Standard Tests Good Indicator For Students

Standard Tests Good Indicator For Students



Abstract

Researchers widely agree that learning history should involve more than learning historical facts and should include competencies of historical thinking. Various models of historical thinking view students' competency to take historical perspectives as a standard in history education. In this study we introduce a standardized measure for historical perspective taking (HPT) consisting of a short scenario set in the German Weimar Republic. We assessed students' HPT by using rating scales; our data were obtained in grammar schools from 170 German 10th graders. Latent class analyses identified three types of students with similar profiles of HPT. One was present-oriented and two showed more or less contextualized historical thinking. Students' history grades were connected to their HPT competency. We discuss limitations of the study and argue for further research on measures assessing students' historical thinking.

Standard Tests Good Indicator For Students

Introduction

There is ample consensus today that students learning history should do more than simply increase their factual knowledge about historical events, people and processes (e.g. Dickinson et al., 2001 In: A. Dickinson, P. Gordon and P. Lee, Editors, Raising standards in history education vol. 3, Woburn Press, London (2001).Dickinson, Gordon, & Lee, 2001). Working with historical documents, evaluating contradictory evidence or taking historical perspectives contribute to students' historical thinking, empowering them to encounter various historical accounts in school, in everyday life and in the media.

However, making historical thinking a standard in education is no simple matter, as Dickinson et al. (2001) have pointed out. Conceptually, research, policy and teachers have to agree on relevant competencies of historical thinking. In this study, we focus on a competency we call historical perspective taking (HPT). It means knowing that certain historical agents or groups had particular perspectives on their world, and being able to see how that perspective would actually have affected actions in different situations (Lee & Ashby, 2001). Students who achieve this will not only benefit in terms of historical understanding but will also be better able to cope with the present world (Ashby & Lee, 1987). For these reasons HPT has become a standard in various models of historical thinking. In the United States, the National Standards for History in the Schools (National Center for History in the Schools, 1996) mention “appreciating historical perspectives” as one part of historical comprehension. In the UK, this competency can be found in History Standard 2 of the National Curriculum - “knowledge and understanding of events, people and changes in the past”. In american, which is the context of the present study, taking historical perspectives is part of a taxonomy proposed by the Association of History Teachers (Sauer, 2006).

Setting up a standard like HPT requires measures to test whether large numbers of students meet it. Measures for students' historical competencies have to be different from merely fact-checking, multiple-choice items; they require theoretical elaboration combined with a sensible methodological approach. To date, reliable standardized tests are ...