A Crossroads Resource

II. Crossroads Social Studies Methods Syllabus: American History Themes In Historical Inquiry Methods For Teaching The Crossroads Curriculum

Theme II. The Evolution of American Political Democracy and Ideas

This theme combines Bernstein's two political themes. Units I, IV, and V and Bernstein's introductory essays are the foci for pedagogy for teaching this theme. First, read Bernstein's Essay IV: What Was the American Revolution? as a basis for teaching concepts.

The models of concept teaching are presented using readings from Bruce, Weil, and Showers (1992), which incorporate Jerome Bruner's work as well as other models. Novice teachers will be expected to apply these models to historical material.
  1. The methods of teaching concepts
    1. Reprise and review of European contacts: Teaching the concept of treasure over time.
      1. Develop a plan for teaching the concept of treasure, for example, using inductive thinking. What are examples of treasure for the early European explorers? What were they searching for? For advanced students, V.S. Naipul's account, The Search for El Dorado, is fascinating reading. Then make a table comparing examples of treasure today (as seen by any particular age of students) to treasures as seen by "explorers" of the Caribbean. Develop a definition of treasure from your tables. Test your defined concept with other examples, perhaps from other eras in history.

    2. Apply the concept teaching model to the evolution of the notion of democracy. What was the meaning of the concept of democracy in 1780? How would you teach the concept at several different time periods? What components would the definition have?

  2. Unit IV: What Was the American Revolution?
    1. Use the same concept teaching method to define the term revolution as a concept through inductive reasoning.
    2. Write a framework for several dramas about the periods before, during, and after the American Revolution, as a means to provide your students with a guide to finish the dramas as projects. For example, see the play and/or movie, 1776. Also use documents such as Abigail Adams' letters to John Adams, and the writings of Jefferson and Thomas Paine.

  3. Unit V: The Ambiguous Democracy

    1. Read Bernstein's Essay V and the chapters on the inquiry models and cooperative learning models in Joyce, Weil, and Showers.
    2. Present the cooperative learning models of Slavin, Sharan and Schachar, Johnson and Johnson. Each model should be reviewed and then used within subsequent models as in the next section.
    3. This is an ideal place to introduce the inquiry model to teachers and students. There are a number of interesting problems for young people to investigate during this historical period. A sample list of problems would include Indian (Native American) policies and Indian land policy, The Trail of Tears, protagonists in the Indian issue such as Andrew Jackson, William Henry Harrison, and Tecumseh.

    The puzzling events or problems can be taken directly from CROSSROADS. From there, the model is developed as follows:
    * questions within the problem to be researched
    * tasks to be done by the individuals
    * time frame developed and written down for each person
    * data gathered
    * hypotheses developed and discussed (in group or whole class)
    * substantiating data collected
    * deductions made and prepared as a paper and/or report
    * further questions to be studied


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