| National Standards
for History:
Part Two Chapter
One
|
|
Questions Concerning These Standards
|
|
Q: Do these Standards
require that each era be taught at all three levels, grades 5-6, 7-8, and
9-12?
A: No. The local school curriculum
will determine when an era is to be taught, whether at grades 5-6, 7-8,
and/or 9-12. Once that curriculum decision is made, teachers can enter
these standards to determine which ones are appropriate for their students,
and how the standards they select are related to others within a well-articulated
curriculum in history, grades 5-12.
|
|
Q: Are high school teachers expected to teach all standards identified as appropriate for grades 9-12?
A: No. These standards assume
that schools will devote three years of study to United States History
and three years of study to World History sometime between grades 5 and
12. Therefore, an era will probably be studied in some depth during at
least one earlier school year (e.g., grade 8). In that case, the more numerous
standards deemed appropriate for grades 9-12 will, in part, have already
been addressed in an earlier grade, and the emphasis can be turned in the
high school U.S. or World History course to those standards judged not
to be appropriate for the earlier grades. Again, these are matters of well-designed,
articulated curriculum planning, within the jurisdiction of local schools.
|
|
Q: Does the thinking skill identified in a particular elaborated standard limit
teachers to drawing upon that one skill?
A: No. Decidedly not. Each
elaborated standard highlights one important thinking skill. However, it
is understood that good teaching will incorporate several, or even many,
thinking skills to develop these understandings. In fact, as students’
historical knowledge deepens, they will draw on a widening range of skills.
|
| Q: Do these standards limit
the instructional approaches teachers might adopt to develop these outcomes
with students?
A: No. These standards are
intended to open possibilities, not to limit teachers’ options for engaging
students in lively activities within what has been called the “thinking
curriculum.” To take one example from U.S. history, “Compare the arguments
advanced by defenders and opponents of the new imperial policy on the traditional
rights of English people,” can be developed through any of a number of
teaching approaches. For example, students might*:
Create a chart listing
the competing arguments in two parallel columns.
Assume the roles of defenders
and opponents of England’s imperial policy and debate the issue whether
England was right in developing its policy.
Write “Letters to the Editor”
for a July 1775 issue of their classroom newspaper, the Boston Liberator,
in which the editorial page is devoted to assessing opposing views on England’s
imperial policy in the context of the mounting crisis.
Create a historical argument
in the form of an essay, speech before the English Parliament, or an editorial
in which they confront the opposing views on England’s imperial policy
and justify the position they judge warranted by the data.
An example from world history
further illustrates a variety of instructional approaches that can be used
for the 4th elaborated standard for Era 3, Standard 2A: “Describe the changing
political institutions of Athens in the 6th and 5th centuries BCE, and
analyze the influence of political thought on public life,” can be developed
through any number of teaching approaches. For example, teachers might
select one episode from the time of the Persian Wars when Athens faced
invasion (480 BCE) and the Assembly voted upon a bill proposed by the Athenian
general Themistocles for the defense of Athens. In this case, students
might*:
Recount or create
a flow chart of the procedure for passing a bill in 5th-century BCE Athens.
Prepare a speech such as
Themistocles might have delivered before the Athenian Assembly setting
forth the plans for the evacuation and defense of Athens, and conduct a
mock session of the Assembly to debate the proposal.
Consider the roles of people
from different classes in Athenian society such as women, children, the
elders, landowning males under the age of 50, slaves, and those who had
been ostracized or disenfranchised. Analyze who was allowed to participate
in the democratic process under Athenian law at this time, and how each
group would be affected by the Assembly’s decision on the proposed evacuation.
|
| Q: Won’t
the elaborated standards each require a separate lesson or sequence of
lessons, and doesn’t the total teaching load therefore far exceed the total
number of teaching days available, even over three years of instruction?
A: No. Good teaching, it
should be emphasized, will often develop two or more of these elaborated
standards in a single lesson or sequence of lessons. These standards are
intended to signify desired outcomes of instruction and not to prescribe
a particular teaching plan. Teachers will creatively design their own instructional
plans, integrating related understandings in a variety of ways to accomplish
these ends.
For example, in the teaching
approaches just considered-creating a flow chart, conducting a mock meeting
of the Athenian Assembly, and analyzing potential political roles of people
from different classes of Athenian society-the first and second activities
contribute directly to achieving the first of the five elaborated standards
and the third activity contributes directly to achieving three of them:
the first (describing the changing political institutions of Athens and
the influence of political thought on
public life); the fourth
(explaining class divisions of Greek society and the social and political
roles of major classes); and the fifth (analyzing the place of women in
Athenian society). Teachers seeking to make the most of their instructional
time will therefore probably select the third activity over the least productive
activity of creating a flow chart, and thereby hit the proverbial two-or
three!-birds with a single stone. |
| Q: Why are famous figures
from U.S. and world history such as Robert E. Lee or Wilbur and Orville
Wright seldom mentioned by name in the standards?
A: The standards are neither
a curriculum nor a textbook where these names, and hundreds of others,
will undoubtedly be mentioned and elaborated upon. Rather, the standards,
which are curricular guidelines, direct teachers’ attention to broad historical
developments. For example, students should understand “how political, military
and diplomatic leadership affected the outcome of the Civil War.” In acquiring
this understanding, students will find names such as Robert E. Lee, George
McClelland, Ulysses S. Grant and many others, in textbooks and other sources. |
|
|
|
