The power of democracy is its adaptability to a changing world. We can envision and work toward a society that is more just than the present. History education is more relevant now than ever. We offer ideas and strategies that can transform the history classroom into a space for understanding the past with the explicit purpose of learning from the…

This qualitative case study sought to analyze and describe both the quantity and quality of African American history curriculum integration into Virginia's U.S. History curriculum standards at three points in time (2008 standards, 2015 standards, and revised 2020 standards) in the three U.S. history courses (USI, 5th; USII, 6th; VUS; 11th).…

By some estimates, over 1.2 billion tons of soil was blown across the Great Plains during the height of the Dust Bowl. The so-called "black blizzards" these massive dust storms caused suffocated cattle, sickened children, and destroyed thousands of family farms. Formerly prosperous farmers, unsure why they had such bad luck, wondered if…

Teaching with primary sources provides educators with opportunities to expose students to authentic analysis, critical thinking, and perspective taking. When students are exposed to primary sources in the classroom, they can examine the point of view of the source, what information they can gain from the source, what information is missing, and…

The later part of the nineteenth century through the early twentieth century has many monikers in U.S. history textbooks, such as the "Gilded Age," the "Progressive Era," and the "Second Industrial Age." What it is rarely called, but should be known as, is the "Nadir of Race Relations." One topic in this…

In this article, the authors focus on a one-week research project examining Frederick Douglass's civic actions to challenge racial discrimination African Americans faced before and after the U.S. Civil War. Our one-week research project was implemented at a free public charter school in amid-sized Southern city. Our project connects to the…

A current topic in U.S. public schools is teaching issues of racial discrimination in American history. There are those motivated by political gain for elected office that are trying to shut down conversations about slavery and Jim Crow segregation laws in K-12 schools while others point out the central role that race has played in U.S. history…

Neil Bates and Robert Bowry have chosen to tackle the issue of curriculum coherence by including local history, both as starting point for new students joining the school in Year 7 and as a golden thread running throughout their Key Stage 3 curriculum. In this article they explain the rationale for their plans, focusing not only on the powerful…

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…

Shifting to an inquiry-based practice can be challenging. How should teachers get started? How many times should teachers plan for inquiry? What do teachers do when students struggle with inquiry? How long does it take for students to buy in to the inquiry process? These kinds of questions, and the concerns that underlie them, can create an…

Making a passionate case for teaching Black British history in the secondary school curriculum, Hannah shares here the personal journey she has travelled in planning for Black British history in her curriculum. She cites her inspirations and offers striking examples to illustrate her rationale and approach to teaching this history. Hannah…

Dissatisfied by her previous enquiries on medieval kingship and inspired by Helen Castor's "She-Wolves," Elizabeth Carr sought to incorporate the stories of powerful medieval women such as Empress Matilda and Eleanor of Aquitaine into her Key Stage 3 curriculum. Carr used these stories to highlight to her pupils the crucial substantive…

Social studies teachers have to design classroom instruction to prepare students to be future democratic citizens. This means that middle school students need learning opportunities to grapple with issues of racism in our country's past and present. In this article, I discuss a six-day research project implemented in a sixth-grade U.S. history…

This article details how a team of fourth-grade teachers in Rockingham County, Virginia used the Inquiry Design Model (IDM) to deepen student understanding of Barbara Johns and the Moton Student Strike's fight for racial justice in Virginia and to reframe their overall approach to Black history in general. Although Rockingham County Schools are…

In this article, Sohyun An presents a lesson that she was invited to teach at an elementary school in Georgia for the celebration of Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) Heritage Month. As a social studies teacher educator and mother of Asian American children attending the school, she has worked with some of the teachers to advance critical…