group interaction, and observations, we researched 55 students at a Dutch junior high school who visited a slavery museum and the National Slavery Monument. The visit reinforced the students’ ideas that it was important to preserve the historical remnants of slavery, primarily to remember that freedom and equality have not always existed and because these remnants are important to the descendants of enslaved people. Although the students gained insight into the ways in which significance is attributed to the history of slavery, they did not come to understand the lack of awareness regarding slavery in Dutch society. Although the visit stimulated critical reflection on the interplay between understandings of significance and identity, many students linked the heritage of slavery directly to a Black ethnic identity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article considers the design process for new formative history assessments. Over the course of 3 years, my colleagues from the Stanford History Education Group and I designed, piloted, and revised dozens ofHistory Assessments of Thinking(HATs). As we created HATs, we sought to gather information about their cognitive validity, the relationship between the constructs targeted by the assessments, and the cognitive processes students used to answer them. Three case studies trace the development of different HATs through analyses of draft assessments, student responses, and think-aloud protocols. Design principles specific to formative history assessments emerged from these analyses: (1) assessments must be historically accurate, (2) assessments must target specific historical constructs, (3) assessment structure must align with targeted constructs, (4) assessments must yield useful information for teachers, and (5) pilot data are indispensable for refining HATs. These finding suggest the need for increased attention on the construction and validation of new assessment materials for the history classroom. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The ability to make connections is an important aspect of teaching history and a vital skill in our increasingly globalized world. This study examines how preservice and practicing teachers organize and connect world historical events and concepts for themselves and for instructional purposes. Findings are based on interviews with 2 card-sorting and think-aloud tasks. Analysis of card-sort maps found that participants made different kinds of connections that give insight into the types of knowledge needed for and the challenges involved with teaching world history. Participants were able to represent the most sophisticated historical processes when they discussed how to connect events to other events. All of the participants made fewer event-to-event connections in the second card-sort focused on instruction, and all but 1 changed the organizational scheme of the cards. This second finding indicates a shift in how participants represented their thinking of world history for themselves and how they might represent it for their students. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article reports on a study that repositioned elementary students in new roles as active, critical participants in historical inquiry—roles that required a more mature epistemic stance. It reports 5th-grade students’ responses to instructional methods intended to help them understand the nature of historical knowledge, appreciate the work of historians, read and reason with greater historical sophistication, and view themselves in more historian-like roles within a school setting. Questionnaires and interviews were conducted at the start and end of the school year to investigate the impact of weekly document-based lessons embedded within a relatively traditional elementary social studies curriculum. Students showed some modest yet significant differences from the start to the end of the school year in the way they viewed texts and themselves in the process of learning history. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In this study, the effects of a disciplinary reading and writing curriculum intervention with professional development are shared. We share our instructional approach and provide writing outcomes for struggling adolescent readers who read at or below basic proficiency levels, as well as writing outcomes for proficient and advanced readers. Findings indicate significant and meaningful growth of about 0.5 of 1 standard deviation in students’ abilities to write historical arguments and in the length of their essays for all participants, including struggling readers. Our study also considers teacher implementation of the curriculum intervention. We found that teachers who were most faithful to the underlying constructs of our curriculum intervention also made successful adaptations of the lesson materials. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]