I fell in love with History in my 9th grade
World History class. However, instead of merely having us see history as
"fact collecting" (Wineburg, as cited in Buehl, 2013) our teacher
utilized the principles of history to help us learn better universally across
the academic spectrum. There were high expectations for us as young students
that, in the beginning, seemed unfair and inappropriately difficult for our
age. As young students we were responsible for 12 page plus papers, projects, and
intensive, time consuming readings. While I do not recall most of the
information taught in the class, what I did learn was the intangible skills of
reading critically and being able to talk about those readings in a classroom
setting. We were thinking critically about everything that came through the
classroom. Our teacher was also a lawyer, and so we looked at everything like we
were in a courtroom.
The readings of literacy all discuss
the importance of reading comprehension, and the tendencies to simply skim, or “pseudoread”
the text. We as teachers ought to be working to help instill the critical eye
of a lawyer into each of our students. Critical reading is examining the text
for arguments, meaning, implications, reasonings, evidence, and errors to take
hold of and find the truth. History, I find, is one of the most fertile grounds
for achieving this end and enabling the idea that "comprehension
instruction must be embedded in the teaching of the discourse of an academic
discipline" (Buelh, 74). This is due to the factual reliability of information
in History being on the same level as Science but with variability in
interpretation and significance. There are some manners of debate on how events
occurred, discrepancies, and gaps of knowledge. However, there is much of History
that is concrete in most Historians minds as factual. And that perspective
would hold unless more information and new discoveries were made. Where History
gains greater fertility of critical thinking, is the implication of History.
Our past shapes the world as it is today. Debate and scrutiny surround the
world Historical applications and interpretations. When we look at facts of
past events with the eye of a lawyer, we can achieve the education of critical
reading that pertains to all other subjects in general education.
Students should be encouraged to wonder,
debate, cross-examine, search for evidence, and be able to present that
evidence before others in a coherent way that enables us to be able to make
more informed decisions. The following video outlines ideas of thinking
critically, which heavily remind me of the way a lawyer would interact with
sources.
Just as the video says, we should be able to formulate
questions, gather information, apply that information to understand the
concepts, assumptions and interpretations, then consider the implications, and
finally explore other points of view.
The final and one of the most important pieces of
application for us as teachers can be found at nearing the end of Buehl chapter
2. “Teachers can, and indeed need to teach reading compression. Comprehension
instruction emphasizes explicit modeling and support of fundamental
comprehension processes: making connections to background knowledge, generating
questions, creating visual and mental images, making inferences, determining
importance, synthesizing, monitoring, and problem solving” (Buehl, 74). The key
phrase that I find in this is modeling. As teachers, it is so important for us
to not assume that our students will be able to critically analyze a source
without first being educated on how to do so. As such, we need to be able to
model that to our students and use our experiences in the classroom to help
them gain the skill of critical thinking. 
Critical thinking, weighing the value of information, is an incredibly hard skill, and because of emotional biases and habits of thought it is basically impossible to do it for all information fairly. With History though, much of the personal bias (can be) reduced, which gives an excellent field of thought to practice this essential skill. I think it is great you had the opportunity to approach history from a lawyer's perspective. I think the practice in cross-examining and needing to communicate support for a given interpretation is not only great for history but for being a general consumer and citizen of a country.
ReplyDeleteI enjoy reading your post and I think you highlighted the learning methods are not just good for history but could be applied to any subjects. I think you brought up a good point that as teachers, we should help students gain the critical thinking skill instead of just imparting knowledge from the hard copies. Critical thinking is a lifelong beneficiary skills. I hadn't thought that history could be teaching like what your teacher did, because my histories classes were always taught in a stereotyped way -- focus on memorizing. Teachers are the compass in the knowledge sea. We see how important it will be as educational models.
ReplyDeleteI find the following comment of yours very interesting. You say that the " factual reliability of information in History being on the same level as Science but with variability in interpretation and significance." This claim can be disputed and argued as there is much in history that can be disputed. There is a famous saying that history is written by the victors. So to take what is written in textbooks as indisputable facts is problematic even if can dispute its effects on society etc. and that is one thing we must instill in our students; the ability to question everything; even the so called facts. So much of what science has discovered also changes as new discoveries take place. So we must understand that fact is truth in the present but may change as our understanding changes and our social reality changes. And as we engage with knowledge we change it and understand it in ways unique to our own understanding of the world developed through our experiences and reality.
ReplyDeleteI think teaching reading comprehension and critical reading skills are of the utmost importance in the classroom. Critically reading applies not only to history classes but to every subject and every avenue students could potentially be entering after graduation. Although I understand your argument about most of history being factually sound, I somewhat disagree. When discussing historical events with others, I often find their understanding of them to be completely off. These misunderstandings however often find themselves as believed truth by many. I think reading critically can help address that. When students engage in reading and read with a lens of critique and questioning, it allows for them to question the so often misunderstood aspects of history. Pseudoreading does not allow for this so the importance of promoting reading that does focus on comprehension and questioning is important.
ReplyDeleteAfter you raised your opinion on critical thinking, I read this article again with a critical eye. Interestingly, I found that reading with critical thinking enabled me to have a newly cognition of comprehension. I didn’t merely analyze what the author meant, but at the same time, focus more on my own thinking. In contrast to Buelh’s thoughts, I came up with many arguments on issues, especially when inconsistent with his views. Indeed，it is important that students should be encouraged to wonder, challenge and cross-examine. However, critical thinking was hardly ever mentioned in my previous study. Students subconsciously regard the content of the book as completely correct and never think critically. In this way, it can easily cause “Pseudoreading”. I like Buelh’s words:“I like to typify comprehension as a meeting of the minds.”—the mind of the reader and the mind of the author, because I believe that only reading with thinking can bring a deep understanding of the article.
ReplyDeleteI really enjoyed your thoughts on critical thinking/reading. I also agree that history is one of the best places to learn about critical thinking because the content and curriculum is so rich and expansive and involves real people, which are often the hardest to understand critically. In my favorite history classes, I also don't remember all the facts, but I do remember understanding the content, which is frustratingly not the goal in every class. The era of standardized testing has made it difficult for teachers to focus on what matters, helping students understand, and more so on helping students test well. In chapter 2 when Buehl discusses the need for teachers to teach comprehension, that challenged me to think about how there are many types of comprehension, historical comprehension, math comprehension, and so on, but literacy and comprehension, understanding, that needs to be taught in all classes and taught in all kinds of curriculum, because that is a literacy skill and a life skill. Lately, in the educational field, there has been a push for interdisciplinary content and I think comprehension and literacy are an essential part of that.
ReplyDeleteHi Kyle. I was surprised that student of 9th grade were responsible for 12 page plus paper. Fortunately, you’ve learned how to look at everything in a critical way thanks to your practice and your history teacher. I totally agree with you that critical thinking plays an essential role not only in students’ learning but also in their lives. If students believe what teachers and books said is truth without thinking, they’ll become machine absorbing knowledge passively and the society will not make advance. In addition, when reading your view of history, I thought of Li Shimin, the second empire of Tang dynasty of China, said that “with history as a mirror, one can understand the rise and fall of a nation” (“以史为镜，可以知兴替”), in other words, one can learn from history with critical eyes. All in all, teachers of all subjects should, like you said, instill critical eye of a lawyer into each of our students.
ReplyDeleteThank you for sharing your high school experiences. Do you think critical thinking is gained by being engaged in these different assignments (paper, projects, etc) or is it through the repetition of these assignments? I think it is great that as a 9th grader you were introduced from the get-go to think critically, to challenge the readings through an argumentative approach (especially since your teacher is was a lawyer). History is somewhat tough since a lot of information is grounded with evidence, so there is no real "debate," but of course there are areas in which arguments can be made. So there is somewhat of that "memorization" going on, but definitely critical thinking involved as well.
ReplyDeleteI think by understanding that we need to start teaching students to start using critical thinking, it leads to your last point, that it can be applied to different real-world situations (modeling).
I think there are pro's and con's to "memorization" and modeling. While modeling is important for learners, you don't want to do it so much that the students begin to think in YOUR way of thinking. So often this happens in teaching and it is sometimes hard to avoid. Buhle offers a good model to assist with teaching students to engage and track their own thinking and the text provided, but again there is no one right answer of how to do so.-Kiley
DeleteThank you for your sharing. I agree with the idea our past shapes the world as it is today, and I have to say that what we learn shapes the people as we are today. I totally agree with your opinion "as teachers, it is so important for us to not assume that our students will be able to critically analyze a source without first being educated on how to do so. As such, we need to be able to model that to our students and use our experiences in the classroom to help them gain the skill of critical thinking."
ReplyDeleteI think critical thinking is the mother of creative. In our world today creative is really important so that the society can develop more fantastic.
I agree with you that students should be taught to think critically when analyzing the problems.“Students who do surface processing rely on their teachers to tell them what they need to know, often commenting, ‘I read it, but I didn’t understand it’ ” (Buehl, 31). I think one of the important reasons that can explain this phenomenon is that the students were lack of critical thinking. If students are able to think critically, they will not only obey what teachers tell them to do, they may think about the purpose of teachers’ instructions and even read with their own questions formulated about the materials before reading. I think teachers ought to teach student how to learn and how to read to learn, but not only instill knowledges. In other words, the ultimate goal of teaching may be to equip the students capacities of learning independently in their future life and that the critical thinking plays an essential role in this process.
ReplyDeleteI graduated high school more than fifteen years ago, and I cannot recall an instance in which I had to analyze a text critically. The only thing that we had to do was a summary of the books. Although making summaries do involve some comprehension, or perhaps memorization, it does not allow us to think critically. I agree with you in that teachers should educate students on how to analyze sources critically. You had the advantage of having a teacher who fomented those skills in you. Unfortunately, many of our students do not have that opportunity and they either "get it" or "don't get it."
ReplyDeleteThank you for sharing your personal experience. I had a similar experience, but in high school. In my history class my teacher was known for being the “hard” teacher, just because she assigned so many assignments. But, just like you, I think that actually helped me in the long run because I am able to read long articles or text and find key information. I agree with how important reading comprehension is. If students are not reading critically, then they are not actually understanding the text. This will not only help students in history but, in all other subjects.
ReplyDeleteBeing a critical thinker and a critical reader are huge if you want to succeed in class, especially history. You're correct in pointing out how history is often thought of as "fact-collecting," (and you were fortunate enough to have a history teacher who taught his class as more than that.) What I find interesting is the model you cited at the end of chapter 2 of the Buehl reading. It's one thing for teachers to know how to teach critical thinking skills, but to do actually do it in practice is where I think teachers sometimes fall short. I couldn't help but think about my experiences in high school. Once I started taking AP classes in junior and senior years, I was being taught to examine the content in a critical manner. My freshman and sophomore classes were not heavily involved in critical thinking skills. I think teachers should teach kids critical thinking skills as soon as possible so they can be prepared for not just school, but for life.
ReplyDeleteHello Kyle - thanks for the post. I also find that modelling engaged reading is the key to demystifying complex texts, though I would argue that the modelling need not come from the teacher. Our classrooms are full of readers that bring a wide variety of reading strategies to the table. If we create an environment where students can model good reading strategies for one another, I believe that that makes the process of engaging with texts and critiquing texts more approachable.
ReplyDeleteIt’s interesting how the examination of history is portrayed in your post. The ability to critically examine text and form arguments gives students ability to synthesize knowledge and form arguments that is validated through multiple sources. History is not meant for just rote memorization of facts and figures, but the subject and class mirrors subjects like science in taking information to formulate an argument. Which allows students to think critically.
ReplyDeleteI really want to thanks for your ideas.Actually,I think that you are lucky to have a history teacher who teach you to see things critically.I have never know that I should say things critically and I always choose a side before college.I think if I'm gonna be a English teacher of high school in the future.I want to a teacher who teach them see things critically.This content not only helps students in the area of study but also in the field of their lives.Seeing things from different aspects can really help students to learn more and understand more.
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