Civic education historically has focused primarily on preparing students to influence politics and government policy. Less attention has been paid to the curricular implications of civil society, even though it is a crucial site for deliberatively informed action and one of the primary ways in which students will enter the public sphere. This…

There is growing momentum in teacher education to organize the preparation of teachers around "core practices." Advocates call for identifying discipline-oriented, research-based teaching moves associated with student learning and then shifting teacher education pedagogies and programs toward preparing beginning teachers to implement…

Authentic pedagogy is a complex enterprise for students and teachers. Planning and developing the instructional procedures and scaffolds for student success is daunting. In addition, the teacher implementing the lesson makes dozens of quick decisions as they attend to student thinking and decide how to respond. These spontaneous decisions can have…

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…

This study examines teachers' justifications for addressing unplanned controversial issues in the classroom. It builds on the premise that controversial issues arise unexpectedly in the classroom context and that some teachers actively choose to address such issues rather than avoid them. Through a series of semi-structured interviews with…

Quality civic education is often understood as involving discussions of controversial social and political issues, a task made more difficult for teachers amidst the kind of political polarization that characterizes the current political climate. This study explores high school social studies teachers' thinking and sensemaking related to…

This mixed-methods study explored the factors secondary history teachers use to determine historical content for their classrooms and the degree of perceived control in decision-making.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…

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…

The author looks at subject-field disputes about what to teach in the field of social studies in the U.S. He identifies the selection of subject matter to teach as a first source of conflict about the field's nature given the scope of history, geography, and other social sciences. The author argues that disagreements about what and how to…

To be an informed citizen in today's information-rich environment, individuals must be able to evaluate information they encounter on the Internet. However, teachers currently have limited options if they want to assess students' evaluations of digital content. In response, we created a range of short tasks that assess students' "civic online…

The protests against the Budget Repair Bill in Wisconsin during the spring of 2011 provide a powerful moment in which to examine social studies teachers' curricular, pedagogic, and personal political decisions in the context of a local, controversial current event. We engaged 7 middle and high school social studies teachers from small and large,…

This study examines how teachers in 4 urban newcomer high schools conceptualized and implemented social studies education for Latino/a newcomer youth through an emerging framework of culturally and linguistically relevant citizenship education. Through a multi-site, collective case study design, the perspectives and decision making of social…

Although primary source accounts provide students with direct access to the experiences of historical participants, they can reinforce the dominant culture historical narrative if misrepresented by teachers, curriculum publishers, or scholars. The author demonstrates the importance of adhering to guidelines presented by critical Indigenous…

Historical empathy scholarship has evolved to the point where further progress necessitates empirical examinations from a variety of perspectives. Prior studies on historical empathy have largely focused on teachers' pedagogical approach and student outcomes. This qualitative study focuses on students as they engage in the process of historical…

This study addresses the question: Do second-grade students from low- socioeconomic-status (SES) schools taught with an iteratively designed project-based approach to social studies and content literacy instruction: (a) make statistically significant gains on standards-based social studies and content area literacy assessments, and (b) reach a…