Stepping into other people’s shoes proves to be a difficult task for high school students: assessing historical empathy through simulation exercise

Abstract

In 2011, the Finnish National Board of Education assessed the learning outcomes of history with a study whose results raised doubts about the fulfilment of the goals of history education. This article seeks to expand awareness about Finnish adolescents’ understanding of historical empathy. The study assessed twenty-two 16–17-year-old high school students’ ability to understand predecessors’ actions in particular historical situations. The study also examined how well a simulation exercise works as a tool of empathy teaching and evaluation. Students participated in the simulation and afterwards the students were interviewed. They also participated in a survey that measured their attitudes before and after the exercise, and wrote an essay at the end of the course. The results of the study show that most of the high school students did not reach the goals set for history teaching. The weak performance of students is explained by the strong tradition of history teaching which has been continuing in Finnish schools despite the curriculum reform. Teaching still concentrates on passing a meta-narrative on to students who have not yet enough experience of explaining historical events from a multiperspective point of view.