Historical Truth Chapter 6

1
Historical Truth Chapter 6

• How Can I Encourage
• Students to Use Historical
• Fiction to Build Their
• Understanding of History?

2
Historical Thinking

• The Framework of Mara Zarnowskis Making Sense
  of History
• Big Idea
• How can I encourage students to use historical
  fiction to build their understanding of history?
• Teaching history should be beyond teaching just
  simple facts about human history. There are two
  purposes of teaching history to students. One is
  savoring history to make it more interesting and
  approachable for students so that they can
  associate themselves with fictional historical
  figures. The other purpose is teaching
  historical knowledge to help students understand
  the past, present and future. The benefit of
  introducing historical fiction is students can
  hear the voices that were silenced and missing
  from historical accounts in the social studies
  curriculum.
• Zarnowski states
• Historical truth is a broader concept than our
  everyday, common-sense notion of what is true or
  false
• Verifiable truth Literal truth
• Unverifiable truth Artistic truth or
  Historical trueness
• Historical fiction written for children and
  young adults reflects only a narrow range of
  historical interpretations and perspectives
• Think about the accuracy of historical facts.
• e.g., Saddako

3

• Teachers report that historical fiction is
  appealing to students and sparks interest in
  learning.
• -Can learn about the difficult parts of history
  in approachable ways.
• e.g., Days of Tears
• Historical fiction that contains previously
  unheard voices
• -See and feel history from different perspectives
  and points of views.
• e.g., The Game of Silence and Worth
• Historical fiction and nonfiction on the same
  topic
• -Providing examples of different kinds of
  historical truth.
• e.g., Fever and An American Plague
• See Suggested Historical Fiction and Nonfiction
  on the Same Topic
• Zarnowskis 6 week Lesson plan outline
• Week 1 and 2 Reading historical fiction
  Savoring the story and sorting out fact and
  fiction
• Week 3 and 4 Reading nonfiction Clarifying
  Not Sure items
• Week 5 and 6 Writing a class question-andanswer
  book Documenting the facts

4
Historical Literature

• Suggested Historical Fiction and Nonfiction on
  the Same Topic in Chapter 6
• Big Idea
• This list of historical fiction /nonfiction
  pairs will provide students opportunities to
  inquire historical truth and gain historical know
  ledges

Topic Historical Fiction Nonfiction
American Revolution My Brother Sam is Dead by Collier and Collier Give Me Liberty! By Freedman
Child Labor January 1905 by Boling Kids at Work by Freedman
California Gold Rush The Ballad of Lucy Whipple by Cushman The Great American Gold Rush by Blumberg
Coal Mining Coal Miners Bride by Bartoletti Growing up in Coal Country by Bartoletti
Dust Bowl Out of the Dust by Hesse Children of the Dust Bowl by Stanley
Irish Potato Famine Nory Ryans Song by Giff Black Potatoes by Bartoletti
Orphan Trains Rodzina by Cushman Orphan Train Rider by Warren
Slavery Days of Tears by Lester Slavery Time When I Was Chillun by Hurmence
Teddy Roosevelt The Presidents Daughter by Bradley Theodore Roosevelt by Betsy Harvey Kraft
Yellow Fever Epidemic 1973 Fever 1973 by Anderson An American Plague by Murphy
5

• Suggested Historical Literature in Chapter 6
• Big Idea
• How does Historical Fiction Contribute to an
  understanding of historical truth?

6
Hands On Experiences

• Teaching Idea 1 Help students see that
  historical fiction reflects the times in which it
  was written.
• - Have students read Johnny Tremain which was
  written in 1943 during World War II and compare
  it with My Brother Sam is Dead by Collier
  Collier which was written in 1974 during the
  Vietnam War era.
• - Then have students discuss the attitude of
  each author towards war and why the authors wrote
  the books
• Teaching Idea 2 Compare The Birchbark House with
  Little House in the Big Woods
• - Introduce two books to students and
  explain that both books deal with westward
  expansion by different group of people- the
  Ojibiwa community in The Birchbark House and a
  pioneer family in Little House in the Big House
• - Invite students compare work, play, family
  life, hardship and pleasures in daily life
  between the books
• Teaching Idea 3 Compare historical novels about
  the Orphan Trains
• - Introduce Worth and Rodzina to students
  and tell them the main characters in the books
  are different.
• - Have them read and discuss how the two
  characters experiences with Orphan train differ
  from each other.
• - What are the main characters conflicts?
• - How are these conflicts resolved?
• - How do these books help you understand how
  children were affected by the orphan train
  program?

7

• Teaching Idea 4 Use Days of Tears for Readers
  Theater for 6th grade and up.
• The book contains a series of powerful monologue
  and dialogue that can lead to good discussions.
• - The Kitchen (pp.3-14).
• Characters 2 slaves, Mattie, Will (Matties
  husband), Emma (the daughter of Mattie and Will)
• Dialogue Having a serious discussion about
  upcoming sale of slaves
• - Interlude 1 Emma as am Old Woman
  (pp.15-17)
• Character Old Emma
• Monologue Emma recalls the horror of that day
  and claims that no picture can capture what it
  felt like.
• - The Dining Room (pp.18-29)
• Characters Master, Slave-Seller
• Dialogue conversation between the master and
  slave-seller

8

• Teaching Idea 5 What to ask?
• Zarnowski claimed that students need to be able
  to ask deeper and critical thinking questions
  beyond knowing what happened in the story. Here
  are questions Zarnowski suggested.
• How does the book help me understand daily life
  in the past?
• Could the events really happen? What evidence
  do I have?
• Which events really happened? How do I know?
• Which characters really existed? How do I
  know?

9
Historical Accounts Chapter 7

• How Can I Show Students
• That Accounts Are
• Incomplete and Require
• Additional Facts to Tell the
• Whole Story?

10
Zarnowski says on p. 163

• Many students are convinced that there is only
  one true version of history. They think that
  most authors of history books dealing with the
  same topic provide exactly the same information,
  but use different words. And if they do spot
  differences in information between books, one
  book must be wrong and the other right

11
Research suggests

• Over time, students develop sophisticated ideas
  about how historical accounts are written

Student thinking What it means
1) All accounts are about the same thing The only differences between two accounts are the differences in the words used
2) We cant know the past Because we never saw what happened in the past, we cant know what happened
3) We can know the past, but not all of it Gaps in information and errors cause differences in accounts.
4) Authors can distort accounts Authors can actively contribute to distorting the past by exaggerating, giving in to bias, and telling lies
5) Accounts reflect the authors viewpoint Authors may select different questions to answer.
6) Accounts will, of necessity, differ No account will be complete. Accounts will be judged by historic-specific criteria.
12
Research suggests

• Students need to understand that history is based
  on evidence left behind, not on direct
  observation.
• Students need to know that historians rigorously
  question the available evidence they do not
  accept it unconditionally.

13
Historical Literature

• Who Were the Founding Fathers? Two Hundred Years
  of Reinventing American History by Steven H.
  Jaffe
• Jeffersons Children The Story of One American
  Family by Shannon Lanier and Jane Feldman
• The Power of One Daisy Bates and the Little Rock
  Nine by Judith Bloom Fradin and Dennis Brindell
  Fradin

14
Hands on Experiences

• My class played a math game against me. I won.
  We then wrote accounts of the event taking place.
  Which is the right account?
• From p. 178, Inserting Information. During our
  content reading time, students were asked to add
  information to math books add more details than
  were included.

15
Make History Happen in Your Classroom

• Using this organization will help you think about
  goals, materials, and activities, resulting in a
  coherent teaching plan based on theory and
  research but works in your real world classroom.