Reasons for using primary sources to teach history

Posted by Lindsay Gibson

In my last blog entry I discussed a few of the obstacles that educators face when using primary sources in their history teaching, and promised that my subsequent blogs would provide tips and suggestions for using primary sources for teaching history. Before doing so I thought that for this blog it would be helpful to backtrack and discuss some of the reasons history educators have suggested for using primary sources in the class. It is important to remember that the commonly discussed reasons for using primary sources presuppose that primary sources are being used purposefully and effectively.

On oral history and the presence of the past

Posted by Jennifer Bonnell

When I first moved to Toronto from British Columbia ten years ago, I took up a job with the Multicultural History Society of Ontario, coordinating an oral history project on the Scarborough community of Agincourt. Conducted in partnership with the Scarborough Historical Museum, the project took on a life of its own, interviews yielding more interviews as our network in the community expanded. In the end we conducted over 50 interviews with long-established residents and newer arrivals to the community from places as far flung as Sri Lanka, Egypt, Estonia, and Hong Kong. We transcribed every one of them (unbelievably, now, looking back). The project resulted in a travelling exhibition that toured schools, shopping malls, and civic and cultural institutions throughout Scarborough. It provided a meeting place for widely diverse experiences of a place changed almost beyond recognition, from a cross-roads farming community to a polyglot suburb, in the space of fifty years. The interviews generated a lot of nostalgia for this lost place, and, predictably, some bitterness about the changes that had occurred: the loss of rich farmland to suburban tract housing and shopping centres, the multiplicity of languages and lifeways that replaced what was familiar. They also, however, provided poignant commentary on the place that Agincourt had become: the opportunities for connection across cultures that it supported, the misunderstandings that persisted, and the experiences—some joyful, some horrific—that people carried with them to this place. Represented as they were in the exhibition through text excerpts, images and audio clips, these divergent experiences drew people in. People read, they lingered, and most of all they listened.

Should we teach controversial issues in the history classroom?

Posted by Cate Duquette

Like most university teachers in Quebec, my classes are three hours long, split into two ninety-minute blocks by a welcome fifteen minute break. This break, I feel, is a key moment of the class since it is a time when students not only ask questions but also engage in interesting discussions regarding history and history education. Today, the subject of our conversation was the political situation in Egypt and Yemen. At some point, a member of the class wondered how she could address the topic with her students. Most of her classmates were quick to give her suggestions, except for one. She remained quiet for a time before voicing her concerns: should such a controversial topic be brought up in the classroom? Do students have sufficient knowledge of the history of the Middle East to fully understand the crisis and take a critical position on the situation? And what about her own opinion, should she share it with her students? As a history teacher, we sometimes hesitate to bring up controversial issues in the classroom. We know from experience that heated discussions, often based more on emotions than on critical thinking, might erupt, causing us to lose control of both topic and students. Why then should we present controversial issues to our students? Is the study of controversial issues profitable for the learning of history?

Obstacles to using primary sources for teaching history

Posted by Lindsay Gibson

The importance of using primary sources for teaching history is almost universally accepted by history teachers, history educators and historians and other members of the history education community. However, in my experience as a high school history teacher, university social studies methods instructor and PhD student in history education throughout the past decade I would argue that primary sources are not used very often, and not very effectively in high school history classrooms. I am not blaming teachers for this state of affairs, instead I am going to discuss several obstacles that prevent teachers from using primary sources effectively in their history classrooms.