One Year Later
I remember the day quite vividly. It was August 12, 2017 and I was sitting on my couch at home watching the news coverage of the "Unite the Right" Rally in Charlottesville, Virginia. My mind wandered as I watched the chaos unfolding in this picturesque sleepy little college town where I had spent a week at a teacher seminar just about a month before. My mind also wandered as I looked down at my sleeping daughter. Zoe was born just 3 days before on August 9. Here is a sat with a great juxtaposition in my mind: Chaos and violence unfolding before my eyes and a sleeping baby that has no idea what world she's going to grow up in. It wasn't long after that, around 1:45pm, that the scene unfolding on TV got worse as a member of the rally drove his car into a crowd of counter protestors killing 1 and injuring 19 others. The news played the clip of the incident over and over again. As I watched I could not pull myself away. I had to watch it. I had to let it sink it. I had to emblazon this image into my mind. If nothing else for my daughter that I was holding. At that moment I realized that this is the world she is going to grow up in. This is the world she will have to find her way in. And this is the world in which she will have to decide for herself what is right and what is wrong.
As I sat there, my mind also drifted to my students. The students that I have in 8th grade US History and the ones I have a limited amount of time to get hooked on why the study of history is important to them and their futures. At the time, I didn't have a lot of answers as to how I would use this dark moment in history to connect to my students and, to be honest, I still am not entirely sure. But now, one year later, I sit here again and think about that day and think about how that pivotal moment became a wake-up call to me and my teaching. Here are my thoughts about the future of history education, at least at the middle school level and the way I see it. This is by no means how everyone should teach as every school, district, community, is different. But in my mind, this is where we're at.
Why This Moment Matters
I believe that every American can point to a defining moment, a "where was I when I heard about this" type of moment that made them view the world in a different way. For some, it can stretch all the way back to the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941, others it's the Kennedy assassination, or the Vietnam War, the Iran Hostage Crisis, the fall of the Berlin Wall, etc. But for someone like me who didn't live through any of that, my first defining historical moment was 9/11. I was in 8th grade on that fateful day. Little did my 13 year old mind know it then, but life would never be the same. Because I experienced that event live and unfolding in front of my eyes but I will always view the world through a different lens. My students, this year's group will be born in either 2004 or 2005, have no first hand memories of that day. They view the world through a different lens than I do. For them it's just history and there's a big difference between history and memory.
Charlottesville is another one of those defining moments for me. Watching that day unfold I could not not helped but be moved by what anger and hatred can do (which is pretty scary to realize). I also realized that for some students, they have grown up seeing things like this on TV and for them it might not be that big of a deal. Charlottesville was the moment I realized as a history teacher (in Michigan in 8th grade we cover topics all the way through Reconstruction) it is my job and sacred duty to prepare these students to tackle big questions they will face in communities across the country. How is the past presented? Who's version of the past will be depicted? Who gets to protest if they don't agree? Does violence mean you don't get to speak your voice? These are all questions this generation of students will have to tackle in some form or another. It's all about being knowledgeable and being able to defend your position with accurate evidence. This is where history teachers need to be on the front lines of battle.
Where Are We At
I realize that I'm about to make some generalizations here that may offend some people. But, collectively, US history teachers, and their classes, get a bad rap for being boring and unnecessary for the 21st century. Routinely at parent-teacher conferences I get the glances and non verbal cues that parents don't value their student's grade in history like they do in Honors Math or Advanced English. They don't see history as valuable to helping their child grow and enter the workforce. At the same time, we are not doing ourselves any favors in the profession if we stick to the age-old instructional methods. When I talk to people about why they didn't like history growing up I get a refrain of the same answers: "it was all memorization," "dates and facts," "dead people who were boring," "I never felt that I would use any of this." With all of that in mind, I constantly hear stories of teachers around the country who are still teaching this way. Students sitting silently in class listening to a prepared PowerPoint lecture while the teacher sits on a stool pointing to the board. The students are silently taking notes, sleeping, or daydreaming. After that, the students pull out their work packets and begin copying definitions and answers out of the textbook. Then, at a later date, there is a multiple choice quiz or test, and perhaps, if the teacher feels up to the grading, an essay question (often the topic given in advance). This method of instruction does nothing to help students actually learn how to use history and use it to impact their world. It is no wonder then that when people spew hate and untrue facts on the internet, no one questions it, or worse--believes it blindly. If we are not teaching students how to actually think and apply the lessons of history then we are failing them. I am not saying that every 8th grade US History classroom is like this, but a rather large percentage still is. I think if we took an honest look at our profession we would be scared to really see what's there if we pulled back the curtain a little bit.
Lots of progress has been made by some really great people. There are hundreds of fantastic educators on Twitter who are trying new things, pushing their students in new directions, and challenging them. The Stanford History Education Group with the work of Sam Wineburg is pushing Historical Thinking and it's all amazing stuff.
Where I Need to Go
1. Establish the "Why?"
I need to do a much better job of establishing why history is important in my classroom. It cannot be simply because I like it, or it's a required class, it has to mean more to students, it has to be tangible. They have to see the purpose in it. In the book Extreme Ownership, former Navy SEALS Jocko Willink and Leif Babin talk about how if people don't understand the "why" of a mission it has a very low chance of success. It is no wonder than, that if we fail to show students why history is important, we have a high rate of failure and students not appreciating the study of the past. We need to start by establishing the why of history. Whether for you that means explaining the skills of analyzing and sifting through evidence, evaluating evidence, making an informed decision, understanding multiple perspectives, whatever it is, we need to establish the why.
2. Give Them the Tools to Succeed
There's the age-old saying "if you only have a hammer than everything looks like a nail." If we limit our student's thinking about history to rote memorization then we can never expect them to make critical decisions and use their knowledge. If we want students to make informed decisions based on their historical knowledge then we need to give them the tools to do so. This doesn't mean throwing down a printed DBQ packet you found online in front of them that has 5-6 sources and saying "go." This means teaching them how to actually look at a source. How to evaluate it. How to interact with it. How to value it. How to appreciate it. Only then, can you evaluate history and look at a problem from different perspectives. Giving students the complete record and letting them decide is key. I once saw a lesson about the Mexican-American War which was billed as a "deep thinking lesson for answering critical questions." The lesson contained five sources: President Polk's Declaration of War, a map of major battles, a letter from American General Winfield Scott, a table of casualties of the war, and a map of territory gained by the United States as a result of the war. The students then were supposed to answer the question "Was the Mexican-American War a Good Thing for the US?" Ugh. "good" for who, I asked? Where is the perspective of the Mexican Army, or Mexican citizens, in this assignment? Where are the voices of those in Congress who opposed the war? (a young Abraham Lincoln had a lot to say on this topic...). Where are the voices of the American Irish soldiers who abandoned the US Army because they were being persecuted and fought for the Mexican Army? Do you see how failing to include that side of the war can lead to pigeon holing students into a narrowing vision of history?
3. Give Them All the Details: The Dark Side and All
We can't cover up history and we shouldn't. I cringe when I hear teachers explain lessons they did in class on topics like the aforementioned Mexican-American War and who don't include multiple perspectives or both sides. I often hear the same thing when it comes to the American Revolution (think Patriots awesome-could never do any wrong; British, evil-always wrong) or Indian Removal and the Trail of Tears (by this I mean some teachers reduce it to a vocab term). Why are we afraid to give students the complete picture of American history? Is it because we're afraid to admit past mistakes that were made by Americans? Are we afraid that somehow students will view America as lesser if we do that? Whatever the reason is we need to stop doing it. We need to give students everything. Give them all the details in American history and let them come to their own conclusions about what we've done. By not doing so, we are limiting their minds and in turn making them more close minded.
To wrap this up, the above 3 things are going to be my focus this year. I realized that 1 year after Charlottesville I still haven't done a good job at any of them. And because of that I may be contributing to the problem. If history is going to be relevant we need to show the connection and what it can do. We need to be open to talking about our country's past and how to grow from mistakes we've made. We need to be honest that a misunderstanding of the past can cloud our present decisions and make us think and act on things we shouldn't. It can also make us not appreciate one another--which is arguably the worst of all the side effects. Maybe the anniversary of Charlottesville will stir some thinking in history teachers and pushing us to gear up the next generation with the historical skills necessary to take on the challenges they will face.
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