One approach that I have definitely embraced is to allow students to explore the meanings of concepts before presenting them with labels, i.e. formal definitions curated or generated by me.
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Category: Uncovering History
I’ve been thinking a lot more about archives over the past year. This may appear odd, given my investment in historical study. In my study and practice as high school history educator engaged with academic history, however, discussions around archives separate how academic historians—producers of historical knowledge—and history teachers and students—consumers of historical knowledge view […]
Oops! I inadvertently posted this lesson plan as blog post. Click here for this slow motion DBQ, and here for other lessons.
Students used multiple sources to draw defensible conclusions about the plague
After introducing students to the historical processes around understanding plague pandemics yesterday, I guided my classes through primary sources on the Black Death in Europe and the Middle East today. This is such a work in progress that I added documents as the day went on. Like yesterday I used Slides with Pear Deck for […]
Stenka Razin Sailing in the Caspian Sea, Vasily Surikov, 1906Stepan, aka Stenka, Razin led a 17th century attack on outposts of the Russian state, and it looks different from the vantage point of Moscow or the Caspian sea. I’m currently reading about rebels and pirates in Qing China, and Razin was both. This “rebellion” began as maritime […]
Practicing the historical thinking skill of corroboration
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Bring On History Fest!
As the people who read my tweets and my family know, I am very excited for Minnesota’s first annual History Fest on August 9th. It promises discussion of historical thinking and opportunities for collaboration, the two main streams of my professional growth this decade. Keynote speaker Bruce Lesh’s book Why Won’t You Just Tell Us the Answer? […]
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DBQs for everyone
In a decade of teaching AP History, first Euro and now World, I have developed an appreciation for the Document-based question. Students will ultimately forget many of the historical facts that we cover in AP History. The skills developed practicing and writing DBQ should be much more durable and transferable, because students practice in my […]
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New Year, New Rubric
Just in time for the 2014-15 school year I’m rolling out Rubric 2.0: Historical Thinking. In collaboration with colleagues in my school distict and in my twitter-based PLN, I plan to do action research with this rubric this year. Three of the five lines are the same from last year’s Rubric 1.2: Writing with Evidence. Adding “Corroboration” […]