The understandings and preconceptions students bring into the history classroom can interfere with student learning. Analyses of student and professor interviews in light of emotional bottlenecks revealed two different, though related, student preconceptions: procedural preconceptions about history as a field of study and pre-existing worldviews that link students' identities to the past. With the Decoding the Disciplines method instructors can capture the students' narratives early to better anticipate and re-channel resistance, moving students away from emotional snap judgments to more critical and historical ways of thinking. [This article was written with with Keith Eberly and Nicole McGrath.]