The previous vignettes describe a few of the many good practices for teaching and learning in history and social science. By engaging students in the acquisition of skills and methods of learning, study, reasoning, and expression through concentration on important subject- matter content, teachers lead them to become knowledgeable in history, geography, economics, and civics and government.
The goal of a history and social science curriculum is to enable students by systematic study to acquire the knowledge, skill, and judgment to continue to learn for themselves; to participate intelligently, justly, and responsibly in civic life, and in deliberation about local, national, and international issues; and to avail themselves of historical and cultural resources historic sites, museums, parks, libraries, multimedia information sources wherever they may live or travel.
A sound curriculum taught by good teachers in well-managed classrooms gives students the opportunity to understand themselves and others in time and place. In their course of study through the school years, students learn to read, listen, write, frame relevant questions and reasoned arguments, engage in discussion and debate, conduct research, and interpret and present evidence and data.
By becoming skillful and competent in history and social science, students come to understand the foundations, principles, and institutional practices of the United States as a representative democracy and a constitutional republic. They learn traditions and ideals of other nations and cultures. They learn how different people, in many circumstances, used their intelligence and the resources available to them to establish and sustain ways of life for themselves and their posterity.
By learning how others have discovered, identified, and tried to contend with questions of human affairs in their time and place, students have the chance to understand them, to see matters from their points of view. With such insight and understanding, students can conduct their own lives and further learning thoughtfully, knowledgeably, and with the consideration for others that marks responsible citizens.
History and social science should be studied by every student every year.
Learning history and social science takes time. Students should be introduced to these subjects early in their schooling, when they are learning to read and write. Elementary school pupils can begin to learn historical content through exposure to the drama of the past; they can become familiar with the settings in which history has unfolded; they can learn something of economics by studying history and geography; and they can learn stories and form habits suited to citizenship. Middle school students can learn more about reasoning logically as they study history and social science in greater detail. High school students can then undertake increasingly sophisticated study and interpretation. Study of history and social science can improve job opportunities, encourage civic participation, and enrich private life.
Course content in each grade span and grade level should be developmentally appropriate, increasing in complexity as students learn and mature. Important topics, texts, and documents should be restudied at several grade levels. Students should, for example, study the United States Constitution several times during their school years, each time achieving deeper understanding by considering, through reading, writing, and discussion, progressively more demanding questions.
Guiding Principle Two
PreK-12 instruction in history and social science is made coherent by teachers from all grade levels working together to achieve a properly sequenced course of study. Such a sequence prevents major gaps and needless repetitions.
Thus, every school district should provide time and resources for the needed collaboration, including partnerships with local college and university faculty members. Guiding Principle Three
An effective history and social science curriculum emphasizes learning through the study of United States and world history, geography, economics, and civics and government.
Students need to learn of events, ideas, individuals, groups, ideals, dreams, and limitations that have shaped our country and the world. Intellectual and political freedom, informed judgment in the present and the future, and a reliable sense of one's rights, opportunities, and responsibilities depend on such learning.
In these pursuits, students should study primary and secondary sources, learn to use electronic media and to read and interpret data, become familiar with specialized vocabulary in the subject areas, and learn to draw conclusions logically from available evidence. Asking important questions, and framing reasoned opinions and arguments based on evidence depend on regular practice of reading, writing, speaking, and listening.
Guiding Principle Four
An effective history and social science curriculum recognizes each person as an individual, encourages respect for the human and civil rights of all people, and also emphasizes students' shared heritage as citizens, residents, and future citizens of the United States.
Citizens and residents of the United States need to know its history, traditions, ideals and principles, system of government, successes and failures, and its varied regions. The curriculum should include study of the rich and diverse contributions people of many backgrounds have made to American life and institutions.
An effective history and social science curriculum embraces study of historical interactions among individuals, groups, and institutions. Through studies in geography, economics and social history, civics and government, the arts and humanities, students learn the historical explanations for differences among people in the past and today. They learn of differences in human experience and imagination among individuals and peoples. Students also learn that individuals cannot be reduced simply to members of groups and that we are all individuals whose human and civil rights deserve respect.
Guiding Principle Five
An effective curriculum in history and social science draws on and integrates several disciplines and fields of study.
The study of history, geography, economics, and government is severely incomplete without study of the fine arts, literature, religions, ethics, and developments in science, technology, and mathematics. For example, scholarship and research in many social sciences, including anthropology and archaeology, have been advanced by discoveries in biology and chemistry, and each has expanded knowledge of ancient history. Students should learn that framing and answering questions and organizing thought often require knowledge in a number of subject areas.
Because most United States institutions and ideals trace their origins through Europe, the study of Western civilization is a central feature of a history and social science curriculum. Students must also learn by the study of other civilizations that non-Western sources have made significant contributions to Western civilization, and that the history of Western civilization includes efforts to learn about non-Western cultures, peoples, institutions, and geography.
Guiding Principle Six
The historical narrative should provide the continuous setting for learning in social science, as well as the frame of reference from which teachers choose the current events and public policy issues for student study, presentations, and classroom discussion.
The deep study of history and social science can be informed and enlivened by considering current events and issues that students perceive as significant to their own lives and to the life of their society. Current events should be chosen for their significant relation to important historical themes or turning points already under study. Assignments for papers or oral presentations should enhance student understanding of the possibilities and the limits of comparing past to present and present to past.
To become well grounded in history and social science, and to continue learning for themselves long after they have finished school, students need to acquire both core knowledge and a firm grasp of reasoning and practice in inquiry and research. They must learn how to frame and test hypotheses, to distinguish logical from illogical reasoning, and to grasp the superiority of reflective thinking and evaluation over the impulsive and uninformed rush to judgment and decision.
In the course of helping students to identify, ask, and begin to answer important questions in history, geography, economics, and civics and government, knowledgeable teachers decide which specific content and skills merit greatest emphasis and practice. Teachers ought to give sustained, consistent attention to distinctions among the following: knowledge (judgment verified, proven, demonstrated, or confirmed by evidence); informed opinion (judgment supported by evidence); uninformed or mere opinion (belief without evidence); bias and prejudice (belief in spite of contravening evidence); scapegoating and stereotyping (prejudice based on radical and unfair oversimplification); open mindedness (receptiveness to new evidence); narrow mindedness (receptiveness only to evidence in favor of one's opinions, special pleading); and closed mindedness (unwillingness to seek, heed, or listen to evidence). Over time, students who have become familiar with these distinctions will learn to reflect thoughtfully and to conduct reliable research.
Good teachers explain such distinctions explicitly, as developmentally appropriate, but they illuminate them also by concentrating on the specific "how to" knowledge students need in order to understand subject matter content:
- how to understand and use maps, globes, and visual representations of quantitative data (including graphs, charts, and tables);
- how to speak and write clearly and accurately; how to understand and distinguish cause, effect, sequence, and correlation; long-term and short-term causal relations; and limitations on determining causes and effects;
how to gather, interpret, and assess evidence from multiple and sometimes conflicting sources; how to distinguish relevant evidence from irrelevant information; how to assess the applicability of different forms of analysis, such as costs and benefits, to specific cases; - how to distinguish knowledge from various forms of opinion; how to minimize avoidable error; how to identify valid and fallacious arguments; how to test hypotheses; how to identify and avoid bias and prejudice; how and how not to compare present and past and infer lessons from the past; how to distinguish sound generalizations from false oversimplifications;
- how to enter in thought and imagination the point of view of others; how to memorize with understanding rather than merely by rote [Teachers may find it useful to refer to p. 36 of the English Language Arts Curriculum Framework: "Memorizing poetry, speeches, or dialogue from plays can engage students in listening closely to the sounds and rhythmic sequences of words. Young children delight in making a poem their own by committing it to memory. Since memorization and recitation or performance require repeated reading of a poem or speech, these techniques can often help older students find layers of meaning that they might not discover in a single reading. As many adults know, the poems, songs, and speeches learned in the classroom often last in memory long after they graduate." The same points hold for history, social science, and other subject areas.];
- how to distinguish intentions and intended consequences of action from unanticipated and unpredicted effects; how to recognize and appreciate the force of accident, confusion, oversight, error, and unreason in human affairs;
- how to pay sufficient heed to the limits of our understanding and knowledge in matters of great complexity without underestimating the extent to which we may come to know, or at least to reach, judgments supported by evidence.
"How to" knowledge cannot be acquired in a vacuum divorced from subject matter content. Skills must be learned through the detailed study of subject matter. A map has to be a map of someplace, whether real or fictional. An hypothesis is intended to explain specific phenomena. The limitations of our knowledge vary with the particulars of specific casesthe availability of specific artifacts, documents, and records; the survival of particular ruins; the specific technology needed to reach a particular sunken ship. The relevance of a form of analysis depends on the specific questions to be answered, just as which sources of information are useful varies with the specific subjects and issues to be addressed. Comparisons of present and past require concentration on parallel details of each.
Knowing how to frame a problem or conduct research in history and social science depends on knowing that some important facts are well establishedwhen and where certain events occurred, who was involved or affected, and other matters of consequence that students need to learn. Students must also learn proper definitions of words and concepts. This curriculum framework deliberately emphasizes both knowing "how" and knowing "that," because becoming knowledgeable and adept at learning calls for both.
Knowing when and how to apply a particular technique of research in inquiry is achieved in the course of acquiring relevant factual knowledge in the subject area. A good curriculum develops how-to knowledge hand in hand with the learning of specific and detailed subject matter content. Students who study such a curriculum come to understand enduring questions and emerging issues in history and social science in progressively greater depth. By properly designing curricula, courses, and instruction in history, social science, humanities, arts, languages, natural sciences, and mathematicsand paying heed to their integration and natural overlapteachers can lead students toward understanding of humanity and human events.
As students practice applying intellectual skills to academic content, they are positioned to discern our common humanity and our individual differences as well as the importance of individuals and associations of individuals in the drama of history. By learning the rights that governments should be designed to secureand forms of government that have trampled human rightsthey are enabled to grasp the responsibilities of citizens in exercising and protecting human and civil rights for everyone.