It was a quest that began over three decades ago when the author began teaching at the Owen Sound Collegiate and Vocational Institute (OSCVI) in 1984. The school had a long, storied history dating back to 1856 when it first opened its doors to students from Owen Sound and the surrounding area. As a teacher of a survey course in Canadian history…

Research in history education has long suggested that teaching with primary source documents adds significant value to a student's learning experience, resulting in deeper levels of understanding beyond mere fact acquisition. Recent studies have specifically identified the value of using digitized primary sources. One category of primary source…

Assessing students' historical understanding has been a long-standing challenge in history education. One of the widely used tools for accomplishing this task is the large-scale standardized test, the results of which are used as an indicator of student knowledge and skills in the social sciences/history. At the national level, the National…

The Integrative Model of instruction engages students in critical thinking while providing history teachers with an instructional strategy other than a traditional lecture format. The Integrative Model was used to develop an interactive lesson titled "The Formation of American Political Parties: Federalist versus Anti-federalist." This article…

To cultivate imagination and empathy among school students is a basic challenge for history teachers. This paper examines the relative roles of the teacher and student in nurturing imagination and empathy in the Singapore history classroom, specifically, through source-based studies. Both imagination and empathy are ways for students to think…

Improving critical thinking--defined by one expert as "reasonable reflective thinking focused on deciding what to believe or do"--has been a frequent topic in the writing of history educators at least since the early 1970s. Attitudes and interests do support higher-level thinking and, most importantly, knowledge used in carrying it out…