Early in the COVID-19 pandemic, historians -- along with archivists and other stakeholders -- began to initiate digital memory banks, inviting members of the public to upload personal stories, pictures, videos, or other material connected to the pandemic and its impact on everyday life. This article describes how platforms from Western and Central…

In November of 2016, Laurent Dubois discussed the importance of Haiti in writing the history of slavery, freedom, and human rights in the Atlantic World during the Age of Revolutions for Aeon. He explained that histories of modern political thought and culture underestimated the Haitian Revolution due to the lack of written sources by the enslaved…

After reflecting on the difference between his study of source extracts at university and how he was using source extracts in the classroom, Jonathan Sellin went in search of a new way to help his pupils to situate sources in context. Finding inspiration in the work of intellectual historian Quentin Skinner, Sellin decided to show his Year 9…

Sam Pullan explains how a chance encounter has helped him to improve his introduction to the modern themes and founding documents of US politics. Working with a professional historian whom he met, by chance, over dinner, he was able to produce lessons at the cutting edge of subject knowledge to grab the attention of his Year 11 pupils. This…

Digital technologies have expanded access to a wealth of resources stored in archives. But authenticating, describing, and indexing these resources requires painstaking work. Most cultural institutions (e.g., museums and libraries) lack the financial resources and workforce to optimize searchability and readability of digitized records, which…

Analytical reading and writing are embedded in a disciplinary approach to history instruction and present opportunities to extend students' literacy practices. U.S. educators and researchers have come to rely on the Document-Based Question (DBQ) to assess and develop students' historical knowledge and argument writing. However, this task has been…

Struck by his GCSE students' bewildered expressions when studying source extracts, Liam McDonnell decided to adopt a new approach to source analysis. Inspired by the work of other history teachers, McDonnell decided to use an anthology of substantial sources when studying nineteenth-century Whitechapel in London. By revisiting the sources at…

History as a subject area is facing increasing demands from the society to be more profitable and, sometimes, more conformist. The Tuning methodology, developed in cooperation with a large number of Universities worldwide, could offer a viable and sustainable way to take societal needs into account without compromising academic soundness.

In this article, questions of public education in both environmental issues and science, more broadly, are examined in an effort to respond to Richard Aldrich's call for historians of education to use their skills and understanding both to inform the present and to shape a more enlightened future. In particular, the lives and work of three women…

Frustrated that her A-level students were being overly dismissive when asked to judge the convincingness of academic historians' arguments, Paula Worth drew on previous history-teacher research and theories of history for inspiration. After noting that her students would unjustly reject esteemed historians' accounts for lack of comprehensiveness,…

Lots has been written in recent years about how history teachers can bring academic scholarship into the classroom. This article takes this interest in academic practice a step further, examining how pupils can engage directly with the kinds of sources to which historians are increasingly turning their attention: the 'everyday' objects of ordinary…

The U.S.-based American Historical Association (AHA), the largest -- and most influential -- professional organization for historians, was the first disciplinary society in the world to lead a Tuning project, launching its work in 2012. This essay analyzes a survey distributed to historians on campuses that have taken part in the AHA Tuning…

Young children can engage in close reading, critical thinking, and historical thinking when age-appropriate texts are coupled with discipline-specific tasks. Prior knowledge is an impediment, though. Primary elementary learners simply do not have much of a historical schema. Because of primary elementary students' familiarity with Thanksgiving,…

The National Curriculum for History in England (DfE (Department for Education). [2013]. 'The National Curriculum for England, History Programmes of Study: Key Stages 1 and 2'. https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_-_History.pdf, 1) states that the purpose of studying history is to inspire pupils' curiosity, to 'ask…

Intrigued by the wide range of pupils' responses to a sourcebased essay question, Jonathan Sellin decided to investigate why pupils were using sources in such different ways. Probing his own philosophical assumptions about history, and how they have changed over time, prompted Sellin to explore pupils' assumptions about how historians use sources…