Anyone else jolted out of their complacency by reading Lies My Teacher Told Me?

[Catherine]

I haven't finished the book, but after a few chapters, I redid my eighth grader's history to focus far more on primary sources, and less on secondary sources, though there are still many, many of these in our history study. But it is difficult, because of the sheer volume of primary sources, and the need to find a narrative to follow-I'd love for him to read Lincoln's letters, for example (we do moderns this year), but he obviously can't read them all.

 

I am wondering how those of you who use a lot of primary sources for history choose and find what to use. Disclaimer-I am NOT a history person-I'm learning all the time, but I don't already know what's out there.

[Julie in Austin]

I enjoyed that book.

 

While I think primary sources are, of course, terrific, I don't know that the only solution to the problems that he raises are to turn to primary sources.

 

One thing that I will often do is to look up an issue on wikipedia, esp. the "criticism" section. Not that I consider wiki itself an always-reliable source of information, but it is a pretty good clearinghouse for "the other side" that I might not always have known exists.

 

Another terrific source is the Critical Thinking in US History books, which are great for presenting (at least) two sides to every issue and encouraging kids to, well, think critically about what they are studying.

[MorganClassicalPrep]

I actually don't think the problem is secondary sources, it is the tertiary sources that create a problem. Things like textbooks are tertiary sources. The writers of most textbooks pull from secondary sources for their information, so it is twice removed from the primary. Sort of like the childhood game of telephone, if you get far enough down the line the message gets twisted.

 

There are many quality secondary sources out there, but I don't know how to find good sources for children. I use search engines on my college library website to find most of my sources. JSTOR is the primary search engine I use, but I'm pretty sure you have to pay for the use of it.

[Kirch]

I thought the book was really interesting, and it did really make me think about how to teach history to my kids. It's been a while since I read it, but I remember hearing or reading something else about the same time that warned against going too far in the *opposite* direction (i.e., Columbus was pure evil vs. Columbus was a saint). I definitely came out with a desire to focus more on primary sources, but even there you have to be careful to find as much as you can from all sides. You also have to know the cultures you're studying, because things will look very different viewed through the lenses of modern sensibilities.

 

But I think the thing that bugged me the most after reading that book is realizing how much misinformation continues to be taught simply out of laziness--either it's too much trouble to find out the truth (or at least more balance) or it will supposedly cause too much stress/havoc to teach it.

[Guest]

I read this book a number of years ago, read another about the misconceptions/lies that monuments perpetuate, and am now reading Teaching What Really Happened (also by James Loewen). This book suggests ways to help students think critically about their textbooks and also recommends further books with even more specific details about using primary documents, but also political cartoons, monuments, maps, etc. Most of the readings and activities are recommended for high schoolers, but can be adjusted for middle school. However, a good pair of books that offers suggestions not for source materials in particular but for questions/topics for all grade levels comes from the UCLA Center for History in the Schools; the two books are called Bring History Alive! There's one for world history, one for US. http://nchs.ucla.edu

 

But there are also other books that make you really stop and think about what we take as set in stone. For instance, the other day I found a book called Lost States, which tells some amazing stories about how chancy it was that the states took the shape and number they did; there were all sorts of alternate state border propositions, different ways of carving up the territories, plus ideas about annexing other Pacific Islands, Cuba, and other places. Makes you aware how contingent even such a thing as the shape and size of our country really is. There are lots of little treasures like that one you can use to make kids aware of the "back story" behind official history.

[Catherine]

I will definitely look into the UCLA book, because one of my difficulties, as I was saying, is locating knowing what questions to ask. I think our history study so far has tended to focus only on the narrative, which of course is what younger children need, but it's also the foundation for further study. Now, I'd like to move into more depth and less breadth for my 13 yo. 17 yo-too late for him!

[Catherine]

I have access to an academic library through work-I can check into their access to JSTOR. Thank you. And I agree-it's the textbooks, as Loewen points out, that are most problematic.