Teaching History Objectively

This week's article summary is There is Little Evidence of K-12 Indoctrination.

As you’ll see in the article, Middle and High School history teachers have been in the crosshairs of many parents over the past number of years. Specifically, history teachers (and some English teachers as well) have been accused of pushing a liberal agenda in what and how they teach.

I have a good friend back in New York who teaches Upper School American history. Last summer I asked him how he negotiates teaching in such a charged, polarized atmosphere. He told me that at least for him, the controversy about teaching history is blown way out of proportion. At the beginning of the school year, he tells his students that they will discuss many topics and subjects, some of which are controversial, and that everyone in the class needs to be respectful of differing viewpoints expressed by others. He tells parents the same thing at Back-to-School Night. He told me that he teaches today the same way he’s always taught, and that his students are very open minded, inquisitive, and respectful.

The article’s research affirms what my buddy told me: the vast majority of history teachers strive to remain neutral when teaching toward the goal of developing critical, independent thinking in their students. Especially in the Internet Age, we all need to be more critical and skeptical of whatever we click as there’s little editorial oversight that fact checks postings. 

As a former history teacher, I am a champion of the discipline, yet I worry that most people in America today are quite ignorant of the past and accept as gospel what they read and see online. History to me is less about facts and dates and more about ideas and patterns. Certainly, humans have perpetrated much ugliness and cruelty on one another, yet there has also much goodness and progress over the past 5000 years of civilization. 

As the science of reading is strengthening children’s reading skills, let’s remember to include content knowledge through history as a integral need for reading comprehension. 

Joe

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The combination of COVID-19 school closures and rising culture wars put a harsh spotlight on educators, but none had it worse than the nation’s social studies educators. Social studies has long been a political punching bag, but it reached a new peak around 2021, with teachers accused of indoctrinating students in a variety of political viewpoints, teaching students to “hate” the United States, and coloring key moments of U.S. history with a paintbrush of contemporary “woke” politics.

Pushback hasn’t been limited to conservatives, either: Lessons based on slavery simulations and other damaging, ahistorical lessons periodically go viral and create an uproar.

Fueled by this rhetoric, policymakers in some 18 states have passed legislation or other rules regulating how teachers can discuss issues of racism, sexism, and inequality in the classroom. Discussing critical race theory, the study of institutional racism, and even current events is banned or limited in some states, and under attack in others.

But preliminary findings from a new study by the American Historical Association shows that most middle and high school teachers history teachers strive to keep their lessons politically neutral.

“The divisive concepts legislations that have been introduced by lawmakers make assumptions about what teachers are teaching. We always knew that teachers don’t teach critical race theory in their classrooms. Not one piece of legislation had any data on what’s being taught,” said Jim Grossman, the executive director of the AHA.

Few teachers rely on political extremes to teach their lessons, but still most must navigate the rhetorical accusations that they’re indoctrinating students, the AHA concluded.

Over three quarters of teachers surveyed said they cobble together a multitude of online resources and use textbooks only as a reference, rather than source material.

“We found that teachers don’t use materials from contentious sources, so the accusation that teachers are teaching kids to hate America is simply untrue,” said Jim Grossman, executive director of AHA.

Kevin Levin, a history educator who conducts professional development workshops with educators on teaching history, said that vetting digital material—now a primary source of information—is a skill that teachers still need to develop. “Some teachers do use reliable materials, but just as many are plugging terms into a search engine and clicking the first thing. This has potential to mislead,” said Levin. This danger is heightened now, because technology like ChatGPT can fuel false information that doesn’t come with any warning.

History teachers don’t personally have to be politically neutral, said Levin, but they must maintain a balance of diverse of views within their classrooms. Not only does that protect against allegations of partisan teaching, but it also develops students’ skills to grapple with complicated questions. “Students have to be taught how to think. That is different from telling them what to think,” said Grossman.

“When teachers can share more materials in class, it helps students understand that the past is just as complicated as the present, and there’s no one interpretation. Students are not treated as sponges, who only absorb and regurgitate one interpretation,” said Levin.

Some aspects of history education are inevitably challenging, Levin said. Allowing students to arrive at their own conclusions goes against the notion that they should be taught a particular version of past events, as was the case in prior generations where a narrative of American exceptionalism prevailed.

The AHA will release its full report this fall. Grossman hopes it will temper the accusations laid against history teachers, and prompt more support for their training and development as educators who inspire critical thinking in their classrooms.

“We are providing an empirical basis to come to the same conclusion that we should’ve come to logically,” he said. “Our data shows that educators are using history lessons to develop people who cannot be indoctrinated in the future.”