Exploring empathic thinking among history student-teachers in Ghana: A case of Dr J.B. Danquah's letter to Dr Kwame Nkrumah in prison

Abstract

Learning about emotionally tricky topics sometimes creates educational tension among teachers and learners in the learning environment. In history education, one primary goal of teaching the subject is to promote empathic understanding among learners in the classroom. This study assessed 135 student-teachers ability to understand the actions of past historical actors. Specifically, it explored the student-teachers’ process of contextualising past actions and making moral judgments. The study adopted the qualitative research approach, where student-teachers wrote essays based on a letter Dr J.B. Danquah wrote to Dr Kwame Nkrumah with a follow-up think-aloud to explore the student-teachers thoughts on the letter. The study found that cognitive knowledge of the past promoted the student-teachers ability to contextualise the actors' actions. The student-teachers also viewed historical empathy as a dual construct by using moral and emotional expressions to empathise with the actions and decisions of the historical actors. The seeming suggestion brought forward by these findings is that student-teachers may be able to support their would-be students to empathise with the actions of historical actors in their pedagogical practices. It also points to a need for support in the training of student-teachers where the emphasis is placed on procedural and substantive knowledge as a necessary step for achieving historical understanding.