The Development of Historical Thinking Assessment to Examine Students’ Skills in Analyzing the Causality of Historical Events

<p style="text-align: justify;">This research aimed to develop a historical thinking assessment for students' skills in analyzing the causality of historical events. The development process of Gall and colleagues and Rasch analysis models were used to develop an assessment instrument consisting of two processes, including the analysis of the framework of cause and consequence, the validity, reliability, and difficultness test. This research involved 150 senior high school students, with data collected using the validation sheet, tests, and scoring rubric. The results were in the form of an essay test consisting of six indicators of analyzing cause and consequence. The instruments were valid, reliable, and suitable for assessing students’ skills in analyzing the causality of historical events. The developed instruments were paired with a historical thinking skills assessment to improve the accuracy of the information about students' level of historical thinking skills in the learning history.</p>

Analysis of the Use of E-Learning as a Historical Learning Medium during the Covid-19 Pandemic

The purpose of this study was to see how E-learning applications were used in history lectures during the Covid-19 period. This research uses descriptive-evaluative research strategy with Mixed Methods technique (quantitative and qualitative). The descriptive-evaluative analysis in this study is limited to the E-Learning program as a historical learning medium. The subjects of this study were teachers of history subjects and students at SMA Negeri 1 Kota Padang who used E-Learning. Data was collected through interviews, documentation, and distributing questionnaires. This study uses descriptive statistical analysis, namely calculating the amount of data obtained from questionnaire data and then evaluating the data in the form of percentages. The influence of online learning with E-Learning applications on students’ historical thinking skills and historical awareness abilities is substantial. Furthermore, using E-Learning technology into history lessons may aid students in developing a stronger sense of national identity. As a result, it is possible to infer that the E-learning application had a significant impact on history learning during the COVID-19 epidemic.

Paradoxes of Historical Memory in A. Tvardovsky’s Post-War Poems

The article deals with the modern interpretation of four post-war poems by A.T. Tvardovsky: House by the Road, Beyond Distance, Tyorkin in the Other World, By Right of Memory , which were insufficiently studied in the previous research works. The main idea is focused on the artistic embodiment of historical thinking in these works. The main feature of these works is a contradictory combination of utopian consciousness and the dystopian mood of the lyric hero, who is pondering over personal and historical memory. The author concludes that Tvardovskys post-war poems capture the paradoxes of the historical thinking of a personality who, on the one hand, gets out of the influence of the dominant ideology, and on the other hand, demonstrates an apologetic attitude towards the key concepts and mythologems of totalitarian discourse. The hero of Tvardovskys later poems appears as a front-line soldier, an artist, a publicist, an analyst of modern times, a prescient; he wanders the roads of the past and present, at the crossroads of personal and historical memory, gets even to death, goes on believing in the mission of the political leaders, the a priori truth of the Country and the People inspired by dystopian impulses and sees mysteries of history through his destiny.

Didactic Perspectives on the Interpretation of Historical Sources in Schools

The purpose of this article is to offer a clear and concise overview of the didactic perspectives on the interpretation of historical sources that have been developed in recent years. To this end, we have considered it appropriate to dedicate a few paragraphs to the problems of current historical education and to the proposals that seek to remedy this situation. Likewise, we have specified the scope of historical thinking in history teaching and presented the main research associated with it. The exposition of these details has served as a preamble to the central development of the topic. In the main section, we have presented the treatment of historical sources as a methodological process, intimately related to their interpretation, which accounts for the skills and abilities that the student must develop for the satisfaction of historical research problems. As conclusions we emphasize the importance of the use of historical sources in the disciplinary and methodological understanding of the subject by the students. Finally, regarding the methodology used for the elaboration of this work, we have resorted to the bibliographic analysis of various sources of information, including theses, research articles and books, in order to provide a comprehensive overview of the topic we have proposed to investigate.

Applied History

The past few years, the field of applied history has witnessed the publication of several manifestoes, the establishment of dedicated research centers, and the foundation of an academic journal. Conceptual discussions about the notion of applied history and the very fact that the methods and techniques of applied history are now part of the discipline of history provide further evidence of the field’s maturity. By offering an historiographical overview tracing the roots of applied history, this article will show that both discussions about the contemporary relevance and application of historical thinking, and the actual application of history to current events, possess a long history: applied history has been part and parcel of history writing since ancient times. Moreover, the article offers a discussion of recent debates about the concept and methods of applied history and concludes by mapping the trends that are shaping its current development.

The Spinning Silkworm: Benedetto Croce’s History as the Story of Liberty

This article explores the abiding relevance of Croce’s last book in the philosophy of history, which, due its publication during the war has always been neglected. After discussing the context of Croce’s antagonism to the anti-historicist tendencies of his own times, the book is interpreted as theoretical underpinning of Croce’s ‘ethico-political’ histories by which he sought to close the gap between historical thinking and action. This he does on the basis of a sophisticated realist ontology, which is still relevant for contemporary philosophy of history.

Listening like a historian? A framework of ‘oral historical thinking’ for engaging with audiovisual sources in secondary school education

History education in many parts of the world is increasingly integrating the practices and sources of oral history. This rapprochement between the field of history education and the field of oral history presents an opportunity to allow students to engage with and develop the particular ways of thinking used by oral history practitioners and theorists. This study investigates how ‘oral historical thinking’ might be captured in a framework designed for educators, much like the various existing models of historical thinking, to support secondary students to analyse and interpret audiovisual interview sources in a way that emulates experts in the field. The study presents a prototypical ‘oral historical thinking framework’ and explores its possible applications to classroom teaching.

Historical thinking and family historians: Renovating the house of history

Family history research, as a multi-billion-dollar industry, is one of the most popular pastimes in the world with millions of enthusiasts worldwide. Anecdotally regarded by some in the academy as being non-traditional, family historians are changing the historiographic landscape through the proliferation and dissemination of their familial narratives across multiple media platforms. Learning to master the necessary research methodologies to undertake historical work is a pedagogic practice, but for many family historians this occurs on the fringe of formal education settings in an act of public pedagogy. As large producers of the past, there have been many important studies into the research practices of family historians, where family historians have been shown to draw upon the research methodologies of professional historians. Paradoxically, little attention has been paid to how these large producers of historical knowledge think historically. This paper reports on interview findings from a recent Australian study into the historical thinking of family historians. Drawing on Peter Seixas’ (2011) historical thinking concepts as a heuristic lens, this research finds that some family historians, despite being largely untrained in historical research methodologies (Shaw, 2018), display the theoretical nuances of the history discipline in (re)constructing and disseminating their familial pasts.

Story education: Assessing history education in light of narrative therapy

This paper discusses the obstructive dimension of specific declarative knowledge on historical thinking. Through considering the anthropological and social-psychological functions of stories, the author identifies potential difficulties individuals may face when trying to decipher, understand, and evaluate particular stories, as intended by historical thinking. By comparing the incapacity to cope with complex historic narratives with the effects of trauma, the paper discusses how approaches in narrative psychotherapy may add interesting insights to the domain of history education. The paper concludes that selection of declarative knowledge needs to be critically reviewed from a pathological perspective if historical thinking is set to be one of the main functions of history education.

Between “Acts-And-Facts History” and “Edutainment” in the History of Education Study Courses: The Case of University of Latvia

At present, the history of education is experiencing a paradox: research in the history of education is flourishing, but the history of education as a study subject is losing its relevance in university curricula. The present research aims at examining the potential of education history in student-centred and research-based study process while addressing the experience in teaching education history in master’s study programmes at the University of Latvia from 1920 to 2020. The article comprises three sections: the first section offers an overview of the evolvement of the history of education as a study subject in Europe and Latvia; the second section, based on the experience of teaching the history of education and research in history didactics, reveals three possible approaches to the study course in the history of education; the third section foregrounds the integration of digitized historical sources in the delivery of student-centred and research-based education history courses. The research demonstrates that each of the three approaches (“acts-and-facts history,” “problem-oriented history of education,” and “edutainment”) has student-centred potential in shaping historical thinking. The student-centred study process in a modern university is closely related to research-based studies, which in the study course of education history means independent research of history aligned with students’ individual interests in the field of education.