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Teaching History Skills and the Use of History Teaching Resources on Historical Sites; An Action Research Project

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Title: Teaching History Skills and the Use of History Teaching Resources on Historical Sites; An Action Research Project


1
Teaching History Skills and the Use of History
Teaching Resources on Historical Sites An Action
Research Project
  • Dr. Yosanne Vella
  • University of Malta
  • Faculty of Education

2
Action Research
  • This paper describes the various objectives
    behind an Action Research project which involves
    developing educational history teaching materials
    and activities with specific history skills and
    concepts as learning objectives.
  • Action Research
  • a self-reflective spiral of planning, acting,
    observing, reflecting and re-planning
  • Jean McNiff 19887

3
  • Initial funding for this project was obtained
    from the Maltese National Commission for UNESCO
    together with collaboration from Heritage Malta.

4
Objectives of Research Project
  • Teamwork students working in a group may use
    their peers talk to support their own thinking.
  • Vygotsky calls verbal thinking
  • Constructivist Approach
  • the belief of the necessity for every human
    being to put together thoughts, interpretations
    and explanations that are personal to themselves
    in making sense of his/her experiences and
    situations. (Gatt20032)

5
  • New History teaching methods.
    A method that lays less emphasis on content
    and more on the process of learning.
  • A method which is now used in various
    European countries although its adoption is
    uneven and sporadic.

6
The Activities
  • workbooks/handouts
  • problem solving tasks and open-ended problems for
    students to solve which require on site research
    work.
  • on site drama and role play activities where
    students can re-enact history scenes.
  • craft work activities include model building,
    artefact making and painting
  • simulation games such as board games based on the
    general theme of the history site can be played
    on site.

7
History Thinking Skills
  • the skill of empathy
  • the skill of interpreting a primary historical
    source in this case a pre-historic building

The Inquisitors Palace
Tarxien Temples
8
Tarxien Temples
9
The Inquisitors Palace Vittoriosa, Malta
an architectural gem, representative of the
checkered history and European heritage of the
islands (Gambin, 20033)
10
Teachers Resource Book
11
Activities on site
  • Role Play
  • Board Game
  • Finding Patterns and Shapes
  • Paintings of Figures
  • Coats of Arms
  • Worksheet

12
Activities on site
  • Role Play
  • Board Game
  • Finding Patterns and Shapes
  • Paintings of Figures
  • Coats of Arms
  • Worksheet

13
Activities on site
  • Role Play
  • Board Game
  • Finding Patterns and Shapes
  • Paintings of Figures
  • Coats of Arms
  • Worksheet

14
Activities on site
  • Role Play
  • Board Game
  • Finding Patterns and Shapes
  • Paintings of Figures
  • Coats of Arms
  • Worksheet

15
Activities on site
  • Role Play
  • Board Game
  • Finding Patterns and Shapes
  • Paintings of Figures
  • Coats of Arms
  • Worksheet

16
The Inquisitors Palace/ The Skill of Empathy
17
The Skill of Empathy
  • One way of getting students to empathise with
    people who lived long ago is through role-play.

18
Costumes and real historic settings create the
right atmosphere to be transported into the past.
19
The Tarxien Temples
  • At the time they were being built, beginning
    around 3500BC, no one else was raising
    free-standing buildings in stone anywhere else in
    the World (Trump 200269)

20
Learning Objectives
  • become familiar with the basic layout of the site
  • a two-dimensional perspective - aerial
    impression of Temple from a
  • jig-saw they have to construct

21
  • a three-dimensional perspective
  • after experiencing the Temple first hand they
    also have to reconstruct it by putting together a
    model of the site.

22
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23
Interpreting a Primary Historical Source a
pre-historic building -Tarxien Temples
  • Pupils are taken to different areas outside
    the Temple

24
They are asked to imagine what it might have
looked like when it was brand new
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  • The tasks of the workbook which students have to
    fill in as they go round are aimed at
  • helping students to interpret what they are
    seeing, with strong emphasis on the possibility
    of various valid interpretrations.

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33
Conclusion
  • This project in my opinion reconfirmed the
    effectiveness of the basic principles behind "New
    History" as a teaching approach.
  • Work on the sites is not enough to produce the
    kind of intense history teaching advocated by
    Christine Counsell, children need as she says

34
Counsell (2004)
  • all kinds of structures to think at a high
    level text one minute, picture the next,
    activity one minute, listening the next,
    open-ended questioning then, and for how long?
    Revisit the Text? Introduce a new activity? What
    is the best way to do this? Teachers need time to
    learn to teach in ways that are challenging and
    pupils need careful training if they are to get
    used to the idea that the history lesson is a
    place where you learn to tolerate uncertainty.

35
  • The preparation and follow up activities are
    crucial to further create understanding, also as
    this on-going research project progresses it is
    becoming evident that it is a complex process
    that involves besides pedagogical concerns
    various other factors such as time management,
    sequence and chronology of activities as well as
    vocabulary usage.

36
For more information
  • a. Vella, Yosanne (2005) Creating on site
    history activities for school children an action
    research project Journal of Maltese Educational
    Research Vol3 N02 2005 1-x www.educ.um.edu.mt/jme
    r
  • b. Vella, Yosanne (in print) Using History
    Skills and Concepts to teach Citizenship in
    Global Citizenship Challenges for Social and
    Economics Education to be published by
    International Association for Citizenship, Social
    Economics Association
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