Historical
Skills
Historical skills involve the necessary and transformative view of history as the human story that includes students. Rather than a passive learning experience that is only interested in the reciting of events, dates and people of the past, a problem-solving approach to the complexities of the human story can become the avenue that engages students as individuals, historians, and citizens. Students need to see clear standards and objectives that inspire a curriculum that involves skills of investigation, problem-solving, invention and inquiry. My hope is that, through the use of badges, I can instill in my students the skills necessaries to engage in the urgent work of history.
The Human Story
History is easy, right? All you need to know is what happened when it happened, and how it happened, and then you're done. This was the history I was learning in my high school years and quite frankly, this did not sound very interesting to me. It taught about issues of the past to the people that were not around anymore. What is the relevance in that? Not only was I not interested in this type of history, but I wasn't really good at it either.
In my current experience as a fellow, I have learned to appreciate human history through my growth as an educator. Starting with changing my perspective about the subject, history should be taught effectively and actively by instilling valuable skills in the curriculum. Lauren Schmidt (2007) describes an active approach to history that creates a transformational experience that involves the student, "They also acquire skills of inquiry and communication through field studies and other research projects; the use of maps, globes and models; and the consideration of various forms of historical evidence." (p. 31) This accomplishment occurs through setting a curriculum that differentiates activities for the assessment of historical evidence and understanding in students. However, lessons can be differentiated giving students the opportunity to ask questions and complete tasks that involve historical thinking, and go through the motions with having little understanding of historical skills. How can students create concrete language and comprehension of historical thinking that can be transformative to their experience as citizens?
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Schmidt suggests approaching history from a Problem-Solving Behavior perspective instead of a history based only on events. This is where the format of history changes from excluding to including students in the Human Story. She suggests that students should embrace the experimental approach of being willing to tackle problems of identity, citizenship, environment, social order, and justice, "the goal is to help your students discover that social studies are a multi-millennial chronicle of human beings trying to solve a handful of basic propels through experimentation and invention. And guess who is writing the last chapter in the story?" (p. 34) Teaching a history that recites events and dates is easy, however, because the human story is one that is complex, filled with more questions than answers, the process of teaching this history is difficult and even messy. Teaching a problem-solving history is to invite the next generation of problem-solvers, inventors, politicians, researchers, and citizens to engage in the meaningful work of understanding and assisting the complexities of the human story.
Standards and Objectives
When I was thinking about my inquiry question, "How can gamification enhance historical thinking?" I was troubled by defining "historical thinking." My broad idea was to instill in my students the passion and fervor for the subject, but I did not have a formal view of how I would reach that. Looking back at my first year in the fellowship, I knew I had signed up to teaching students history but did not recognize exactly the actual learning goals or objectives. It wasn't until creating a research question for my inquiry project when I decided to explore the standards that strived to instill the transformative skills of the social studies described by Schmidt. I decided to think about what the parameters set by my department inspired a problem-solving mindset in the history taught at Loomis Chaffee. The four objectives highlight in the department's website became the cornerstone of the badges I created in my gamed course. The standards set in the badges are the objectives I would strive to include in my curriculum to aim to earn badges to prove competency in such skills. While earning a badge meant competency, it also meant a sense of reward for the hard work in hopes that students can see themselves as historians and citizens of our collective world.