THE IMPORTANCE OF HARMONY WITH HISTORY IN THE CLASSROOM LoFaro 1

The Importance of Harmony with History in the Classroom

William LoFaro

Manhattan College: Education 206

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Abstract

Throughout this paper, I explain the importance of making sure high school students taking part

in a history class are continuously engaged, as this subject is often viewed as particularly dry to

those without an explicit interest in it. This will be done through my analysis of my personal

experiences in high school history classes, and my research into the topic, eventually resulting in

my plan to engage students, and breathe new life into a subject based on the experiences of those

long dead. This will be done to answer the question, “What actions can be taken to keep high

school students engaged in History?”

Introduction

History as a subject is one that is often met by vastly differing opinions amongst the

students that are required to take it. While there are obviously some such as myself who develop

a passion for the subject, eventually progressing to teaching it themselves, the majority

consensus of the subject tends to be more on the side of negativity. Such conclusions can largely

be attributed to somewhat common opinion that history bares no real importance to someone’s

everyday life, along with the format in which the content is relayed frequently being less than

stellar. Such a mix of aspects mean that when difficulty is excluded from the equation, many

hold the subject of history in low regard. This is of course an issue as a class that have no

investment in what they are learning is also a class that will only artificially learn the content.

It is my belief that simply altering the way that teaching history is approached is the most

viable way to improve not only its reputation amongst students, but also their retention of what

they learn. I believe this is largely due to how history fits into a classroom setting. Unlike some

other subjects, history is much more rigid when it comes to the content that is available, as it is

based in fact rather than variable concepts. It is due to such rigidity that the only genuinely
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viable option for improving the subject is simply the method in which it is taught or presented.

As long as it is presented to the students in an alluring or interesting way, even one of the more

dry topics in history can become something truly enjoyable to learn.

Research

While many students see no point in learning about a subject such as history, some

recognize the common answer as to why it is that they must take the classes. In a study done on

thirty different students across multiple grades, Bruce A. Vansledright asked students what the

importance of learning history is, with a similar answer being presented across all of the grades

analyzed. One of the high school students in particular states, “History is the study of stuff that

has already happened. Why it’s important is learning from our mistakes. We can be sure we learn

from our mistakes by knowing what our mistakes were and how they came out, so we don’t do

the same thing wrong again, at worst, and so we can do the same thing right. We can know what

was done wrong, how it was done wrong, and how it can be made right” (Vansledright p.530).

as proven by the fact that a similar answer to this was given by students all the way down to fifth

grade, this seems to be the default answer for why students believe they must learn history. This

is also perpetuated by my own experiences in high school history classes, with many of my peers

recognizing such reasoning for the class. With that being said, they are not wrong by any means,

as attempting to understand and better the future based off of what is learned about the past is a

major part of learning history. The primary issue is that regardless of the fact that many students

understand why they need to take a class, it does not mean that they will show any interest. This

can largely be attributed to the fact that students have no influence over the type of content that

they are learning. In an article describing some of the flaws that plague the subject, author

Valerie Strauss describes her view on the content history classes often focus on, “For the state to
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determine what world history is important for a student to learn hints at a delusion of grandeur.

How can anyone in their right mind select the historical events for a particular person to study?”

(Strauss). The point Strauss brings up is something important to consider when trying to uncover

the answer of what is holding down the potential of the subject. Oftentimes, teachers are given a

curriculum that they must cover, with minimal wiggle room to use in order to try and diversify

the type of topics that they cover throughout the duration of their entire class. While this is the

case in many classrooms, I was lucky enough to have a much more varied atmosphere in many

of my high school history classes, with the types of topics and perspectives covered varying in

each and every topic. This was primarily due to the fact that the teacher in question was not

afraid to break away from the standardized perspective that is often covered at length within the

average history textbook. Such consistent perspectives being prevalent end up actually

detracting from the effectiveness of many textbooks, as even if they contain helpful and

important information, the fact that their contents are blatantly bland and uninteresting to read

ends up only detracting from students’ investment in the topic they are learning. This issue is

only made worse by the fact that the point of view covered in many textbooks is notably

alienating and biased. Michael H. Romanowski covers this idea in depth in his analysis of

history textbooks, “History textbooks incorporate attitudes and ways of looking at the world. In

making judgments about what should be included and what should be excluded, and how

particular episodes in history should be summarized, textbook authors assign positive or negative

interpretations to particular events, thereby asserting a set of values” (Romanowski). As

Romanowski describes, many textbooks, even to this day, contain an underlying message that

their telling of events portrays, yet rarely do they specifically address that such a message exists.
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This ends up resulting in resource for student that does more to deter them than help them in any

meaningful way.

Class Plan

For the sake of being specific, this plan would specifically be applied to that of a high

school level World History class. The primary philosophy that will encompass the entirety of

class plan centers around the presence of diversity throughout as many aspects of the class as

possible. The primary aspects that I intend to focus on are the perspectives I cover in the class,

my approach to the usage of textbooks, and ways to get students involved in the work that will

be done in the class.

To start off with, the first and most important part of the class would be shaping the kinds

of perspectives that I cover over the 10 weeks that this plan encompasses. The first step in

advancing this step would be to learn as much as possible about the students in my class, as their

backgrounds, ethnicity, and culture will likely play a role in the types of historical perspectives

that pique their interests. The viability of such an idea is enforced by Strauss’ findings on why

some people finally find an interest in history outside of the classroom, “They like it now

because they can read about what interests them. They have a choice. They learn about specific

stories of specific people” (Strauss). While my students would not have free reign over the types

of things they learn, Strauss’ words still hold importance to my plan. A sentiment shared by

many is that they are much more easily engrossed in something that they are able to relate to, and

so combining that idea with Strauss’ will likely result in a way to broaden the types of stories

that students will learn, without pushing it too far away from the base curriculum. This would be

done by having somewhat extensive introductions at the beginning of the class. As each student

shares their individual traits and details, It would give me the ability to take note of such things.
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A major reason an idea such as this is viable is due to how many perspectives are often available

for any given historical event, with this especially holding true with the chaotic history of the

world. Such talks about different perspectives leads into the next portion of my plan.

Textbooks are a tool that are often synonymous with history classes, and so while I have

no intentions of excluding them from my class, I do want to alter how they are used to a

considerable extent. To begin with, I do not want textbooks to be a major time-sink for students

as they often are for many classes, as I’d much prefer to relay the key content to them through

speech, images, or other media, rather than something that the majority of them will dislike such

as textbook readings. Strauss once again does well in describing how students often think of

textbooks, “Bottom line, they don’t read a textbook and they aren’t forced to memorize”.

(Strauss). As someone who has experienced numerous history classes that put major emphasis

on the usage of a textbook, I cannot help but agree with such sentiment. When assigned readings

in a textbook reading, oftentimes students will view this as nothing but a chore, taking no true

interest in the words that they are being forced to read. This is not helped by the fact that more

often than not, history textbooks are not written with much style to make them any more

interesting. To counter such an issue, another part of this step is making sure that I have multiple

different texts for students to read. To implement this, any time a reading is assigned, it would

not be from one source, but rather two from different sources. Having the students focus on

readings from different sources will allow them to grasp different concepts regarding the topic,

such as differing opinions, or even how different people share the same opinion.I do this with the

intention of introducing students not only to different perspectives on each topic, hopefully

including some that they can relate to, as well as in the hopes that they begin to understand how

to pull the truth from two conflicting sources. A task such as deciphering what true middle
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ground lies between two different sources is much more engaging than a simple reading. This

would all be done in hopes of fulfilling the type of goal as described by Romanowski, “One of

our educational goals in a democratic society is that schools develop critically thinking, socially

conscientious students who have grasped the meaning of democratic values” (Romanowski).

.My intentions in integrating this would be to have students regularly have readings to do at the

beginning of each new topic. This would be done to give them something of an introduction to a

topic, before eventually experiencing the bulk of the topic in class.

The last aspect of my plan would be finding ways to truly engage students in each and

every one of the topics that would be covered. I believe this to be key to the class’ success as in

unison with the previously mentioned aspects of my plan, students will hopefully be able to grow

because of it. Vansledright explains such a goal in his research, “How students view the purpose

of engaging in topical or disciplinary study appears deeply connected to what they eventually

learn and understand” (Vansledright, p. 531). Such a goal is the final fusion of the previous

ideas, with students learning about a diverse array of perspectives about multiple topics, bit with

one final aspect needing to be added. By using the initial information gained from the initial part

of the plan, I can then use the possible new topics of focus as events to begin my search for

relevant texts. The combination of these two steps of the plan will hopefully result in a class in

which the students are enthusiastic about not only a diverse variety of topics, but an array of

opinions and perspectives on each of those topics. The aspect required to complete such a plan is

collaboration. Over the course of the classes 10-week span, I intend to have collaboration

between students consistently play a major role. This is in hopes that the students not only

develop an understanding of how to understand perspectives from the lesson and text, as well as
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those of their peers and classmates. This will also likely keep them engaged and invested in their

learning of history.

Conclusion

Despite the commonly neutral or negative perspective of history that is held by students, I

believe that it is fully possible for teachers to turn around such a negative view of the subject.

By actively working to expand on any flexible aspects of a subject as rigid as history, teachers

will hopefully be able to win over those that have previously thought of history as nothing more

of an inconvenience. With plans and research in place, history will hopefully become something

that ignites passion and excitement in the average student.

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References

Bruce A. Vansledright (1997) And Santayana lives on: Students' views on the purposes for
studying American history, Journal of Curriculum Studies, 29:5, 529-558, DOI:
10.1080/002202797183892

Strauss, Valerie. “Analysis | Why so Many Students Hate History - and What to Do about
It.” The Washington Post, WP Company, 18 Apr. 2019,
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/answer-sheet/wp/2017/05/17/why-so-many-
students-hate-history-and-what-to-do-about-it/. 

Romanowski, Michael H. “Problems of Bias in History Textbooks.” Problems of Bias in

History Textbooks,
https://www.socialstudies.org/sites/default/files/publications/se/6003/600310.html.