Connecting to the Future
Student Historians
I want to teach social studies and history because I am fascinated by the past. I enjoyed history in middle and high school but in college I was exposed to a type of instruction I had not had much experience with. My first US history professor in college colored his lectures with real stories. He introduced us to the actual people we were studying. We went to the Southern Historical Collection, which was housed on campus, we were able to read letters, decipher ledgers, examine hand drawn maps from the civil war. I was surprised at how much of history was hidden and it was in those primary documents that I discovered a love for those individuals who actually experienced the history I was studying.
Digital history has given teachers the opportunity to expose their students to this more in depth dimension of history. Teachers can now access the Southern Historical Collection from the internet in their classroom. They can show the students actual primary documents. History Engine takes this idea and expands on it. With the introduction of technology in the classroom many practices have evolved and rightly so. It is also important to continue this growth into other spheres such as the essay.
By using the History Engine students will learn from each other. They can discover a link between their episode and another students. Their episodes are published. They are now an expert on a particular time in history. From the readings I can see that the beginning stages of this "history as a database" program are concerned with undergraduate students. However, it becomes obvious that the techniques students need to work with the History Engine they are not recieving prior to their work with the engine. I think I would assign an episode to my high school classes. One episode per student and they will have the semester to work on it. I think this would give me enough time to teach my students how to examine primary source documents and how to write an episode while we stay on track in terms of state curriculum expectations.
Digital history has given teachers the opportunity to expose their students to this more in depth dimension of history. Teachers can now access the Southern Historical Collection from the internet in their classroom. They can show the students actual primary documents. History Engine takes this idea and expands on it. With the introduction of technology in the classroom many practices have evolved and rightly so. It is also important to continue this growth into other spheres such as the essay.
By using the History Engine students will learn from each other. They can discover a link between their episode and another students. Their episodes are published. They are now an expert on a particular time in history. From the readings I can see that the beginning stages of this "history as a database" program are concerned with undergraduate students. However, it becomes obvious that the techniques students need to work with the History Engine they are not recieving prior to their work with the engine. I think I would assign an episode to my high school classes. One episode per student and they will have the semester to work on it. I think this would give me enough time to teach my students how to examine primary source documents and how to write an episode while we stay on track in terms of state curriculum expectations.
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