Teaching World History Research Articles

Periodization in World History Teaching: Identifying the Big Changes

Periodization in World History Teaching: Identifying the Big Changes

Dare We Teach World History? Dare We Not?

SECONDARY WORLD HISTORY TEACHERS face unusual pressures. Not only do they have the longest time span to consider for inclusion in their course (in comparison with other history courses) but they are also caught in a fundamental debate about the conceptual focus of the course. There is a difference of opinion on whether the course should help young people know their own culture, Western civilization, or whether teachers should emphasize the increasing interdependence of our society with other cultures by teaching about them all. The latter option would treat Western civilization as one of several equal cultures, devoting about the same amount of curriculum time and space to India, Latin America, SubSaharan Africa, Middle East, East Asia, and Westem civilization. Other pressures come upon the world history teacher from dynamic single-issue lobbies. The possibility of thermonuclear annihilation seems so overwhelming that one can argue the world history course should focus on building a basis for peace. The Holocaust in Nazi Europe was so horrendous that a case can be made to devote a major segment of the course to pounding that memory into the next generation. The devastation of poverty and famine in the Third World is so urgent that a rationale can be built for focusing on imperialism and its aftermath as the central issue in a relevant world history. Others can say that there is too much to include in a world history course so the only do-able option is to examine one thread through history-such as technology, or cities, or law.

Murasaki and Comnena: Two Women and Two Themes in World History

IN RECENT YEARS many world history courses have been evolving from what were essentially Western Civilization courses into more truly global studies of the human past. Both world history teachers in their courses and publishers in their world history textbooks have been increasing their coverage of the histories of Asia, Africa, and Latin America. Although the questions of how best to incorporate material on those regions' histories into one's course and what new world-scope themes to use have stimulated many historians and provoked some to devote their energies exclusively to issues in world history, this evolution has also created some new dilemmas. Obviously something has to be left out in order to make room for the new material, and when historians are faced with such difficult choices, they often fall back on the more traditional political histories and omit the material on women and social history in general, the history of science, and some newer fields. Although the thirteen people who designed the team-taught, twosemester world history course at Tufts have by no means solved this problem, we are concerned about it.I And while our attention has primarily been focused upon developing thematic generalizations that will help us cope with the question of what to include and what, reluctantly, to omit, we have in our pre-1500 medieval section come upon two modest themes that at least spotlight two women, Anna Comnena (1083-ca. 1153), a great Byzantine historian and princess, and Murasaki Shikibu (973-1025?), the Japanese lady-in-waiting who

Sequencing the Writing of Essays in Pre-Modern World History Courses

TEACHING AND LEARNING HISTORY can both be improved by the application of increasingly complex writing assignments.' Sequencing the writing of essays is especially valuable in world, or global, history where the grand sweep of human ideas and actions across time and space raises an almost limitless number of questions. The problems posed by this abundance-many of which can be turned into good essays-cannot be solved by the random assignment of those essay questions that are fancied by teachers and/ or students. Textbooks2 and methods of teaching world history may limit the number of questions but do not solve the problem of selecting the most appropriate questions during the learning process. I favor the comparative method-comparing the key institutions and the value systems of various cultures and civilizations. Whatever method is used, however, writing assignments in world history should include essays that are sequenced according to their difficulty. The sequencing model proposed here is for an introductory course in world history and is based upon seven steps of difficulty. Although it implies a theory of learning history through writing (a point to which I will return at the end of this essay) the model is the result of years of teaching courses in world history. The purpose of each step, or level, of difficulty is explained and illustrated by essay questions.3 The aim of thefirst step is to have students think creatively about historical change in the distant past about which we know relatively little. Questions posed are:

The Teaching of World History: A Status Report

ry which transcends national and regional boundaries and comprehends the entire globe-is one of the marks of the present.i This awareness that Barraclough spoke of has grown today into a movement of significant strength within the historical profession, perhaps not yet earning the descriptive term, revolution. This paper will examine some dimensions of the movement towards world history, review the most cogent complaints and criticisms against the way it is taught, offer some tentative responses to the criticisms, and suggest a few practical approaches for stepping up the forward march of this movement. The last point is particularly crucial since, as with any other movement, unless it can grow and can attract supporters, the world history movement may well stagnate and wither away. Evidence of a movement to world history is fragmentary, but can be found at both the secondary and college levels. In Fall, 1981, the New York City public secondary schools adopted a world history requirement, replacing two separate courses, a history of Western Civilization and regional studies of Eastern Civilization, with a three semester world history course. 2 In Texas, all high school students are required to take one year of world history or world geography (90 per cent select the history option).3 A report released last June by the College Board, entitled Academic Preparation for College, outlined certain basic academic subjects that college-bound students

Teaching for Historical Understanding in British Schools

THE PAST DECADE and a half has been marked by a concerted effort to revise the curriculum of both American and British schools. In America reform efforts began in the mid-1950s and received a major stimulus from the publication of Jerome Bruner's The Process of Education.1 Most areas of the curriculum were examined and major changes were made in the teaching of such subjects as mathematics, language arts, and the social studies. Included were efforts to develop inquiry or discovery approaches in the learning of history. Richard H. Brown and the Amherst Project sought to design a new American History curriculum; John W. Thompson and the World History Curriculum Project attempted to build new approaches to the teaching of World History; and Edwin Fenton at Carnegie-Mellon University sought to construct a four-year secondary school social studies cur-

Teaching World History: Structured Inquiry through an Historical-Anthropological Approach

Teaching World History: Structured Inquiry through an Historical-Anthropological Approach

Book Reviews

Douglas D. Adler and Glenn M. Linden, eds. Teaching World History: Structured Inquiry Through a Historical-Anthropological Approach. Boulder, Colorado: Social Science Education Consortium, Inc., 1976. Pp. iii, 164. Paper, $6.50; Glenn M. Linden and Matthew T. Downey, eds. Teaching American History: Structured Inquiry Approaches. Boulder, Colorado: Social Science Education Consortium, Inc., 1975. Pp. iii, 110. Paper, $4.95. Review by James F. Marran of New Trier Township High School West (Northfield, Illinois). John G. Clark, David M. Katzman, Richard D. McKinzie, and Theodore A. Wilson. Three Qenerations in Twentieth Century America: Family, Community, and Nation. Homewood, Illinois: Dorsey Press , 1977. Pp. xx, 529. Cloth , $13 . 95. Review by Donn Neal of the Great Lakes Colleges Association. Leonard L. Richards. The Advent of American Democracy, 1815-1848. Scott, Foresman American History Series. Glenview, Illinois: Scott, Foresman and Company, 1976. Pp. 182. Paper, $4.95; Edward Pessen, ed. Jacksonian Panorama. American Heritage Series. Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill Company, Inc., 1976. Pp. xli, 502. Paper, $6.95 Review by Davis D. Joyce of the University of Tulsa. Ronald N. Satz. American Indian Policy in the Jacksonian Era. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1975. Pp. xii, 343. Paper, $4.25; M. Thomas Bailey, Reconstruction in Indian Territory: A Story of Avarice, Discrimination, and Opportunism. Port Washington, New York: Kennikat Press, 1972. Pp. 225. Cloth, $11.50; Francis Paul Prucha, ed. Documents of United States Indian Policy. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1975. Pp. ix, 278. Cloth, $14.95; paper, $4.95; Britton Davis. The Truth About Geronimo. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1976. xxv, 253. Paper, $3.75. Review by Leonard F. Ralston of SUNY, Cortland. Charles S. Campbell. The Transformation of American Foreign Relations, 1865- 1900. New American Nation Series. New York: Harper and Row, 1976. Cloth, $15.00; paper, $5.95. Review by Frank J. Rader of Empire State College, Saratoga Springs Center. Robert Sklar. Movie-Made America: A Cultural History of American Movies. New York: Vintage Books, 1975. Pp. vii, 340. Paper, $5.95. Review by Jack W. Berryman of the University of Washington. Jesse Lemisch. On Active Service in War and Peace: Politics and Ideology in the American Historical Profession. Toronto: New Hogtown Press , 1975: Pp. ix, 150. Paper, $3.00. Review by David DeLeon of the University of Maryland, Baltimore. John F. Cady. The Southeast Asian World. St. Louis, Missouri: Forum Press, 1977. Pp. 80. Paper, $1.95; William J. Miller. The Japanese World. St. Louis, Missouri: Forum Press, 1977. Pp. 81. Paper, $1.95. Review by Eugene Lubot of the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga. Basil Dmytryshyn. A History of Russia. Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice-Hall, Inc. , 1977. Pp. xvii, 645. Cloth, $14.95; Adam B. Ulam. A History of Soviet Russia. New York: Praeger, 1976. Paper, $5.95. Review by Susanne McNally of Hobart and William Smith Colleges. C. W. Cassinelli. Total Revolution: A Comparative Study of Germany under Hitler, the Soviet Union under Stalin, and China under Mao. Santa Barbara: Clio Books, 1976. Pp. 252. Cloth, $19.75; paper, $6.25. Review by Gene Grabiner of SUNY, Buffalo. Jules R. Benjamin. A Student's Guide to History. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1975. Pp. 122. Cloth, $10.95. Review by Michael L. Berger of St. Mary's College of Maryland.

On the series of "New World History Teaching"

On the series of "New World History Teaching"

How to Teach the Southeast Asian History in the World History Teaching

How to Teach the Southeast Asian History in the World History Teaching

One aspect of the World History teaching in France

One aspect of the World History teaching in France

Development and Dissemination of Materials for the Teaching of World History in a Foreign Language (German)

Development and Dissemination of Materials for the Teaching of World History in a Foreign Language (German)

Development and Dissemination of Materials for the Teaching of World History in a Foreign Language (German)*

The Modern Language JournalVolume 54, Issue 2 p. 112-115 Development and Dissemination of Materials for the Teaching of World History in a Foreign Language (German)* Helmut A. Keitel, Helmut A. Keitel Hamilton High SchoolSearch for more papers by this author Helmut A. Keitel, Helmut A. Keitel Hamilton High SchoolSearch for more papers by this author First published: February 1970 https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-4781.1970.tb02243.x † The research reported herein was performed pursuant to Contract No. OEC-3–7-070210-2703 with the Office of Education, U. S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare. Contractors undertaking such projects under government sponsorship are encouraged to express freely their professional judgment in the conduct of the project. Points of view or opinions stated do not, therefore, necessarily represent official Office of Education position or policy. Preliminary findings were reported in the Wisconsin Association of Modern Foreign Language Teachers Bulletin, Vol. LIV, No. 1 (October, 1967), pp. 16–22. AboutPDF ToolsRequest permissionExport citationAdd to favoritesTrack citation ShareShare Give accessShare full text accessShare full-text accessPlease review our Terms and Conditions of Use and check box below to share full-text version of article.I have read and accept the Wiley Online Library Terms and Conditions of UseShareable LinkUse the link below to share a full-text version of this article with your friends and colleagues. Learn more.Copy URL Share a linkShare onFacebookTwitterLinked InRedditWechat Volume54, Issue2February 1970Pages 112-115 RelatedInformation

The Teaching of World History

The Teaching of World History

Aims in Teaching World History

Aims in Teaching World History

World History Teachers in Conference. International Commission for the Teaching of History. Index of References

World History Teachers in Conference. International Commission for the Teaching of History. Index of References

Nikolai Gogol on the Teaching of World History

the text of this essay. Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol-Yanovsky was born in the town of Sorochintsy, Province of Poltava, in the Ukraine, on March 19, 1809 (old style). He dropped the second, Polish-sounding half of his name early. Gogol means literally golden-eye, but has the figurative meaning of one who struts about, assumes airs. The writer's patronymic comes from his father's first name from which the name of the family estate Vasilievka was also derived.

The Teaching of World History

The Teaching of World History