Curricular framing of imperialism in high school World History classes often bears the marks of the Western Civilization courses that preceded them
Author: Eric Beckman
I am a veteran high school history teacher interested in decolonizing history curricula, anti-racist pedagogy, and e-learning.
My interest in assessing colonialism involves the content as much as the process. In the photograph assessment, which I am currently grading, I want students to address the racism inherent in both colonialism itself and how it is presented in textbooks. The assignment, however, raises as many issues as it closes. I am finding it much […]
Last Spring I piloted an assessment of student understanding of the “new” Imperialism in regular level World History classes with eleventh graders. Students created google slides centered on photos of imperialism. Students interpreted the photos and analyzed causation, with three slides–before, during, and after–for each photo. I modified a History Alive! World Connections lesson, and students used History […]
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White innocence and legality
History and social studies teachers should be wary of the ways that whiteness shaped and shapes who is included and who is excluded.
I’m frankly a little embarrassed as a history teacher that I was slow to take seriously the popular support for and acquiescence to the possible authoritarianism of President-Elect Trump (for more on Trump’s authoritarianism see @sarahkendzior and Brendan Nyhan). Despite extensive reading and research since I started teaching in 1990, America, its past and present, is always more racist than […]
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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? […]
UPDATE: Resources for the lesson described in this post are now on this page. For high school history teachers, comparing secondary source treatments of historical events is no longer just a good idea, it’s the law. In Minnesota that’s state social studies standard 9.4.1.2.2, benchmark: “Evaluate alternative interpretations of historical events; use historical evidence to support or refute those interpretations.” This […]
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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” […]
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Race, Space, and Privilege
Recent events have reminded me that as a white teacher engaging students in many racially tinged topics I need to foreground my own privileged social position. Part of this privilege is the possibility of dismissing race as something that happens elsewhere and to other people. My daughter just turned thirteen, and the guidance that I […]