History teacher

“ A receptive attitude with reference to local tradition and history should always be taken by the history teacher. He should know something of the local history within a few weeks after he has entered a new community, if he has not been able to study it in advance. A young graduate student entering a small western college as instructor, found in the library no volumes upon the subject of his doctor’s thesis. ”

“ The idea of education as learning still dominates us, and so it is that while we have numbers of teachers of history who are or who attempt to be, or who pose as historians who teach, we have comparatively few teachers of history who are teachers whose instrument is history. In relation to the science of history, and indeed to all the sciences, the importance of teacher as teacher is still insufficiently recognised.
Now the virtues required of the historian as of the specialist in any other science are extreme accuracy, fulness, delicacy and discrimination within the department of his work. ”

“ The existence and growth of these local and general societies show that there is a strengthening of interest in history, and that the work of the history teacher is becoming more conscious and more highly organized. They indicate also that under new standards the comparison of ideas and the stimulus of personal intercourse are needed to hold the history teacher to his work. There is no excuse for back-sliding with these associations in the field ”

“ In many ways the history teacher may influence the community. He may advise and co-operate with the local librarians in the purchase and loan of books; he may give public lectures upon historical topics; he may write historical articles for papers or for publication in book form; he may found or join societies for the study of local history; he may use means to keep alive the local interest in history. These activities will win respect for the teacher and the subject, and develop in our American communities a similar respect for local history and tradition. ”

“ The teacher of history in secondary school or college has a better opportunity to influence the community in which he lives than the teacher of almost any other subject; and if to history it be his or her lot to add economics and government as well, the field of influence should be correspondingly widened. Mathematics, formal English, exact science, the foreign languages, one and all, must give way in human interest to that of biography and history. At the beck and call of the historian there are all our records of what man has thought and said and done. ”

“ But what history teachers do need to concern themselves with is the failure to supply their pupils with a reliable store of facts. If the statistics of the Board seem to imply that history teaching is inferior to teaching in most other subjects, it would be consoling to accept the suggestion that the poor returns are not the result of poor teaching, but of no teaching, since many candidates have tried the examination without instruction, an experiment they would make in no other subject. ”

“ Such a method will not add to the intricacy of history for the student, but it will require more efficient teachers of the subject, and it will prevent that serious evil of the high school teaching of history,—the assignment of history to any unattached instructor, whether he or she knows anything about history or no. History teaching in the college or the graduate school has, to a certain extent, found itself, and won the respect of its fellows; history teaching in the high school and preparatory school has not yet reached that point of self-development. ”

“ The public high school, supported as it is by the money of the people, must necessarily adapt itself to the needs of the children [68] sent to it; the vast majority of our pupils receive from us the “finishing touches” of their formal education, as they do not go to college, but plunge at once into “the world.” Such being the fact, what then should be the aim of the history teacher? ”

“ A competent history teacher, however, should not need to depend entirely on the text-book, outline, or syllabus, but should be able to select his or her own topics with judgment and success. A teacher properly trained to interpret the subject matter of the different fields of study who will take into account the length of time available and the extent of the text to be covered, can successfully plan out any desired course of study from beginning to end. ”

“ It will be noted also that all experienced teachers of history, and all superintendents who are really interested in improving the quality of the teaching of elementary history have had abundant opportunity to contribute toward the improvement of the proposed course, and to object to that which seemed visionary, impracticable, or unwise. ”

“ But just as good writers of history are rare, so good teachers of history are likely to be few, since in an important sense they are at once teachers and oral historians. Where the text-book is depended upon for the narrative, as in the United States, a different difficulty presents itself to the teacher. ”

“ The History Teacher's Magazine for September indicates by its articles that it is to continue the consideration of the Ancient History teaching. A good article deals with the European War and History Teachers, and holds that this war must have a deep interest "for every teacher whose mind is at all trained to grasp the true significance of events. The history teacher has now the opportunity to stand as an expert guide for his school community and for the larger community about the school." ”

“ A history teacher who cannot talk interestingly for an hour on any of the great periods of history has surely missed his calling. But to keep a class quiet, to retain their attention, to amuse and entertain, is far from making history vital. If the recitation is to be really vital, the students must do most of the talking, the criticizing, and the questioning. There can be none of these worth while without proper preparation. ”

“ In all conferences of history teachers, much time is spent in considering how best to inculcate historical mindedness, accurate thought, cultivation of the imagination, and clear reasoning; primarily it is acknowledged that there must be acquired a stock of definite information, but the discussions seem to assume that the acquisition of the information is an easy matter, and that the exercise of observation, analysis and judgment, may occupy the greater part of the time of pupil and teacher. ”

“ For teachers who are working by themselves in small schools and are not specialists in history a very useful guide may be found in the “History Syllabus for Secondary Schools,” issued by the New England History Teachers’ Association, and published by D. C. Heath & Co., of Boston. The “Outline of Ancient History,” in pamphlet form may be had by itself. One value of these outlines is that they divide the work into one hundred exercises, and then indicate the proportion of time this group of teachers have found it wise to devote to each section of the work. ”

“ The chief point is, that no course of instruction which claims at all to give completeness of culture can be regarded as concluded before it has introduced [240] the pupil to the pragmatic study of history, and has taught him to look for causes and effects. This applies preëminently to modern history, on account of its direct connection with the present; but mediæval and ancient history, too, have to be worked over once more from this point of view. History should be the teacher of mankind; if it does not become so, the blame rests largely with those who teach history in schools. ”

“ The want of a History suitable for the Schoolroom has long been felt by educators. In most instances, the Histories presented have been too much encumbered with details of but little service to the pupils. This has been one of the causes which has prevented History from being one of the usual branches of study in our Common Schools outside of cities and towns; none can so well appreciate the difficulties which have surrounded this subject as the teacher. Another cause which has precluded the study of History has been the high price of all the text-books on this subject. ”

“ The methods of teaching history in the schools have become more vital and efficient. In the earlier grades history-stories are told orally by a skillful teacher, maps are outlined on the blackboard, historical charts showing changes in territory and populations are used, and the discussion of important topics by the children is encouraged. Source-materials and references to the larger histories are used to stimulate independent study and use of books. ”

“ Teachers of history and school administrators should unite to see that the new plan is given a fair test under the best possible circumstances. High school and college teachers should join with elementary teachers in endorsing this plan for raising the standard of history teaching in America. ”

“ But, until public school education, until school education generally, has much more completely assimilated, and found a more comfortable place for historical teaching, I should deprecate any large increase of historical exhibitions for boys coming up to the University. Holding, as I do, that a sound classical training must be the foundation of successful historical study, and sure as I am that nothing but such training can prepare a man to be a good historical teacher, I should not give a historical exhibition to a boy who does not show some promise of taking good Honours in Moderations. ”

“ Leaving normal school, college, or graduate school, the young teacher of history, if he or she is fortunate enough to get a chance to teach his own subject at once, enters a high school, or small college, where, in many cases, he is permitted to work out his own pedagogical salvation. From alma mater he has brought a knowledge of certain methods of history teaching practised upon him by his own instructors, together with detailed information respecting several narrow fields of human history. ”

“ Here, too, good text-books will give you a bird’s-eye view and an understanding of things often better than the larger histories. Get your general outline view first, and then as time and opportunity offers get the deeper, more critical view by the study of special events and topics. Teachers are lacking in their knowledge of history. The teacher should have a well-organized epitome of the world’s history clearly in mind. He should see the nations come and go as he looks down the ages, and see the mile post which each nation marked in the growth of civilization. ”

“ Students approach it after having devoted time and thought to an elementary course in American history—possibly even a course in English and European history—to a secondary course in some one or more phases of European history and to a course in English history. The teacher who undertakes to lead a class in American history in the secondary school should, therefore, approach this subject with higher ideals and broader purposes than he would set in any other history course in the curriculum. ”

“ To clothe the skeleton of facts with flesh and blood so as to make history what it really is, a record of human beings who not only did things but had also thoughts and feelings like our own, it is necessary to be able to supply the personal details that make the figures of history real, living, men and women. (See the Story of Florence Nightingale, p. 62.) The teacher who does this will himself come to have a more lively interest in history.
The teacher must also know children. For the understanding of history, pupils are dependent on their previous knowledge of life and its interests. ”

“ I am sure that we have not yet solved the problem of examining in history either in school or in college, but I am also compelled to think that the greatest weakness of history teaching at present, in those schools in which the new program is being applied, is that it so often fails to give the pupil a definite knowledge of anything. ”

“ They felt that the renaissance in history teaching, already showing itself in many schools, in a few books on methods, and in the activities of teachers’ associations, should be presented to a wider constituency. They believed that there was a vast amount of good experience in teaching which was not as fruitful as it should be, because it could not be brought to the attention of other teachers. ”

“ In organizing this field of study, while following the general rules of organization, the teacher should remember that the object of this course is above all else to make the student familiar with his present historical environment and its immediate background. To this end it is desirable that a large proportion of the time should be devoted to bringing out and emphasizing movements and institutions that have distinctly modern significance, and that recent European history should be carefully studied. ”

“ The teacher cannot determine merely from a knowledge of history what history is suitable for a given type of pupils. In the elective system of the high school and of the college there is a liberal recognition of the principle that instruction must be adapted to individuals, both in content and method. ”

“ What he learns about cotton is of far less value to him than what he gains through searching for the item. Again, the history lesson treats of the war for independence. The teacher, instead of confining the pupils to memorizing the work on the pages of the school history, sends them to the bookshelves to consult the English histories which shall tell the children something of George III. and the English [243] statesmen of his time. By and by they have gained not only some facility in the use of books, but the knowledge that some books are of greater use than others in the lines of their study. ”