As a new history teacher, one of my main goals is to prepare my students to be citizens in a democratic society, a natural component of that is civic engagement. There are those out there that lament the lack of school instruction in civics, and have attributed our apathetic voting population to this dearth in our curriculum. (We have to blame teachers and schools for something right?) States, organizations, and teachers have been fighting the good fight to bring civics back to our students, a return the time when more than half a credit was required to graduate. I applaud their efforts and while some of those programs such as "We the People" look incredible, I am realistic in that I assume I will not have that type of curriculum at my disposal. So this got me thinking about what the every day teacher can do in their classroom to encourage civic engagement.
A little reading of Dewey brought me straight back to our original education roots (I am talking as far back as Plato) where citizenship has always been a component and at times a foundation of education. In the reading, certain things struck me, for example, Dewey stated that a goal of education should be to conduct education so that humanity may improve. Therefore, education is the social process that prepares students for the world around them; prepares them to see, react, feel, improve, change or support, whichever the situation requires (inherent in this statement is the necessity to teach them to read the situation as well). But it was this portion that got my wheels spinning so much I burned the rubber around my brain, "The conception of education as a social process and function has no definite meaning until we define the kind of society we have in mind."
The kind of society we have in mind... what kind of society do I have in mind? I have examples, the one in which I live in now where the focus is on the individual, or maybe one like Japan, where the focus is on the whole. In one country as far as civic engagement is concerned, the voter turnout ends up around 40% and the other ends up somewhere around 80%. From a social studies teacher who wants to create good citizens I think, "oh wow! What is Japan doing in their schools to to promote this type of civic engagement?! And what does that society look like culturally?" If the Japanese, are 'Japan' focused, what type of things are they voting for? Do they have controversial, time-changing issues on their ballots? Do they have a diverse population of candidates with an array of diverse issues to bring with them? I don't know. So what about the opposite, a society that places emphasis on the individual, a diverse society where politics is inherently controversial? This type of society created a unique bill of rights, celebrating the individual, which was replicated world wide.
I know this seems like a lot of rambling, but at the heart of my rambling, is how and why to teach civics in my classroom? How do you define civics first? Civics education will presumably be defined by the current society in which we live in, but can't the goal or underlying purpose of civics education be to transform that society, or improve it where necessary?
Tuesday, March 20, 2012
Tuesday, February 21, 2012
Take Back the Power!
In a class discussion tonight about current events, media literacy and teaching with and for newspapers in a history classroom, I was struck by how little this seemed to be occurring in an average classroom. This obviously led to a discussion of the challenges that using a newspaper in a classroom poses, for instance, it might require too much background information or context (the assumption being our students lacked this quality), where to and how to place it within the curriculum framework, the time it would take to implement this type of learning, how to choose and what to choose when it comes to newspaper articles, and how to teach about the media (just to name a few). However, when I personally sat down to think about this I was struck by an entirely different question, "why should I teach with and/or for newspapers in the first place?" I basically return again to my essential question in history, what are my goals?
There are multiple objectives to support the teaching with and for newspapers in the classroom: content, skills such as reading, and identifying bias. But I return to my current overarching goal for teaching history, the creation of an informed democratic citizen and I use this same goal to justify the use and teaching of newspapers in my own classroom. If I can begin with my students at a younger age, middle school say, and at least introduce them to newspapers on a routine basis then I am one step closer to achieving my ultimate goal in history education. Newspapers are a conduit of fact, opinion, and debate in this country; they inform decisions from a community level to a national level. A good citizen reads, understands and agrees with or disagrees with an article in a newspaper; a person interacts and engages with newspapers and at the same time participates in the broader democratic community. By encouraging, teaching and hopefully instilling a student's ability and desire to engage with newspapers, I am supporting my broader goal of creating an informed democratic citizen. Start small, begin with teaching them to read and comprehend an article, slowly build up to the more higher order skill of critically reading and analyzing. Over time this scaffolding approach will reach all of the goals previously stated regarding the use of newspapers in the classroom.
If you ask a 9th grader studying world history why people will start a revolution for independence, they will say things like, "they wanted freedoms." Push those same kids a little further to identify those freedoms and the first response, is always, "freedom of the press." Our students know how important something so basic as a newspaper is to democracy, shouldn't we model an exercise of one of the most revered rights? Show our students how important a newspaper can be and use it in our history classrooms for all the things that it is, and it is not.
There are multiple objectives to support the teaching with and for newspapers in the classroom: content, skills such as reading, and identifying bias. But I return to my current overarching goal for teaching history, the creation of an informed democratic citizen and I use this same goal to justify the use and teaching of newspapers in my own classroom. If I can begin with my students at a younger age, middle school say, and at least introduce them to newspapers on a routine basis then I am one step closer to achieving my ultimate goal in history education. Newspapers are a conduit of fact, opinion, and debate in this country; they inform decisions from a community level to a national level. A good citizen reads, understands and agrees with or disagrees with an article in a newspaper; a person interacts and engages with newspapers and at the same time participates in the broader democratic community. By encouraging, teaching and hopefully instilling a student's ability and desire to engage with newspapers, I am supporting my broader goal of creating an informed democratic citizen. Start small, begin with teaching them to read and comprehend an article, slowly build up to the more higher order skill of critically reading and analyzing. Over time this scaffolding approach will reach all of the goals previously stated regarding the use of newspapers in the classroom.
If you ask a 9th grader studying world history why people will start a revolution for independence, they will say things like, "they wanted freedoms." Push those same kids a little further to identify those freedoms and the first response, is always, "freedom of the press." Our students know how important something so basic as a newspaper is to democracy, shouldn't we model an exercise of one of the most revered rights? Show our students how important a newspaper can be and use it in our history classrooms for all the things that it is, and it is not.
Tuesday, February 7, 2012
Learning about your past, is learning history
We have all heard that kids do not know anything about history, after my own observation experiences I too came away with that same feeling; it is discouraging, especially for history dorks like myself! After reading some of "Teaching History for the Common Good" (Keith Barton & Linda Levstik), I feel much better about that blanket statement in knowing that it is not entirely true. The various accounts of elementary and middle school students, and the phone interviews with adults even, show that kids and adults alike know a lot about history. They could point to major turning points or defining moments in American History, they understood various pieces of history, albeit the pieces taught as integral to American identity but nonetheless events of historical significance such as the Revolutionary War, the Civil War, the Civil Rights movement. Those are important moments in history, they certainly do not encompass everything as a teacher and historian I think they should know or I want them to know, but it is a start and it is a start that I can feel good about.
So good, kids are learning history, however that is not the portion of this reading that got me really thinking. The most compelling part of these history studies and data gathering discussing what people know or do not know about history, was how emotional and excited everyone got when discussing their past, their own history. This got me thinking, do historians have it wrong? Have we too narrowly defined what history is? Isn't everyone's past, family history, personal stories, a piece of the broader history narrative? If our past and our own history is something people can cling to and connect with, then that is what we should be teaching. As a teacher, we should not be relegating the creation of family trees, coat of arms, interviewing our relatives, and learning about where we came from and who we are to lower grades. Exploration of personal history should occur at every level in every grade. After all, the older we get the more we care about the past; we get further and further from something and that innate human instinct takes over compelling us to hold on to something, to anything. As a high school history teacher, I want to tap into that, use it to motivate my students early, relate to them and find something about them somewhere in history that I can use to teach them about history.
I know the first argument against this, "we do not have time," "there are standards and tests to teach to!" I get it, but we all know that the first couple of weeks of school make or break the year, establishing routine, classroom structure and environment, outlining classroom management is vital to our success further down the road. Use studying personal past as a way to get to know your students, break down the impersonal history wall right from the start, send your students the message that you care about where they come from and who they are from the day they walk into your class! After all, ensuring that our students know that we care about them is one of those necessary components of a successful classroom.
This week I learned that learning about your past is learning history. Barton and Levstik have a very clear idea as to what the goal of history education is, "its contribution to democratic life."I think at this point in my education, the goal of history in my classrooms, is to get my students to care about the past. To do this, I will start by learning about their past.
So good, kids are learning history, however that is not the portion of this reading that got me really thinking. The most compelling part of these history studies and data gathering discussing what people know or do not know about history, was how emotional and excited everyone got when discussing their past, their own history. This got me thinking, do historians have it wrong? Have we too narrowly defined what history is? Isn't everyone's past, family history, personal stories, a piece of the broader history narrative? If our past and our own history is something people can cling to and connect with, then that is what we should be teaching. As a teacher, we should not be relegating the creation of family trees, coat of arms, interviewing our relatives, and learning about where we came from and who we are to lower grades. Exploration of personal history should occur at every level in every grade. After all, the older we get the more we care about the past; we get further and further from something and that innate human instinct takes over compelling us to hold on to something, to anything. As a high school history teacher, I want to tap into that, use it to motivate my students early, relate to them and find something about them somewhere in history that I can use to teach them about history.
I know the first argument against this, "we do not have time," "there are standards and tests to teach to!" I get it, but we all know that the first couple of weeks of school make or break the year, establishing routine, classroom structure and environment, outlining classroom management is vital to our success further down the road. Use studying personal past as a way to get to know your students, break down the impersonal history wall right from the start, send your students the message that you care about where they come from and who they are from the day they walk into your class! After all, ensuring that our students know that we care about them is one of those necessary components of a successful classroom.
This week I learned that learning about your past is learning history. Barton and Levstik have a very clear idea as to what the goal of history education is, "its contribution to democratic life."I think at this point in my education, the goal of history in my classrooms, is to get my students to care about the past. To do this, I will start by learning about their past.
Essential Question
While trying to think of a clever essential question to ponder deeply over and over again, I came up with nothing. Let's face it, I am not the most witty of historians. But I did keep returning to a question that my answer seems to change daily to, "What is the goal of social studies or history education?" As I continue my studies, work in the classroom and my adventures in blogging, I will return to this question. I think being able to answer my goal of social studies or history education is, is crucial to my classroom.
Tuesday, January 24, 2012
Whose History?
"Whose History?" by Linda Symcox is a historical account of creating and implementing national standards in American Classrooms. Before I even began reading this narrative, I had not been able to fully establish my own idea or opinion as it relates to national standards. Should we have national standards? If so, who should create them and how should they be created? As I sat down to read this book, I had hoped that some of my questions would be answered, or at least I could get somewhat of a grip on my own attitudes towards this topic. I was incorrect.
What struck me as most fascinating about this entire hotly debated, political issue, was the latent hypocrisy beneath the entire standards movement. Politics aside, there is overwhelming support for the creation or the necessity for national standards regardless of what form this comes in. If this were not true, so many efforts throughout the years would not have been funded and attempted at creating a national standard. The consensus on the need for standards is inevitably trumped by individual's political opinions most starkly apparent with Lynne Cheney and her sudden transformation against the 1994 Standards Project. It just seems odd to me that people could want something so badly and in the end fall victim to political pollution, paralyzing something that is so fundamental to what everyone agrees is necessary in education.
When I was thinking specifically about National History Standards I could not help but find myself laughing while reading this account. The more recent conservatives were concerned about downplaying the success of the white majority male in the account of our incredible American Democracy, in attempt to paint a picture of one similar journey through American History. Even within the current democratic debate surrounding the standards, and even deeper within their own political camp, there is not one American view or unified voice, so how on earth could this be true of our entire American History?!
I set out to figure out this whole standards thing, shockingly, I do not have an answer! I suppose that if I did then I would be the new Crabtree or Nash solving our public education woes with the wave of my elm, Phoenix feather core, wand! Unfortunately for all of us, I am not a witch and magic is not going to cure the current ills of the National Standards debate. Our only hope then, remains in the democratic process we in history hold so dear to our hearts.
What struck me as most fascinating about this entire hotly debated, political issue, was the latent hypocrisy beneath the entire standards movement. Politics aside, there is overwhelming support for the creation or the necessity for national standards regardless of what form this comes in. If this were not true, so many efforts throughout the years would not have been funded and attempted at creating a national standard. The consensus on the need for standards is inevitably trumped by individual's political opinions most starkly apparent with Lynne Cheney and her sudden transformation against the 1994 Standards Project. It just seems odd to me that people could want something so badly and in the end fall victim to political pollution, paralyzing something that is so fundamental to what everyone agrees is necessary in education.
When I was thinking specifically about National History Standards I could not help but find myself laughing while reading this account. The more recent conservatives were concerned about downplaying the success of the white majority male in the account of our incredible American Democracy, in attempt to paint a picture of one similar journey through American History. Even within the current democratic debate surrounding the standards, and even deeper within their own political camp, there is not one American view or unified voice, so how on earth could this be true of our entire American History?!
I set out to figure out this whole standards thing, shockingly, I do not have an answer! I suppose that if I did then I would be the new Crabtree or Nash solving our public education woes with the wave of my elm, Phoenix feather core, wand! Unfortunately for all of us, I am not a witch and magic is not going to cure the current ills of the National Standards debate. Our only hope then, remains in the democratic process we in history hold so dear to our hearts.
Thursday, January 19, 2012
Welcome
Welcome to my blog! Just a little information about me to begin, I am a student at GWU getting my Masters in Education to become a 6-12 Social Studies teacher. The posts and comments made by me are my opinion and my own representations and do not represent the view of the University or the program. Feel free to agree or strongly disagree, I look forward to your thoughtful comments!
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