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Historical Learning and Documentation
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From: Monica R. Edinger <edinger>
Date: Fri, 03 Jan 2003 09:36:17 -0500
I hope that the ccbcnet community will tolerate one more post on this fascinating tangent.
As some of you know I'm a 4th grade teacher with a particular interest in the learning of history. My own understanding of the process by which children build historical understandings has been evolving over the years.
A decade ago I began researching, writing, and speaking about the teaching and learning of history. For the two books I wrote on this topic, I read the work of educational researchers, philosophers, and historians. I wanted to gain a better sense of what happened developmentally as young people learned about the past. When did a sense of chronology kick in? What level of research were 10 year olds capable of doing with pleasure? What exactly was going on in terms of historical understandings when they read historical fiction? I watched my own students carefully, trying to see what was going on in their encounters with history. My own practice continually evolved as I learned more.
Ten years ago I tossed a textbook and an imposed-from-the-outside curriculum. Working with an anthropologist and archaeologist on a new curriculum, I at first focused almost exclusively on primary sources. However, as time went on I came across better and better trade books for children on the topics we were studying. While I still feel primary sources are the best thing to use when teaching history to any age group, I've become more open to well-researched secondary sources (with, indeed, back matter that tells me that the appropriate primary sources have been consulted).
Being very familiar with these topics I have been able to determine for myself if the books are relatively accurate or not. I see the documentation as being there to help me with that, not for the children at all. They haven't the slightest interest in the back matter. If I draw their attention to the bibliography to help them learn what one is, they might be intrigued to see some of the other books they have used on it. However, I can assure you, they won't look at it on their own. And I sure wouldn't harangue them to always do so. What a drag! They are brand new to historical research. Learning that there is such a thing as a bibliography, a glossary, and notes is enough. It is interesting to learn about different kinds of books. And all the different elements of a book of history. It is a start. An introduction to an ever growing sense of historical understanding. Just a beginning. For most of all, I want them to feel that delving into history is amazingly cool. That it is, yeah really!, fun. The narrative does that, not the back matter.
As for the veracity of notes, I have to agree with those who say that it is always a bit of a crap shoot. For the last couple of years I've been researching an historical event that has been written about quite extensively. I have discovered mistakes in some of the most lauded books and their notes. Some are the result of using information from primary sources without considering that there were errors in them, the result of problematic interpretation and a lack of knowledge about another continent at another time. These errors have now simply been perpetuated in books written on the topic ever since. Other errors are of geography that would mainly be familiar to someone who knew the country in question. These are the sort of mistakes that only someone who knew the topic from every side would catch. I suspect that they would be missed by many historians so vetting doesn't always do it.
I personally love notes such as Marc and Elizabeth Partridge provide, but there you are. Who are they really for? If we are honest, really honest, who reads them? The gate keepers. (And, boy, do I hate that epithet, but I guess I'm one of them.) Frankly, as Mary E. Lyons pointed out, large swatches of the intended audience of these books are not sophisticated readers, are not avidly interested in history, and are not likely to be capable (or well trained by us gate keepers) of appreciating the level of meta-cognition going on in Marc's Ralegh notes or the detail of Elizabeth's, wonderful as they are.
Monica
The Dalton School New York NY edinger at dalton.org monicaedinger at yahoo.com
Received on Fri 03 Jan 2003 08:36:17 AM CST
Date: Fri, 03 Jan 2003 09:36:17 -0500
I hope that the ccbcnet community will tolerate one more post on this fascinating tangent.
As some of you know I'm a 4th grade teacher with a particular interest in the learning of history. My own understanding of the process by which children build historical understandings has been evolving over the years.
A decade ago I began researching, writing, and speaking about the teaching and learning of history. For the two books I wrote on this topic, I read the work of educational researchers, philosophers, and historians. I wanted to gain a better sense of what happened developmentally as young people learned about the past. When did a sense of chronology kick in? What level of research were 10 year olds capable of doing with pleasure? What exactly was going on in terms of historical understandings when they read historical fiction? I watched my own students carefully, trying to see what was going on in their encounters with history. My own practice continually evolved as I learned more.
Ten years ago I tossed a textbook and an imposed-from-the-outside curriculum. Working with an anthropologist and archaeologist on a new curriculum, I at first focused almost exclusively on primary sources. However, as time went on I came across better and better trade books for children on the topics we were studying. While I still feel primary sources are the best thing to use when teaching history to any age group, I've become more open to well-researched secondary sources (with, indeed, back matter that tells me that the appropriate primary sources have been consulted).
Being very familiar with these topics I have been able to determine for myself if the books are relatively accurate or not. I see the documentation as being there to help me with that, not for the children at all. They haven't the slightest interest in the back matter. If I draw their attention to the bibliography to help them learn what one is, they might be intrigued to see some of the other books they have used on it. However, I can assure you, they won't look at it on their own. And I sure wouldn't harangue them to always do so. What a drag! They are brand new to historical research. Learning that there is such a thing as a bibliography, a glossary, and notes is enough. It is interesting to learn about different kinds of books. And all the different elements of a book of history. It is a start. An introduction to an ever growing sense of historical understanding. Just a beginning. For most of all, I want them to feel that delving into history is amazingly cool. That it is, yeah really!, fun. The narrative does that, not the back matter.
As for the veracity of notes, I have to agree with those who say that it is always a bit of a crap shoot. For the last couple of years I've been researching an historical event that has been written about quite extensively. I have discovered mistakes in some of the most lauded books and their notes. Some are the result of using information from primary sources without considering that there were errors in them, the result of problematic interpretation and a lack of knowledge about another continent at another time. These errors have now simply been perpetuated in books written on the topic ever since. Other errors are of geography that would mainly be familiar to someone who knew the country in question. These are the sort of mistakes that only someone who knew the topic from every side would catch. I suspect that they would be missed by many historians so vetting doesn't always do it.
I personally love notes such as Marc and Elizabeth Partridge provide, but there you are. Who are they really for? If we are honest, really honest, who reads them? The gate keepers. (And, boy, do I hate that epithet, but I guess I'm one of them.) Frankly, as Mary E. Lyons pointed out, large swatches of the intended audience of these books are not sophisticated readers, are not avidly interested in history, and are not likely to be capable (or well trained by us gate keepers) of appreciating the level of meta-cognition going on in Marc's Ralegh notes or the detail of Elizabeth's, wonderful as they are.
Monica
The Dalton School New York NY edinger at dalton.org monicaedinger at yahoo.com
Received on Fri 03 Jan 2003 08:36:17 AM CST
