This article argues that the integration of local history and geography through collaborative digital mapping can lead to greater interest in civic participation by early adolescent learners. In the study, twenty-nine middle school students were asked to research, represent, and discuss local urban sites of historical significance on an…

Recent innovations in Web-based technology tools have made planning instruction with technology in mind far more doable than in years past. To aid teachers in planning with technology, tools are organized into five broad categories: communication, collaboration, presentation, organization and critical-thinking. The purpose and potential of each…

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 of "History Assessments of Thinking" (HATs). As we created HATs, we sought to gather information about their cognitive validity,…

In this qualitative research project, I investigated curricular decision making and the relationship among teacher philosophies, textbook materials, and classroom practice. Participants included 5 experienced 5th-grade teachers who used a comprehensive social studies textbook package, "History Alive! America's Past". Information was…

The school field trip has a long history in American public education. For decades, students have piled into yellow buses to visit a variety of cultural institutions, including art, natural history, and science museums, as well as theaters, zoos, and historical sites. Schools gladly endured the expense and disruption of providing field trips…

Pupils' attribution of significance to sensitive "heritage" of slavery may differ, particularly in multicultural classrooms. Little is known about the ways in which pupils establish a relationship with the present when discussing the significance of heritage of slavery. Starting from theories of historical significance and identity,…

This paper is the synthesis of Elizabeth Henke's four years of work from 2009-2013: three years at the high school and one year at the University for Peace. She summarizes, "A Montessori high school education should reveal to the adolescent a pathway to peace that is built on positive human relations and should provide opportunities for…

History learning is many times considered dull and demotivating by young students. Probably this is due because the learning process is disconnected from these students' reality and experience. One possible way to overcome this state of matters is to use technology like mobile devices with georeferencing software and local history and heritage…

There are so many aspects to teaching history that are vital to creating well-rounded historical thinkers, but one of the most fundamental and most overlooked elements is the idea of causality. Far too many students do not understand the idea of causation, that there are multiple reasons for why historical events occurred and transpired in the way…

Discussions about school curriculum today are framed by this binary--the intellectual desire to explore various pedagogical approaches and the imperative to teach to the test to achieve quantitative results. For history teachers, the freedom to not teach to the test opens many possibilities: veering away from the textbook to focus on works by many…

This article presents problems and possibilities associated with incorporating into history teaching a digital demographic database made for professional historians. We detect and discuss the outcome of how students in Swedish upper secondary schools respond to a teaching approach involving digitized registers comprising 19th century individuals…

Teaching her Key Stage 3 students in Essex, Catherine McCrory was struck by the stark contrast between their enthusiasm for studying diverse histories of Africa and the Americas and their reluctance to engage with certain groups deemed different within England. Inspired by the resources in the local Record Office and keen to implement the part of…

Members of a large, cross-Canada research project on using Canadian social justice literature in the classroom share strategies that teachers are using to teach some of these texts. Strategies range from multi-media projects to song adaptations. Texts and strategies suitable for different grade-levels are represented, and cover a range of…

Mary Brown recognised that her A-level students were finding extended writing difficult, particularly in terms of guiding the reader through the argument with appropriate "signposting". To help her students manage this, Brown devised a metaphor to represent the construction of a piece of argumentative writing which she deployed over a…

Recent reports on the media saturation experienced by the twenty-first century student have brought about an increased interest in focusing attention on the issue of visual literacy in today's schools. Concepts such as instructional personalization, where approaches to curriculum design and instruction are created to concentrate on the…