Offers criteria for an ideal history course from a student's point of view. Teacher preparation, use of primary source materials, simulations, and other involving methods are recommended. While validating these recommendations, a teacher responds that inadequate content preparation, heavy teaching loads, and increasing bureaucracy may mitigate…

Using the National History Day theme for 1985, "Conflicts and Compromises in History," this article provides basic information about the history day program, four sample forms to aid high school teachers in submitting projects, and guidelines on how students should develop their projects. (JDH)

The assumption that European dominion was uninterrupted is an error of perspective. Europe did have its eras of world leadership and world dominion. But in-between were longer periods when other peoples in other parts of the earth exercised skills and organized collective effort far more successfully than the Europeans. (RM)

Oral history was used extensively in writing a history of the Missouri School of Mines, now the University of Missouri-Rolla. The project is described. The process used in selecting candidates for interviews and the interview techniques are discussed. (RM)

Describes the equipment and classroom procedures used for conducting teleconferences. Provides examples of high school students' teleconferences with historians and political representatives. (JDH)

Provides a detailed description of nine ERIC resources designed to aid instruction about China. Included are teaching units, collections of activities, and teacher background material developed between 1981 and 1984 for use in elementary and secondary school settings. (JDH)

Describes the instructional materials used in a sophomore literature course to deal with the topic of possible nuclear destruction, including John Hersey's "Hiroshima"; photographs of Hiroshima and Nagasaki; Carl Sagan's "Cosmos"; and specially prepared handouts and worksheets. (LAL)

A computer program has been developed in which students explore problems, invent solutions, and search for supporting data. The nine units of "Historian" are each built around a major historical problem or question related to United States history. The structure of the program and its use by students are described. (JN)

Described is a unit that is an example of how a traditional subject in Canadian history, the Rebellions of 1837, can meet the social and emotional needs, as well as the intellectual needs, of students. In the unit, adolescent students are compared to "adolescent Canada" of the 1830s. (RM)

The teaching of history in school can be justified only if what is taught offers its recipients an introduction to historical thinking. This article attempts to identify briefly some of the more important elements in historical thinking, and to consider their implications for school teaching. (Editor/RK)

Offering maps and geographic routes for 28 books, this guide illustrates how to teach students in grades 9-12 with literary maps, taking them on a journey through real and imaginary terrains. Entries span a range of genres and literary formats, including novels, dramas, and diaries. Each follows a book's protagonist through space and time,…

Cognitive studies researcher, Samuel Wineburg, has conducted empirical studies over the past decade to compare the way historians think about primary and secondary sources with the thinking processes of high school students and teachers. Wineburg's research demonstrates the importance of domain-based or subject-specific thinking in the teaching…

"How Students Learn: History in the Classroom" builds on the discoveries detailed in the best-selling "How People Learn." Now these findings are presented in a way that teachers can use immediately, to revitalize their work in the classroom for even greater effectiveness. The book explores the importance of balancing students' knowledge of…

With respect to the execution of the work, it has been the aim of the Author to present a perspicuous view of the events of French history, from the very commencement of the nation down to the present time, avoiding as far as possible the dryness of an epitome, and presenting something more than a chronicle of mere facts and dates. An attempt has…

Methods that one junior high teacher uses in his history classes to encourage students to view more critically the history-based commercial films they encounter at the movies and on television away from school are discussed. (SM)