Download Holt Social Studies: World History Pedagogical

Holt Social Studies:
World History
© 2006
Pedagogical
Research Report
Holt, Rinehart and Winston
Holt Social Studies: World History
Pedagogical Research Report
Table of Contents
Introduction.................................................................................................................................... 1
Organization.................................................................................................................................. 2
Strand 1: Reading Informative and Expository Texts............................................................. 3
Defining the Strand ................................................................................................................................... 3
Research that Guided the Development .................................................................................................. 3
From Research to Practice ....................................................................................................................... 7
Strand 2: Effective Instructional Approaches........................................................................... 9
Defining the Strand ................................................................................................................................... 9
Research that Guided the Development .................................................................................................. 9
From Research to Practice ..................................................................................................................... 13
Strand 3: Meeting the Needs of All Students......................................................................... 15
Defining the Strand ................................................................................................................................. 15
Research that Guided the Development ................................................................................................ 15
From Research to Practice ..................................................................................................................... 19
Strand 4: Assessment ............................................................................................................... 21
Defining the Strand ................................................................................................................................. 21
Research that Guided the Development ................................................................................................ 21
From Research to Practice ..................................................................................................................... 26
Strand 5: Teaching World History............................................................................................ 27
Defining the Strand ................................................................................................................................. 27
Research that Guided the Development ................................................................................................ 27
From Research to Practice ..................................................................................................................... 30
Bibliography ................................................................................................................................ 32
Research Base for Holt Social Studies: World History
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Introduction
Holt Social Studies: World History
Pedagogical Research Report
Introduction
On January 8, 2002, President George W. Bush signed into law the No Child Left
Behind Act of 2001. This law contains the most comprehensive reforms of the
Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) since it was enacted in 1965. One
fundamental principle of the new law is that schools and teachers should implement
teaching methods that have been proven to work—effective teaching methods that have
been identified through sound research.
The purpose of this document is to demonstrate clearly and explicitly the scientific
research upon which Holt Social Studies: World History is based. The document is
organized by five major instructional strands that underpin the program:
• Teaching students to read informative and expository texts;
• Using effective instructional approaches;
• Differentiating instruction to meet the needs of all students;
• Using effective assessment to guide instruction;
• Using effective strategies for teaching world history.
These strands describe the key components of world history instruction as identified by
research specifically focused on the social studies and by research on teaching and
learning across the content areas. The Holt Social Studies: World History program
makes use of a number of pedagogical approaches that are based on research findings
unique to social studies education as well as those that have been proven effective
across the content areas. Therefore, these strands encompass topics both specific to
world history and social studies and relevant across content areas.
Research Base for Holt Social Studies: World History
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Organization
Holt Social Studies: World History
Pedagogical Research Report
Organization
This booklet is organized by the five strands that were introduced on the previous page.
•
•
•
•
•
Strand 1: Reading Informative and Expository Texts
Strand 2: Effective Instructional Approaches
Strand 3: Meeting the Needs of All Students
Strand 4: Assessment
Strand 5: Teaching World History
To show how the strands are connected to research and the contents of Holt Social
Studies: World History, this booklet is organized by the following sections within each
strand:
o Defining the Strand. This section summarizes the terminology and findings of
the research.
o Excerpts from the Research that Guided the Development of Holt Social
Studies: World History. This section identifies subtopics within each strand and
provides excerpts from relevant research on each subtopic within the strand.
o From Research to Practice. This section explains how the research data is
exemplified in Holt Social Studies: World History. For each subtopic, you will
find a chart identifying the page numbers of illustrative examples of the researchbased instructional methodology.
At the end of the booklet, you will find a list of all works cited.
Research Base for Holt Social Studies: World History
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Strand 1 – Reading Informative and Expository Texts
What Does Scientifically Based Research Tell Us about
Strand 1: Reading Informative and
Expository Texts
Defining the Strand
At the middle grades, the goals of reading instruction are to develop the student’s ability
to read independently with comprehension, to read for enjoyment as well as information,
and to have the stamina and strategies to continue reading and comprehending difficult
texts.
In the social studies, effective reading comprehension is essential to mastering the
content. Successful social studies instruction requires attention to reading instruction,
particularly the skills and strategies involved in comprehending expository texts and
graphic features.
Research suggests that an effective program for middle grades students requires:
• considerate text;
• support for students’ vocabulary acquisition;
• comprehension strategy instruction; and
• the use of graphic organizers to support comprehension.
Research that Guided the Development
Considerate Text
“Considerate text is characterized by features such as coherence and audience
appropriateness, which were suggested by cognitive theory and research to facilitate learning
from reading…. The concept of considerate text can be helpful in evaluating, revising, and
writing informational text.” (Armbruster 97)
“The more coherent the text is, the more the reader will be able to make internal connections
and construct a coherent cognitive model of the information in the text. … Research has shown
that the better organized the text, the greater the learning. Therefore, a considerate text has a
clear, easily identifiable organization. Clear text organization can be accomplished in several
ways, for example, through the use of headings and subheadings, introductions and summaries,
topic sentences, and signal words and phrases that announce the text structure… In addition to
making internal connections, readers must also make external connections between the
information in the text and their background knowledge and experience. Considerate text is
appropriate to the needs of the reading audience in that it provides adequate explanation and
elaboration of information and engages the reader.” (Armbruster 97-98)
“By coherent text we mean text in which the sequence of ideas makes sense and the nature of
the ideas and their relationships is made apparent … One proven ingredient is more coherent
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Strand 1 – Reading Informative and Expository Texts
texts. Texts that exhibit more coherence have repeatedly been shown to bring about enhanced
understanding of the causal sequence of events and ideas presented in textbooks...” (Beck and
McKeown 237, 254)
“Recent studies have demonstrated that revisions that increased the structural and explanatory
coherence of texts resulted in substantial increases in recall among fifth-grade students… and
college students… (McNamara, Kintsch, Songer, and Kintsch 2)
“We found that readers who know little about the domain of the text benefit from a coherent
text…” (McNamara, Kintsch, Songer, and Kintsch 1)
“We conclude… that revising instructional texts to be more coherent and explicit can indeed
foster better text memory and learning.” (McNamara and Kintsch 282)
“This experiment examined the effects of headings and adjunct questions embedded in
expository text on the delayed multiple-choice text performance of college students. Subjects in
the headings-present group performed significantly better on the retention text than did the
subjects in the headings-absent group. … The results support the view that headings may
promote the organization of passage information so as to increase its general availability…”
(Wilhite 23)
“The studies reviewed for this synthesis provided evidence that the organization of text,
students’ awareness of that organization, and students’ strategic use of text organization affect
their comprehension. The organization of text includes the visual, physical organization (e.g.,
headings, subheadings, location of main idea, spacing) as well as less visible, more abstract
text structures (e.g., narrative, sequence, or descriptive text structures)…” (Dickson, Simmons,
and Kameenui 7)
Vocabulary Development
“In social studies, challenges for readers include how to navigate a wealth of factual information
replete with unfamiliar names, events, and concepts. This is similar to trying to make sense of a
paragraph in which all the familiar place names have been substituted with made-up or
unfamiliar terms. Everyone who reads it could struggle. Many students face this trial in
classrooms daily. In their attempts to absorb facts and concepts in a text, students may miss
why it is to their advantage to gain insight about a time period in history or how a government
functions. Vocabulary demands in social studies texts often require readers to construct
meaning for concepts that are abstract. Concepts such as imperialism, migration, culture,
monarchy, socialization, opportunity cost, and separation of power, for example, are open to
multiple interpretations and require students to learn through a number of contexts as they
refine and elaborate on their initial understandings.” (International Reading Association 31)
“One of the strongest findings about vocabulary instruction, whether direct instruction or learning
words from context, is that multiple encounters are required before a word is really known…”
(Beck, McKeown, and Kucan 73)
“The findings on vocabulary yielded several specific implications for teaching reading. First,
vocabulary should be taught both directly and indirectly. Repetition and multiple exposures to
vocabulary items are important. Learning in rich contexts, incidental learning, and use of
computer technology all enhance the acquisition of vocabulary. Direct instruction should include
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Strand 1 – Reading Informative and Expository Texts
task restructuring as necessary and should actively engage the student.” (Report of the
National Reading Panel 14)
“Based on these trends in the data, the Panel offers the following implications for practice:
1. Vocabulary should be taught both directly and indirectly.
2. Repetition and multiple exposures to vocabulary items are important.
3. Learning in rich contexts is valuable for vocabulary learning.
4. Vocabulary tasks should be restructured when necessary.
5. Vocabulary learning should entail active engagement in learning tasks.
6. Computer technology can be used to help teach vocabulary.
7. Vocabulary can be acquired through incidental learning.
8. How vocabulary is assessed and evaluated can have differential effects on instruction.
9. Dependence on a single vocabulary instruction method will not result in optimal learning.”
(Report of the National Reading Panel 4-27)
“Effective instruction with word meanings 1) relates what students know to the word receiving
attention; 2) shows the relationship of the word targeted for instruction to other words; 3)
provides opportunities for students to use the word they are learning in thoughtful ways.”
(Durkin 268)
“The implication of these results is that preteaching unfamiliar vocabulary can have a direct
effect on students’ understanding of specific ideas within a text.” (Wixson 327)
Comprehension Strategy Instruction
“Experts in reading and studying in the content areas … claim that since content is expressed in
language, instruction in reading comprehension and studying is, or should be, part of the
content area curriculum.” (Armbruster and Gubrandsen 37)
“The past two decades of research appear to support the enthusiastic advocacy of instruction of
reading strategies….The Panel’s review of the literature indicates that there has been an
extensive effort to identify reading comprehension strategies that can be taught to students to
increase their comprehension and memory for text. The instruction of cognitive strategies
improves reading comprehension in readers with a range of abilities….” (Report of the National
Reading Panel 4-46–47)
“Effective comprehension strategy instruction is explicit, or direct. Research shows that explicit
teaching techniques are particularly effective for comprehension strategy instruction. In explicit
instruction, teachers tell readers why and when they should use strategies, what strategies to
use, and how to apply them. The steps of explicit instruction typically include direct explanation,
teacher modeling (‘thinking aloud’), guided practice, and application.
• Direct explanation. The teacher explains to students why the strategy helps comprehension
and when to apply the strategy.
• Modeling. The teacher models, or demonstrates, how to apply the strategy, usually by
‘thinking aloud’ while reading the text that the students are using.
• Guided practice. The teacher guides and assists students as they learn how and when to
apply the strategy.
• Application. The teacher helps students practice the strategy until they can apply it
independently.” (Center for the Improvement of Early Reading 53)
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Strand 1 – Reading Informative and Expository Texts
“The research on comprehension strategy teaching provides powerful evidence that most
struggling readers (and many not so struggling readers) benefit enormously when we can
construct lessons that help make the comprehension processes visible. Many students only
develop the strategies they need with much instructional support. Traditional “assign and
assess” lessons (Read the chapter and answer questions at the end.) offer little useful
assistance for these students. Instead of assign and assess lessons these students need
demonstrations of effective strategy use and lots of opportunities to apply the demonstrated
strategy over time.” (Allington 98)
“Results so far indicate that the group that gained significantly more than others in use of target
strategies also gained significantly more than the others in reading comprehension.” (Bereiter
and Bird 149)
“Overall, teaching students the cognitive strategy of generating questions about the material
they had read resulted in gains in comprehension, as measured by tests given at the end of the
intervention.” (Rosenshine, Meister, and Chapman 181)
“A series of dependent measures assessing students’ ability to recognize and produce explicit
and implicit main ideas at the paragraph and short passage levels indicated a powerful
treatment effect favoring the Strategy group over both the Basal and Control groups. These
results are interpreted as further support for the efficacy of a direct instruction paradigm for
teaching children reading comprehension skills.” (Baumann 93)
Graphic Organizers
“…Graphic organizers help students read to learn from information text in the content areas,
such as science and social studies textbooks….” (Center for the Improvement of Early Reading
51)
“Graphic organizers can:
• help students focus on text structure as they read;
• provide students with tools they can use to examine and visually represent relationships in a
text; and
• help students write well-organized summaries of a text.” (Center for the Improvement of
Early Reading 51)
“…teachers in the subject areas have begun to discover that visual organizers such as time
lines, Venn diagrams, inductive towers, concept maps, causal chains, force fields, and flow
charts help students recognize and take control of the intellectual processes which bring
meaning to the study of academic content. Visual organizers reflect patterns of thinking about
content knowledge; they allow teachers to focus student attention on higher order thinking skills
without shifting attention from subject area instruction. Content area teachers can use visual
organizers in the classroom to clarify the purposes and the thinking processes that make
learning meaningful…” (Clarke 526)
“In spite of the traditional bias toward verbal over visual forms of instruction, a growing research
base suggests that text illustrations can have important effects on student learning.” (Mayer and
Gallini 715)
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Strand 1 – Reading Informative and Expository Texts
“Judging by the experimental studies…we know that engaging students in identifying the big
ideas in a text and in graphically depicting the relationships among these ideas improves their
recall and comprehension of text.” (Snow 33)
“The main effect of graphic organizers appears to be on the improvement of the reader’s
memory for the content that has been read. …Teaching students to organize the ideas that they
are reading about in a systematic, visual graph benefits the ability of the students to remember
what they read and may transfer, in general, to better comprehension and achievement in
Social Studies and Science content areas.” (Report of the National Reading Panel 4-45)
“Pearson and Fielding (1991) reported that 13 series of studies teaching students to study or
create visual representations of key ideas in text (e.g., networking, flowcharting, Construct,
mapping, conceptual frames, graphic organizers, conceptual mapping) benefited reading
comprehension.” (Dickson, Simmons, and Kameenui 21)
From Research to Practice
Considerate Text Considerate texts, or texts that are “friendly” to readers, are written at a level
appropriate for their audience and have a coherent, easy-to-follow organization and structure.
Such texts use visual design and verbal explanations to enhance, clarify, and prioritize the
concepts and skills to be mastered.
Ancient Civilizations SE: pp. 56, 196, 231
World History SE: pp. 342, 360, 508, 595, 672
Example: “Early peoples settled where crops would grow. Crops usually grew well near
rivers, where water was available and regular floods made the soil rich. One regions in
Southwest Asia was especially well suited for farming. It lay between two rivers.”
(Ancient Civilizations SE, p. 56)
Vocabulary Development One important part of comprehension, or meaning making, while
reading informational texts is vocabulary knowledge and development. Understanding
vocabulary is essential to comprehending while reading. Research shows that students can
improve their vocabularies through instruction in words and word study.
Ancient Civilizations SE: pp. 57, 74, 371, R30—R41
World History SE: pp. 111, 328, 371, R36—R53
Example: “Kush’s exports—items sent out to other regions—included gold, pottery,
iron tools, slaves and ivory. Kushite merchants also exported leopard skins, ostrich
feathers, and elephants. In return, the Kushites received imports—goods brought in
from other regions—such as fine jewelry and luxury items from Egypt, Asia, and other
lands along the Mediterranean Sea.”
Comprehension Strategy Instruction Effective social studies programs use instructional
approaches that have been proven effective by research across the content areas. One such
approach is explicit instruction in comprehension strategies. Students must learn that reading is
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Strand 1 – Reading Informative and Expository Texts
an active process of making meaning, and they must practice using the various skills and
strategies involved in that process.
Ancient Civilizations SE: pp. 161, 180—181, 311—312
World History SE: pp. 372, 394, 522—523, 605—606
Example: Reading Social Studies feature at start of each chapter. It shows students
how to become more active readers as they work through the book. (World History SE,
pp. 522—523)
Graphic Organizers Another effective instructional approach for teaching students how to read
informational texts is the use of graphic organizers and visuals as a teaching aid. Information
has always been presented visually in the social studies, through the study of maps, charts, and
timelines. These, and other graphic organizers, assist students in understanding content by
combining words and images to show the relationships between and among ideas. Research
suggests that graphic organizers that are used in textbooks or are teacher-created are effective
in helping students understand and make connections between ideas.
Ancient Civilizations SE: pp. 26, 144, 267, 312
World History SE: pp. 84, 386, 511, 604
Example: Taking Notes feature at beginning and end of each section gives students a
wide range of examples of what a graphic organizer looks like and how it can help them
organize their notes. (Ancient Civilizations SE, pp. 144, 267)
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Strand 2 – Effective Instructional Approaches
What Does Scientifically Based Research Tell Us about
Strand 2: Effective Instructional Approaches
Defining the Strand
Effective social studies programs use instructional approaches that have been proven effective
by research across the content areas. A program that includes appropriate instruction for all
students will include the following approaches:
• providing direct and explicit instruction;
• giving needed support while students are learning;
• modeling both processes and products;
• making interdisciplinary connections;
• supporting group and peer collaboration.
Research that Guided the Development
Direct/Explicit Instruction
“The term direct instruction has been used by researchers to refer to a pattern of teaching that
consists of the teacher’s explaining a new concept or skill to a large group of students, having
them test their understanding by practicing under teacher direction (that is, controlled practice),
and encouraging them to continue to practice under teacher guidance (guided practice).”
(Joyce, Weil, and Calhoun 339)
“Brown and Palincsar (1982) have shown that direct instruction involving three strategies is
particularly effective: instruction in comprehension-fostering strategies, instruction on the
importance and usefulness of the strategies, and metacognitive monitoring strategies to check
the appropriateness of strategy use. This type of direct instruction on strategies has been
applied successfully in a number of studies on a variety of comprehension skills…” (Stevens,
Slavin, and Farnish 8)
“Students in the two instructional treatments which incorporated direct instruction on main idea
strategies performed significantly better than control students in identifying main ideas of
passages.” (Stevens, Slavin, and Farnish 8)
“The results of this study show the significant impact of direct instruction and cooperative
learning teaching students specific reading-comprehension strategies. Clearly, direct instruction
on comprehension strategies, a component of both experimental treatments, is an important
aspect of effective teaching. Direct instruction involves teachers presenting comprehension and
metacomprehension strategies, and students practicing the strategies with teachers guiding
them and giving them corrective feedback. In this study, the two experimental treatments that
incorporated direct instruction yielded significant and substantial effects on students’
achievement. This evidence replicates the findings in a number of previous studies…” (Stevens,
Slavin, and Farnish 14)
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Strand 2 – Effective Instructional Approaches
“The findings substantiate[d] that strategies can be directly taught and that direct teaching of
strategies benefits struggling readers.” (Duffy 33)
“Content area teachers can make a difference in the school lives of adolescents when they
incorporate reading strategy mini-lessons into their instructional repertoire. Explicit instruction in
the development and use of reading strategies requires explanation, modeling, practice, and
application…” (Vacca 194)
“The rationale for the explicit teaching of comprehension skills is that comprehension can be
improved by teaching students to use specific cognitive strategies or to reason strategically
when they encounter barriers to understanding what they are reading. Readers acquire these
strategies informally to some extent, but explicit or formal instruction in the application of
comprehension strategies has been shown to be highly effective in enhancing understanding.
The teacher generally demonstrates such strategies for students until the students are able to
carry them out independently.” (Report of the National Reading Panel 14)
“A series of dependent measures assessing students’ ability to recognize and produce explicit
and implicit main ideas at the paragraph and short passage levels indicated a powerful
treatment effect favoring the Strategy group over both the Basal and Control groups. These
results are interpreted as further support for the efficacy of a direct instruction paradigm for
teaching children reading comprehension skills.” (Baumann 93)
Scaffolding
“…scaffolding has repeatedly been identified as one of the most effective instructional
techniques available... “ (Graves and Avery 138)
“The students’ engagement in complex processes is made possible by providing them with a
variety of supports [e.g., well-structured assignments; models and examples, strategic
sequencing of activities, peer-response groups] and gradually withdrawing the supports as
students appear to become more fluent in their use.” (Hillocks 255)
“Although scaffolds can be applied to the teaching of all skills, they are particularly useful, and
often indispensable, for teaching higher-level cognitive strategies where many of the steps or
procedures necessary to carry out these strategies cannot be specified.” (Rosenshine and
Meister 26)
“The study of history provides an ideal opportunity to develop and practice the kind of complex
thinking skills needed for a rapidly changing world. Historical readings, however, can be difficult
for young people…At the secondary level in particular, teachers are frequently unfamiliar with
reading strategies that could help bridge the gap between the text and student understanding. A
few relatively simple techniques, however, can make the difference between a frustrating
reading experience and one that is meaningful to students. The Scaffolded Reading Experience
offers an array of strategies for structuring and enhancing the reading of historical documents
and texts…” (Graves and Avery 138)
“Scaffolding means supporting students in their initial learning. History instruction should provide
students with temporary support until their learning becomes self-regulated. Scaffolding in
history can be accomplished in many different ways. One form of scaffolding is interspersed
questioning… Another form of scaffolding is to support students by using illustrations in an
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Strand 2 – Effective Instructional Approaches
attempt to portray visually the concepts being discussed in the textbook.” (Carnine, Caros,
Crawford, Hollenbeck, and Harniss 215-216)
Modeling
“[Comprehension] strategies can be taught directly and explicitly following a process in which
the teacher models and explains the strategy, then students apply the strategy by practicing it
with a range of texts under the coaching of the teacher or more skilled reader (scaffolded
practice). The teacher’s role is to monitor the use of the strategy, offer less coaching as less is
called for (removing the scaffold), ask students what strategy they are using and why (therefore
bringing the use of the strategy to the students’ awareness), give students continued opportunity
to observe more modeling, and provide multiple and ongoing opportunities for students to
transact with other students with a range of texts.” (Beers 37)
“The research on comprehension strategy teaching provides powerful evidence that most
struggling readers (and many not so struggling readers) benefit enormously when we can
construct lessons that help make the comprehension processes visible … students need
demonstrations of effective strategy use and lots of opportunities to apply the demonstrated
strategy over time.” (Allington, 2001, 98)
“Teachers should also demonstrate how to apply each strategy successfully – what it is, how it is
carried out, and when and why it should be used … Instead of just talking about a strategy,
teachers need to illustrate the processes they use by thinking aloud, or modeling mental
processes, while they read.” (Fielding and Pearson 65)
Interdisciplinary/Cross-curricular Instruction
“Social studies teaching and learning are powerful when they are integrative.
• Social studies is integrative in its treatment of topics.
• It is integrative across time and space.
• Social studies teaching integrates knowledge, skills, beliefs, values, and attitudes to action.
• Social studies teaching and learning integrate effective use of technology.
• Social studies teaching and learning integrate across the curriculum.” (Curriculum Standards
for Social Studies 11)
“There are several reasons why interdisciplinary teaching is important:
1. The brain searches for common patterns and connections. Thus history, properly
enlivened by relevant literature, becomes a way of making meaning out of other content.
2. Every experience actually contains with it the seeds of many, and possibly all,
disciplines. Thus recent developments in Eastern Europe involve history, geography,
politics, comparative religion, economics, and social science…
3. One of the keys to understanding is what is technically called redundancy. In other
words, if the same message can be packed in several ways, the receiver has a much
better chance of grasping what is actually happening.” (Caine and Caine 119-120)
“Today’s interest in curriculum integration is also generated from … the recent research in
cognitive science and neuroscience demonstrating the necessity of helping learners establish
bridges between school and life, knowing and doing, and content and context…[see Solomon
(1997), Abbott (1997), and Pool (1997)]” (Roberts and Kellough 4)
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Strand 2 – Effective Instructional Approaches
Group and Peer Collaboration
“…the social studies program should be designed to increase the student’s ability to
express and advocate reasoned personal convictions within groups, recognize mutual
ethical responsibility within groups, participate in negotiating conflicts and differences or
maintain an individual position because of its ethical basis, work individually and in
groups, and accept and fulfill responsibilities associated with citizenship in a democratic
republic.” (Curriculum Standards for Social Studies 8)
“Cooperative learning methods are instructional techniques in which students work in small
groups to help one another master academic content or carry out group projects….Motivational
theories emphasize the idea that in groups working toward a common goal, students support
one another’s academic efforts, because each group member’s success helps the group to
succeed. Cognitive theories emphasize opportunities for collaborating students to model higher
order solutions for one another, and to provide immediate, context-appropriate explanations and
feedback to one another.” (Slavin, 2002, 115)
“Over 323 studies have been conducted over the past 90 years comparing the relative impact of
cooperative, competitive, and individualistic learning situations on achievement. On the basis of
this research, it may be concluded that generally achievement is higher in cooperative situations
than in competitive or individualistic ones and that cooperative efforts result in more frequent
use of higher-level reasoning strategies, more frequent process gain and collective induction,
and higher performance on subsequent tests taken individually…” (Johnson and Johnson, 1990,
33)
“Research evidence convincingly argues that ‘good things’ can and do happen when
Cooperative Learning Groups are used (Slavin 1987; Vermette 1987). Users of CLGs can
expect these outcomes for their own students:
• an increase in conceptual achievement
• an increase in the use of critical thinking and higher-order thinking skills
• an increase in individual self-esteem
• an increase in positive attitudes toward those who are culturally or racially different”
(Vermette 271)
“Having peers … interact over the use of reading strategies leads to an increase in the learning
of strategies, promotes intellectual discussion, and increases reading comprehension.” (Report
of the National Reading Panel 4-45)
“(Effective) Teachers form instructional groups that fit students’ academic and affective needs.
Teachers:
a. Use whole group instruction when introducing new concepts and skills.
b. Form smaller groups as needed to make sure all students learn thoroughly. …
f. Make use of heterogeneous cooperative learning groups, structuring these so that there
are both group rewards and individual accountability. … (Cotton 9-10)
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Strand 2 – Effective Instructional Approaches
From Research to Practice
Direct/Explicit Instruction: Asking students to read a text or discussing the contents of text
may help students learn from that text, but it will not teach students how to read and
comprehend on their own. To meet the needs of their students, educators must show students,
directly and explicitly, how to comprehend a text. Educators must make visible the invisible
processes of comprehension so that students can learn how to read and understand texts.
Ancient Civilizations SE: pp. H3—H5, H10—H13, 322—323
World History TE: pp. 317a—317b, 378—379, 680
Example: Reading Like Historian strand helps students to read the text from a historical
perspective. It gives them the tools and knowledge that they need to work their way
through the text successfully. (Ancient Civilizations SE, pp. H3—H5)
Scaffolding: Any process that supports a learner in solving a challenging problem or carrying
out a difficult task is scaffolding. A scaffold might be a tool (such as a graphic organizer) or an
instructional technique (such as a pre-reading discussion). An instructional program that
provides scaffolding follows a logical structure, purposefully selects and sequences models and
examples, and includes materials to guide student learning (such as key words, worksheets,
visuals, and graphic organizers). The goal of scaffolding is independence. When scaffolding is
removed, students apply what they learned in new situations. In social studies, where the
course goals include teaching content and ways of thinking, scaffolding is essential.
Ancient Civilizations SE: pp. 141, 268, 291, 380
World History SE: pp. 394, 352—353, 440, 592
Example: “Building Background: Japan is a large group of islands located east of the
Asian mainland. Life in Japan has always been influenced by many factors. The islands’
geography and location shaped how people lived there, and as you read above, visitors
from other lands also affected Japanese society.” (World History SE, p. 440)
Modeling: When we learn any new skill, the first step is often to watch the performance of an
expert. The next step is to take this expert performance and break it down into a set of more
easily learned steps. Modeling refers to this kind of expert demonstration. In content-area
reading, effective modeling may be a teacher’s verbalizations of his or her thoughts and strategy
use while reading and thinking about an informational text. Students in the social studies benefit
from seeing and studying models of the process or performance they are trying to emulate.
Ancient Civilizations SE: pp. 142—143, 278, 322—323, 372
World History SE: pp. 44, 378—379, 460, 556—557
Example: Social Studies Skills: A page at the end of each chapter introduces students
to a new skill and gives them three steps to help them master that skill: Understand the
Skill, Learn the Skill, and Practice and Apply the Skill. (Ancient Civilizations SE: p. 278)
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Strand 2 – Effective Instructional Approaches
Interdisciplinary/Cross-curricular Instruction: Programs that are interdisciplinary are those
that draw on more than one discipline and integrate the content of two or more traditional
disciplines. By its nature, social studies is interdisciplinary. A student cannot understand the
history of a place without recognizing the impact of its geography. Similarly, a study of
geography cannot be undertaken without recognition of the impact of the environment on the
history of a people. The social studies also lend themselves well to connections across
disciplines, including:
• Mathematics – the social studies present opportunities for measuring and graphing data
• Earth science – the social studies require understanding of landforms, the environment, and
Earth’s ecosystems
• English language arts – the social studies provide opportunities for reading primary source
documents and historical fiction.
Research in cognition and the human brain supports the value of interdisciplinary studies;
students learn best when they make connections between ideas and when ideas and concepts
are reinforced repeatedly and in different ways.
Ancient Civilizations SE: pp. 18, 260, 330—331, 444, 450
World History SE: pp. 384—385, 571, 576
Ancient Civilizations TE: pp. 109, 146, 287, 305
Example: Literature in History feature, from the Aeneid by Virgil. “Connecting Literature
to History: 1. Analyze Rome’s leaders wanted their city to have a glorious past that
would make the Roman people proud. What details in this passage would make Roman
readers proud of their past?” (Ancient Civilizations SE: pp. 330—331)
Group and Peer Collaboration: Effective instruction involves a combination of whole-group,
small-group, and independent activities. Research attests to the benefits of having students
learn together in collaborative and cooperative groups. Students who participate in flexible
groups in which they depend on their group members and feel accountable to the group’s
performance appear to learn more effectively. In addition, this kind of group and peer
collaboration may help develop students’ social abilities and their understanding and tolerance
of all students.
Ancient Civilizations SE: pp. 22, 132
World History SE: pp. 488, 655
Ancient Civilizations TE: pp. 160, 265, 317
Example: Social Studies Skills: Making Group Decisions (World History SE, p. 655)
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Strand 3 – Meeting the Needs of All Students
What Does Scientifically Based Research Tell Us about
Strand 3: Meeting the Needs of All Students
Defining the Strand
Effective reading and social studies instruction successfully meets the needs of students with a
wide range of backgrounds, ability levels, and learning styles. Effective instruction addresses
the needs of English-language learners, advanced learners, students with modality preferences,
standard-English learners, and struggling/developmental learners. The No Child Left Behind Act
is inclusive: Schools must reach all learners and meet their learning needs.
A program that meets the needs of all students will:
• Provide suggestions for differentiation, or presenting instruction in varied ways to meet each
learner’s needs; and
• Give specific instructional suggestions to meet the needs of special populations of students.
Research that Guided the Development
Differentiated Instruction
“Differentiation seems a common-sense approach to addressing the needs of a wide variety of
learners, promoting equity and excellence and focusing on best-practice instruction in mixedability classrooms. This makes more sense than the timeworn method of aiming for students in
the middle and hoping for the best for those on the upper and lower extremes.” (Tomlinson,
2001, 5)
“In all classrooms, teachers deal with at least three curricular elements: (1) content – input, what
students learn; (2) process – how students go about making sense of ideas and information;
and (3) product – output, how students demonstrate what they have learned. … By
differentiating these three elements, teachers offer different approaches to what students learn,
how they learn it, and how they demonstrate what they’ve learned.” (Tomlinson, 2001, 4-5)
“[S]tudents not only have strengths in different types of intelligences, but they also vary in…
interest and learning profiles. Therefore, students should not be expected to learn using the
same content, processes, and products. Students in a mixed-ability classroom need
opportunities to work on different tasks rather than simply performing the same task at different
levels. Differentiated instruction includes different learning products to fit individual needs.”
(Baumgartner, Lipowski, and Christy 18)
“In a differentiated classroom, the teacher assumes that different learners have differing needs.
Therefore, the teacher proactively plans a variety of ways to ‘get at’ and express learning.”
(Tomlinson, 2001, 2)
“Teacher responsiveness to individual student levels of readiness, interest, and learning profiles
mandates the use of a differentiated model of instruction.” (Kapusnick and Hauslein 156)
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Strand 3 – Meeting the Needs of All Students
“Students learn better and more easily when teachers use a variety of delivery methods,
providing students with learning experiences that maximize their strengths.” (Kapusnick and
Hauslein 156)
“Differentiation then is the process by which curriculum objectives, teaching methods,
assessment methods, resources and learning activities are planned to cater for the needs of
individual pupils.” (George 420)
Special Populations
Students Who Are Struggling Readers
“The general principle is to use the same continuum of strategies with the struggling readers
(including teacher read-alouds, sustained silent reading, share reading, guided reading, guided
discussion…), but to augment these strategies with intensive instruction on the specific skills
students need to succeed.” (Au 399)
“Each of the three experiments substantiated that GOs (graphic organizers) produced
significantly higher performance than self-study for the students with learning disabilities
enrolled in social studies, science, and health classes at the secondary level (grades 7 and 10).
Further, those findings were documented with remedial and regular education students as well.”
(Horton, Lovitt, and Bergerud 20)
“The research on comprehension strategy teaching provides powerful evidence that most
struggling readers (and many not so struggling readers) benefit enormously when we can
construct lessons that help make the comprehension processes visible. Many students only
develop the strategies they need with much instructional support. Traditional “assign and
assess” lessons (Read the chapter and answer questions at the end.) offer little useful
assistance for these students. Instead of assign and assess lessons these students need
demonstrations of effective strategy use and lots of opportunities to apply the demonstrated
strategy over time.” (Allington 98)
“One of the most exciting results of this body of research [see Baumann (1984), Raphael and
Pearson (1985), and Armbruster (1987)] was that comprehension strategy instruction is
particularly effective for students who began the study as poor comprehenders…” (Fielding and
Pearson 65)
Students for Whom English Is a Second Language
“What can teachers do to help English language learners learn to read and write in English?
These students will benefit from all the approaches recommended so far … the continuum of
strategies, and intensive instruction to develop reading skills and strategies…” (Au 402)
“Fitzgerald’s (1995b) review of research identifies areas in which focused, intensive instruction
appears beneficial for English language learners. These include vocabulary, expository text
structure, and metacognition.” (Au 402)
“On the whole, the studies reviewed in this article support the contention that the cognitive
reading processes of ESL learners are substantively the same as those of native English
speakers. … Collectively, these forms of evidence, along with other specific findings from the
studies, suggested a relatively good fit to the preexisting native-language reading theories,
models and views…As for instruction, …United States teachers of ESL students could follow
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Strand 3 – Meeting the Needs of All Students
sound principles of reading instruction based on current cognitive research done with native
English speakers.” (Fitzgerald, 1995a, 180-181, 184)
“There are a number of things we can do to help make the task of reading textbooks more
manageable and less frustrating for ESL students. …One way we can help is by reducing the
vocabulary load ESL students may have to contend with. Careful analysis of the content area
text is important to get a better idea of which words are crucial for understanding, which can be
skipped, which can be inferred from context…Teachers can use semantic maps, brainstorming,
structured overviews, and other prereading activities to help ESL students activate background
knowledge… (Teachers can) Lead students to apply selected reading and study skills or
strategies (suggesting a strategy or taking students stepwise through the application)…” (Kang
647-649)
Students with Varied Learning Styles
“A number of studies conducted during the last decade have found that students’ achievement
increases when teaching methods match their learning styles – biological and developmental
characteristics that affect how they learn.” (Dunn, Beaudry, and Klavas 50)
“Theoretically, the closer a teaching strategy is tailored to the learner’s conceptual level, the
more learning will take place (Hunt, 1970b, p. 2).” (Joyce, Weil, and Calhoun 97-98)
“[L]earning style is the way each person begins to concentrate on, process, internalize, and
retain new and difficult academic information. Because each person learns differently from
every other person, the same instructional environment, methods, and resources will be
effective for some learners and ineffective for others.” (Burke and Dunn 104)
“(Effective) Teachers provide clear and focused instruction.
Teachers:
…c. Take note of learning style differences among students, and, when feasible, identify and
use learning strategies and materials that are appropriate to different styles. …” (Cotton 12)
Students with Varied Cultural Backgrounds
“Paying attention to how we teach is an important dimension of teaching in diverse classrooms.
Paying attention to what we teach is another. Teachers should enrich students’ learning of
social studies topics by including multiple viewpoints or perspectives. Multicultural education is
good education because it is more comprehensive. It lays one perspective on an historical event
or character alongside others so that students can compare them and try to draw defensible
conclusions.” (Parker 36)
“Multicultural education has several goals. It endeavors to ground students with multicultural
knowledge, to adopt educational equity and cultural pluralism as philosophies, to empower
students and promote student social action, and to teach from a multicultural perspective.”
(Ford, Howard, and Harris 14)
“Schools should use active problem-based, cooperative-learning activities when appropriate, as
well as activities related to the student’s culture and gender, for the student to realize the
relevance of the task and curriculum.” (Arroyo and Rhoad 151)
“The Center for Research on Education, Diversity, and Excellence (CREDE) developed Five
Standards of Effective Pedagogy based on decades of research across cultural and
socioeconomic contexts… The standards are:
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Strand 3 – Meeting the Needs of All Students
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
Teachers and students working together
Developing language and literacy skills across the curriculum
Connecting lessons to students’ lives
Engaging students in challenging lessons
Emphasizing dialogue over lectures
Studies have shown there is a positive and significant relationship between teachers’ use of the
standards and student performance. [See, for example, Apthorp, D’Amato, and Richardson
(2003); Demmert (2001); Hill, Kawagley, and Barnhardt (2003); Waxman and Tellez (2002).]”
(Klump and McNeir 7)
Students Who Are Advanced Learners
“Advanced learners, like all learners, need learning experiences designed to fit them. …
Advanced learners share other learners’ need for teachers who can help them set high goals,
devise plans for reaching those goals, tolerate frustrations and share joys…” (Tomlinson, 2001,
12)
“Cooperative learning methods generally work equally well for all types of students…Sometimes
a concern is expressed that cooperative learning will hold back high achievers. The research
provides absolutely no support for this claim; high achievers gain from cooperative learning
(relative to high achievers in traditional classes) just as much as do low and average achievers
(Slavin, 1991).” (Slavin, 2002, 118)
“The gifted student should be expected to:
Plan and carry out more complex work.
Use more difficult concepts in planning their work.
Make more accurate measurements.
Complete more stages in an investigation.
Record results more precisely.
Express findings in more sophisticated vocabulary.” (George 420)
•
•
•
•
•
•
“A … general response to the challenges of providing for gifted children is that these children
need enriched curricula made up of learning experiences with greater depth and breadth than
their peer group. Literature, science and social studies are subjects that lend themselves to the
development of enriched curricula and students with special aptitudes often respond with
enthusiasm to programs that allow them to deal with complex and abstract ideas.” (George 418)
“In a review of research on gifted students in the regular classroom, Johnsen and Ryser (1996)
describe five overall areas for differentiation: modifying content, allowing for student
preferences, altering the pace of instruction, creating a flexible classroom environment, and
using specific instructional strategies. The bulk of the research concentrates on instructional
strategies that have been linked to improved student achievement and have been shown to
increase critical thinking, problem-solving abilities, and creativity. The following have been
established as effective strategies (Johnsen & Ryser, 1996):
• Posing open-ended questions that require higher-level thinking
• Modeling thinking strategies, such as decision-making and evaluation
• Accepting ideas and suggestions from students and expanding on them
• Facilitating original and independent problems and solutions
• Helping students identify rules, principles, and relationships
• Taking time to explain the nature of errors” (Stepanek 16)
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Strand 3 – Meeting the Needs of All Students
From Research to Practice
Differentiated Instruction: Differentiation allows a teacher to make their lessons accessible to
a wider range of students. Teachers who offer different approaches to what students learn, how
they learn it, and how they demonstrate what they have learned. Students should not be
expected to learn using the same content, processes, and products but need to be given
opportunities to work on different tasks as opposed to performing the same task on different
levels. Thus differentiation is the process by which curriculum objectives, teaching methods,
assessment methods, resources and learning activities are planned to cater for the needs of
individual pupils.
Ancient Civilizations TE: pp. 51c—51d, 249b, 290, 355
World History TE: pp. 1c—1d, 35, 223a, 577
Example: Interleaf pages at the beginning of every chapter in the Teacher’s Edition
offer references and resources for differentiated instruction activities. (World History TE,
pp. 1c—1d)
Students Who Are Struggling Readers: In order to address the needs of struggling readers,
instruction needs to utilize the same continuum of strategies for non-struggling readers but with
special attention paid to the specific skills that students need to succeed. The use of graphic
organizers, visual aids, and comprehension strategy instruction help build the reading skills of
students in this special population.
Ancient Civilizations TE: pp. 104, 136—137, 294, 330
World History TE: pp. 326, 330, 422, 497
Example: “Differentiating Instruction: Struggling Readers: 1. Tell the class that Europe
is often called a peninsula of peninsulas. On a wall map of transparency, trace the
outline of Europe so that students can observe how the continent is a peninsular of the
European landmass. 2. Have students refer to a political map of Europe to identify the
modern-day countries that make up Europe. Then have students identify the countries
that answer the following questions: What countries are located on peninsulas? Norway,
Sweden, Denmark, Portugal, Spain, Italy, Greece; What countries are islands? United
Kingdom, Ireland, Iceland; What country is farthest north? Norway; What sea forms the
southern boarder of Europe? the Mediterranean (World History TE, p. 497)
Students for Whom English Is a Second Language: English language learners benefit from
the continuum of strategies and intensive instruction designed to develop reading skills and
strategies. Such factors as vocabulary, expository text structure and meta-cognition are
beneficial for student for whom English is a second language. Teachers can help these students
by reducing the vocabulary load for ESL student, careful analysis of the content are text and the
use of semantic maps, brainstorming, structured overviews and other pre-reading activities.
Ancient Civilizations TE: pp. 29, 109, 235, 339, 401
World History TE: pp. 184, 366, 422, 547
Example: “Differentiating Instruction for Universal Access: English Language Learners:
Word Mapping: Have students work in mixed-ability pairs to create word maps for the
following terms: Commentaries, justice, monotheism, prophets, proverbs, principles,
righteousness, Sabbath, synagogue, Talmud, Tanach, and Torah. Each word map
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Strand 3 – Meeting the Needs of All Students
should provide the term’s definition, a sentence using the term, and one to three related
words or ideas.” (Ancient Civilizations TE, p. 235)
Students with Varied Learning Styles: Learning style is the way that each person begins to
concentrate on, process, internalize, and retain new and difficult academic information. Students
with varied learning styles need to be taught using methods that match their individual learning
styles. Teachers who use an assortment of learning strategies and materials appeal to the
varying learning styles of all of their students.
Ancient Civilizations TE: pp. 79, 143, 164, 315, 347
World History TE: pp. 342, 353, 384, 531
Example: “Teaching Tip: Comparing Distances: To help students understand the
distances involved in the Saharan trade, refer them to the physical and political maps of
Africa in the atlas at the back of this book. Challenge students to correspond features on
those maps to features on the “Crossing the Sahara” map (pp. 384—385) and to use the
scale in the atlas to calculate sample distances on this map.” (World History TE, p. 384)
Students with Varied Cultural Backgrounds: Multicultural education endeavors give multiple
viewpoints or perspectives in a comprehensive way. It is important to connect the lesson to the
students’ lives and to engage them in challenging lessons. Teachers who provide lessons that
relate to a student’s culture and gender help the student to realize the relevance of the task and
the curriculum that they are being taught.
Ancient Civilizations SE: pp. 69, 271, 334, 386
World History SE: pp. 357, 398, 470, 537, 599
Example: “Linking to Today: Music from Mali to Memphis: Did you know that the music
you listen to today may have begun with the griots? From the 1600s to the 1800s, many
people from West Africa were brought to America as slaves. In America, these slaves
continued to sing the way they had in Africa…So the next time you hear a Memphis
blues track or a cool jazz tune, listen for its ancient African roots!” (World History SE, p.
398)
Students Who are Advanced Learners: Advanced learners need learning experiences
designed to fit them. They should be expected to plan and carry out more complex work, use
more difficult concepts in planning their work, complete more stages in an investigation, and
express findings in a more sophisticated vocabulary. Instructors can use a variety of ways to
differentiate classroom work for advanced learners, including modifying the content, altering the
pace of instruction, and creating a flexible classroom environment.
Ancient Civilizations TE: pp. 136, 244, 304, 364
World History TE: pp. 138, 300, 449, 577
Example: “Differentiating Instruction for Universal Access: Advanced Learners/GATE:
Calculating Distances: Organize the class into small groups. Assign each group a
present-day country that lay partially or completely within the Roman Empire. Have each
group use modern maps of the Mediterranean world to calculate about how many miles
of roads the Romans built within its assigned country.” (Ancient Civilizations TE, p. 364)
Research Base for Holt Social Studies: World History
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Strand 4 - Assessment
What Does Scientifically Based Research Tell Us about
Strand 4: Assessment
Defining the Strand
Effective assessment is a requirement for effective instruction. Particularly in the social studies,
where there are specific expectations for content knowledge as well as for ways of
understanding and problem solving, one type of assessment cannot supply a complete picture.
Using a variety of assessment types has been shown to be effective for all students, but
particularly for those who have learning difficulties (Bell, 2002). Research has shown that
students’ achievement improves when they receive frequent, consistent, specific feedback on
their progress. This kind of ongoing assessment provides teachers with the information they
need to effectively tailor and differentiate instruction to meet the needs of all students.
A program that provides effective assessment resources will:
• Take multiple, varied approaches to assessment;
• Include diagnostic assessments;
• Provide on-going assessment measures; and
• Guide students in self-monitoring.
Research that Guided the Development
Multiple Approaches to Assessment
“Students should be given multiple opportunities on a variety of assessments to show their
proficiencies. Such assessments may include portfolios, performance assessments, written
reports, research projects, and other demonstrations of students’ knowledge and skills.”
(National Council for the Social Studies, 2003, on-line)
“Diverse approaches should be used to appraise pupil achievement in the social studies. Each
approach should attempt to determine what pupils have learned and what is left to be achieved
by the learner.” (Ediger 240)
“Assessment should be related directly to learning activities and to the work done; it should be
based on a broad range of evidence...[and] in the best of all classrooms, assessment includes
observations of students in action, finished work, and students’ own self-assessment.” (Tchudi
and Mitchell 360)
“Results of this study lend support to the reliability and validity of vocabulary-matching
measures as indicators of students’ performance in the social studies content area… as well as
good indicators of students’ general social studies knowledge…” (Espin, Busch, Shin, and
Kruschwitz 148-149)
“(Effective) Teachers Make Use of Alternative Assessments as well as Traditional Tests.
Teachers: …
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Strand 4 - Assessment
d. Plan assessment as they plan instruction – not as an afterthought…
f. Teach children the scoring systems that will be used to evaluate their work and allow
them to practice using these systems for self- and peer assessment…” (Cotton 19)
“It is increasingly recognized that no one method can uncover the full range of students’
knowledge and that different students may need to show their knowledge in different ways (e.g.,
produce a video, make a presentation, or write a research paper). Thus, in a standards-based
system, multiple methods of assessment are used at different times to determine students’
levels of knowledge and skill … If the knowledge is specific information such as facts, terms, or
details, then selected response items (i.e., multiple-choice, true-false, or matching) may be
appropriate. When the target involves complex ideas such as concepts, generalizations, or
principles, then constructed response modes (e.g., performance tasks, exhibitions, writing
samples, problem solving, or interviews) are more appropriate. In a standards-based system,
teachers need to have a broad repertoire of assessment strategies and know how to
purposefully select (or guide students to select) those that will allow students to provide
evidence of their learning.” (Mid-Continent Research for Education and Learning 22-23)
“Our study has demonstrated that performance tests offer a viable alternative to multiple-choice
tests. By offering a wider range of test formats, more students have an opportunity to show what
they know and what they can do.” (Kon and Martin-Kniep 98)
Diagnostic Assessment
“Teachers should not think of prior knowledge assessment as a discrete pre-test to use from
time to time. Rather, it should be common classroom practice. We should routinely ask
ourselves what we already know that will help us solve a problem or learn from a new unit of
study.” (Shepard, 2005, 68)
“Diagnostic assessment is simply a systematic approach to good teaching. It is systematic
because it has a precise focus on particular important attainment targets which the teacher has
for his or her pupils. In the 5-14 context, these can be from the various subject guidelines or
they can be additional skills or competences which the teacher considers important for his or
her class. It is also more systematic than normal practice because, in conducting the
assessment, the teacher must make a conscious decision about how evidence will be gathered
in relation to the target and he or she must have a clear intention of using this information to
take learning forward.” (Scottish Council for Research in Education 3)
On-going Assessment
“Formative assessment refers to focused and ongoing evaluations like the scores on pop
quizzes. Summative tests come at the end of a course of study, when students must be
accountable for their achievement. The purpose of formative assessment is to guide instruction;
the purpose of summative testing is to evaluate achievement...” (Graves, Juel, and Graves 544)
“(Effective) Teachers:
a. Monitor learning regularly, both formally and informally…
f. Use routine assessment procedures to check student progress. These include conducting
recitations, circulating and checking students’ work during seatwork periods, assigning and
checking homework, conducting periodic reviews with students, administering tests, and
reviewing student performance data...” (Cotton 18)
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Strand 4 - Assessment
“A research review published in 1986 [see Fuchs and Fuchs, 1986], concentrating primarily on
classroom assessment work for children with mild handicaps, surveyed a large number of
innovations, from which 23 were selected. Those chosen satisfied the condition that quantitative
evidence of learning gains was obtained, both for those involved in the innovation and for a
similar group not so involved. Since then, many more papers have been published describing
similarly careful quantitative experiments. Our own review has selected at least 20 more studies
[for full citations to these studies, see Black and Wiliam, 1998a] … All these studies show that
innovations that include strengthening the practice of formative assessment [those activities that
provide information used to adapt the teaching to meet student needs] produce significant and
often substantial learning gains.” (Black and Wiliam, 1998b, 140)
“Many of these studies arrive at another important conclusion: that improved formative
assessment helps low achievers more than other students and so reduces the range of
achievement while raising achievement overall.” (Black and Wiliam, 1998b, 141)
“In order for assessment to play a more useful role in helping students learn it should be moved
into the middle of the teaching and learning process instead of being postponed as only the
end-point of instruction.” (Shepard, 2000, 10)
“Christenson, Ysseldyke, and Thurlow (1989) identified 10 critical factors of instruction that are
important for all students in any subject area. These factors include … active monitoring for
student progress and understanding by the teacher, and frequent and appropriate evaluation of
student progress by the teacher." (Spicuzza, Ysseldyke, Lemkuil, Kosciolek, Boys, and
Teelucksingh 523)
“As instruction is occurring, teachers need information to evaluate whether their teaching
strategies are working. They also need information about the current understanding of individual
students and groups of students so they can identify the most appropriate next steps for
instruction. Moreover, students need feedback to monitor their own success in learning and to
know how to improve.” (National Research Council, 2001, 225-226)
“The research reported here shows conclusively that formative assessment does improve
learning. The gains in achievement appear to be quite considerable, and as noted earlier,
amongst the largest ever reported for educational interventions.” (Black and Wiliam, 1998a, 48)
“The purpose of this meta-analysis was to determine the effects of systematic formative
evaluation of educational programs on academic achievement. Results indicated that the use of
systematic formative evaluation procedures, within a group of studies that employed
predominantly mildly handicapped subjects, significantly increased students’ school
achievement, both statistically and practically.” (Fuchs and Fuchs 205)
“Active teacher monitoring of student performance is viewed as essential for maintaining student
participation and encouraging learning. In a sense, it is what keeps the total instructional cycle
effective. Teachers monitor student progress in various ways; the key for student learning
appears to be the degree to which monitoring is active and frequent… (Christenson, Ysseldyke,
and Thurlow 26)
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Strand 4 - Assessment
Self-Monitoring for Understanding
“Comprehension is usually the biggest problem teachers face with struggling readers from the
third grade and higher … These students are not monitoring their own comprehension to see if
what they are reading is making sense … “ (Au 400)
“Studies of good reader-poor reader differences in text processing … suggest that poor readers
fail to (1) conceptualize reading as a search for meaning, (2) monitor their comprehension to
ensure that they are deriving meaning, (3) engage in strategic behavior to bring meaning to text
and restore meaning when there has been a breakdown in comprehension, and (4) modify their
choice of strategies to meet the varying demands of reading. This profile suggests the need for
instruction which will … promote comprehension monitoring.” (Palincsar and Brown 69)
“Monitoring is a critical step in self-regulation of comprehension processes. That is, it is not
enough for students to be taught comprehension processing; students must also come to
understand where and when to use the processes and be motivated to do so.” (Block and
Pressley 387)
“Fitzgerald’s (1995b) review of research identifies areas in which focused, intensive instruction
appears beneficial for English language learners. These include vocabulary, expository text
structure, and metacognition.” (Au 402)
“These results suggest that direct instruction encourages students to use metacognitive
strategies when reading, a practice that promotes improved comprehension and a greater
awareness of the type of thinking good readers practice.” (Joseph 160)
“[I]nstruction in metacognitive reading strategies and techniques can be conducted utilizing
group instruction in a regular classroom by a classroom teacher. In addition, children can be
convinced to use such strategies on their own and, therefore, assume control of their own
learning.” (Payne and Manning 37)
“…pupils can assess themselves only when they have a sufficiently clear picture of the targets
that their learning is meant to attain.” (Black and Wiliam, 1998b, 143)
“Thus we conclude: if formative assessment is to be productive, pupils should be trained in selfassessment so that they can understand the main purposes of their learning and thereby grasp
what they need to do to achieve.” (Black and Wiliam, 1998b, 143)
“Klenowski’s (1995) data support Wiggins’s (1992) earlier assertion that involving students in
analyzing their own work builds ownership of the evaluation process and ‘makes it possible to
hold students to higher standards because the criteria are clear and reasonable’ (p. 30).”
(Shepard, 2000, 12)
“From the students' perspective it was apparent that student self-evaluation had provoked
metacognitive thinking. When the students were required to identify areas for improvement and
action to be taken, they were not just thinking about what they had learnt but how they were
learning. There is evidence to suggest that some students were also thinking about the
efficiency of their learning strategies.” (Klenowski 161)
“The results of these two studies show that providing students with a goal of learning to solve
problems enhances their self-efficacy, skill, motivation, and task goal orientation and that these
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Strand 4 - Assessment
achievement outcomes also are promoted by allowing students to valuate their performance
capabilities or progress in skill acquisition.” (Schunk 377)
“Among children who are cognitively capable of evaluating their capabilities, self-evaluation may
be a useful adjunct to testing as a means of assessing students’ skills and of providing
information to use in designing instruction. Although learning goals and self-evaluation are not
necessary for all classroom activities, the present results suggest that, when combined with a
sound instructional program, they facilitate self-regulated learning and achievement outcomes.”
(Schunk 380)
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Strand 4 - Assessment
From Research to Practice
Multiple Approaches to Assessment: In the social studies, where there are specific
expectations for content knowledge as well as for ways of solving problems and making
arguments, one type of assessment cannot supply a complete picture. A student who is given
multiple opportunities on a variety of assessments can better demonstrate their proficiency on a
given topic. Assessments include observations of student in action, portfolios, written reports,
research projects, and student’s own self-assessment.
Ancient Civilizations SE: pp. 215—216, 242, 313, 371
World History SE: pp. 345—346, 413, 519, 618
Example: Section 1 Assessment (World History SE, p. 413)
Diagnostic Assessment: Diagnostic testing is a systematic approach to good teaching. It has
a precise focus on particular important targets a teacher has devised for his or her pupils.
Teachers who also make prior knowledge assessment a common classroom practice give their
students the knowledge with which to learn from the new unit of study.
Ancient Civilizations TE: pp. 33, 124, 139b, 288
World History TE: pp. 262, 348, 464, 519b
Example: Checking for Understanding: True or False (Ancient Civilizations TE, p. 124)
On-going Assessment: On-going assessment involves routine assessment procedures to
check a student’s progress. Effective assessment does not simply appear at the end of a unit of
study but continues throughout that unit, actively monitoring the student’s progress. On-going
assessment provides the student with feedback so that they can monitor their own success in
learning and know how to improve.
Ancient Civilizations SE: pp. 68, 69, 71
World History SE: pp. 594, 595, 596
Example: “Reading Check Finding Main Ideas What advances in technology aided
exploration?” (World History SE, p. 594)
Self-Monitoring for Understanding: A student who is motivated to monitor their own progress
can better understand the main purposes of their learning and fully grasp what it is that they
need to achieve. Students can use similar strategies that the teacher uses to evaluate
themselves and, in return, they assume control of their own learning.
Ancient Civilizations SE: pp. 6, 87, 194, 285
World History SE: pp. 201, 390, 446, 611
Example: “As you read Chapter 4, think about what you already know about Egypt and
draw conclusions to fill gaps in what you are reading.” (Ancient Civilizations SE, p. 87)
Research Base for Holt Social Studies: World History
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Strand 5 – Teaching History
What Does Scientifically Based Research Tell Us about
Strand 5: Teaching World History
Defining the Strand
What is history? While some students may perceive history as a timeline of names and dates,
history is the interpretation of past events, the stories of our past. Consequently, effective
instruction in history goes beyond the memorization of facts and takes students into the process
in which historians engage: analyzing evidence and primary sources; considering multiple
perspectives; making connections between ideas; identifying causes for and effects of historical
events; and considering the overarching themes of history. Students of history should
understand how meaning is made in history. The following approaches have been shown to be
effective in helping students develop a rich and deep understanding of world history:
• thematic instruction, organized around big ideas or concepts rather than isolated facts;
• document-based instruction, based on the primary sources that historians themselves use to
critically construct knowledge; and
• instruction that connects geography to history content and instruction.
Research that Guided the Development
Thematic Instruction
“Important principles that enable learners to organize and interrelate information can be referred
to as ‘big ideas.’ Big ideas are essential to help learners understand the connections among
facts and concepts they learn in history. As Rosenshine (1995) notes, ‘without [knowledge
structures], new knowledge tends to be fragmented and not readily available for recall and use’
(p. 263).” (Carnine, Caros, Crawford, Hollenbeck, and Harniss 209)
“The focus should be on themes around which a curriculum can be organized, encompassing
the subject matter to be studied… Themes allow for the organization of seemingly fragmented
topics. They are essential tools in the educator’s kit…” (Caine and Caine 111)
“To counter students’ perception of a uniform and linear pattern of historical change, it is
imperative that instruction focus on the diversity of experience that characterizes a given time
period… students’ limited perception of the expanse of history could be addressed by devoting
attention to gradual and long-term social, economic, and political changes…” (Barton, 1996, 74)
“In providing gifted children with qualitatively differentiated educational programs, a common
thread in enrichment options is the teaching of conceptual themes. Conceptual themes provide
the framework for interdisciplinary studies and naturally lead to individualization in teaching and
learning.” (Riley 30)
“To provide something students can use and think about, we may need to teach a big picture
quite quickly…and keep coming back to it. Such a framework focuses on large-scale patterns of
change, encompassing students’ in-depth studies so they are not simply isolated topics. …the
framework must allow students to think in terms of long-run themes, at first rather isolated from
Research Base for Holt Social Studies: World History
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Strand 5 – Teaching History
one another, but increasingly linked as the students’ understanding increases.” (National
Research Council 68)
Document-Based Instruction
“Using primary source documents allows the student not just to read about the past, but to see
how the past is constructed as history through such sources. It allows students to immerse
themselves into the language, events, and individuals and to take agency in reconstructing
history. To use a primary source is to pose a question of the relationship between an account
and evidence.” (Trofanenko 132)
“These findings carry several significant instructional implications. First, students need
systematic exposure to the collection and evaluation of historical evidence…” (Barton, 1997b,
423-424)
“The main conclusion arising from the factual writing exercise is that work on historical
documents gives children an understanding of the origin of information and it brings home to
them the real meaning of phrases in a textbook such as bad housing conditions or child labour.
When general issues like these are approached through individual examples in documents, the
evidence of the writing of this group of children suggests that the children gain a clearer view of
the problems of life in the past.” (Blake 547)
“For students, reading history was not a process of puzzling about authors’ intentions or
situating texts in a social world but of gathering information, with texts serving as bearers of
information. How could such bright students be oblivious to the subtexts that jumped out at
historians? … Before students can see subtexts, they must first believe they exist….When texts
are viewed as human creations, what is said becomes inseparable from who says it.”
(Wineburg, 1991b, 76-77)
“These articles introduced teachers to the use of primary sources – documents, reports, maps,
photographs, letters, diaries, posters, and recordings created by those who participated in or
witnessed the events of the past – as a teaching method that exposes students to at least three
important historical concepts. First, students realize that written history reflects an author’s
reconstruction and interpretation of past events. Therefore, students learn the need to evaluate
historical accounts carefully to recognize their subjective nature. Second, primary sources
enable students to touch the lives of people in the past directly. Third, as students use primary
sources, they develop a wide range of important analytical skills.” (Schamel 9)
“According to research done in secondary classrooms by David Kobrin, author of Beyond the
Textbook: Teaching History Using Documents and Primary Sources, the students’ sense of ‘why
they might want to work as student historians – their involvement with history – was
strengthened and broadened by the experience of working with challenging primary sources.’”
(Schamel 10)
“Making the study of history an authentic experience means giving young people the same
control over definition and interpretation that professional historians have always claimed for
themselves. … To work as historians, students need to accept, and master, an impressive array
of complicated skills and attitudes.
To begin with, they need to understand primary materials, some of which are archaic. …
Research Base for Holt Social Studies: World History
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Strand 5 – Teaching History
What the Students Said
…Several [students] expressed in their own words an awareness of what we’d call the
socially constructed nature of history. They also wrote – again, in their own words – that seeing
the importance of who created history helped them understand the intellectual responsibilities of
young adults in a democratic community.” (Kobrin, Abbott, Ellinwood, and Horton 39-41)
“The definition of text in effective classrooms has been widely expanded over the past years.
Internet-based text, multimedia texts, hypertext, student-constructed texts, periodicals, and
newspapers all constitute the types of text that fluent readers handle on a daily basis. This same
richness of text must be reflected in classroom instruction. The use of texts on multiple levels
and of different genres can allow all students to do the engaged reading our principles call for. If
multiple texts are used, students need to be supported in learning how to read across multiple
texts.” (Ogle and Blachowicz 270)
Importance of Connecting Geography to History Content and Instruction
“Geography provides important clues to the past. Landforms and climate are related to
migration patterns, land use, and the rise and fall of civilizations. How people use the land also
has a strong bearing on the economic progress of countries and regions. Thus, knowing what
the landscape was like in the past is important for understanding historical processes; as is
knowing who lived in a place, how they lived, and how they used the land.” (The Importance of
Geography in the School Curriculum)
“The fact is, geography has played a crucial role in almost all significant historical events, and
geography shapes the characteristics of the places where people, events, and ideas have made
history.” (Boehm, Saxe, and Rutherford 1)
“Social studies should not be taught in isolated segments. A wider, more integrated experience
is more appropriate and leads to a deeper understanding of life’s complexities. As important as
history, government, and geography are as separate fields of study, they are best taught from
an interdisciplinary perspective (Alexander & George, 1981; Beane, 1990; Stevenson, 1992;
Vars, 1987).” (Allen and Stevens 6)
“Of all the subjects in the school curriculum, geography is probably most closely related to
history. Geography is a major causative factor in historical development. … Classically, whereas
history has posed the related questions When? and Why? Geography has posed the related
questions Where? and Why? Moreover, according to Backler, geography and history also
converge as they relate to five historical concepts: (1) understanding time and chronology, (2)
analyzing cause-and-effect relationships, (3) examining continuity and change, (4) recognizing
and participating in a common memory, and (5) developing historical empathy.” (Reinhartz and
Reinhartz 152-153)
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Strand 5 – Teaching History
From Research to Practice
Thematic Instruction
Instruction organized around big ideas or concepts, rather than on isolated facts, has been
shown to be particularly effective in increasing student learning and engagement in history.
Brain research shows that we learn better when we make connections between ideas; thematic
instruction activates these kinds of connections. Themes can serve as overarching organizers
that focus instruction in history and engage students by putting learning into a real and
understandable context.
Ancient Civilizations SE: pp. 6, 101, 226, 322, 332
World History SE: pp. 202, 378, 454, 565
World History TE: pp. 200, 292, 350, 556
Example: “Understanding Themes: Introduce the key themes of this chapter to students
by pointing out to students that the Renaissance was a time of new advances in science
and technology. Ask students what science and technology Europeans did not have that
other civilizations did. Answers might include the compass and medical knowledge.
Then ask students how Italy’s geography might play a role in improving contacts
between Europe and other civilizations.” (World History TE, p. 556)
Document-Based Instruction
History differs from other content areas; while scientists may study phenomena in the world
now, historians study the past. Because they cannot be direct observers of history, historians
must study primary sources. Primary sources include printed documents, such as letters,
newspapers, diaries, and poems, and visual images, such as paintings or photographs. The
music, artifacts, places, or dwellings of a group of people are also primary sources of evidence
for historians. By examining primary sources, students themselves assume the role of an active
historian.
Allowing students access to primary sources gives students the opportunity to understand how
history is researched and learned, and provides students with the opportunity to create their
own meaning and understanding of history. Students understand that history is an interpretation
of the accounts of many. Using primary sources is an effective instructional strategy for all
students because the analysis of these sources promotes both active learning and critical
thinking. Studies have shown that students are often unable to critically analyze primary source
materials, but that with exposure and instruction they can learn to be critical readers and
viewers.
Ancient Civilizations SE: pp. 9, 192, 266, 294, 411
World History SE: pp. 388, 448, 526, 541, 621
Example: “Yu, shall I teach you what knowledge is? When you know a thing, say that
you know it; when you do not know a thing, admit that you do not know it. That is
knowledge.” “I do not enlighten anyone who is not eager to learn, nor encourage anyone
who is not anxious to put his ideas into words.” (Ancient Civilizations SE, p. 192)
Research Base for Holt Social Studies: World History
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Strand 5 – Teaching History
Importance of Connecting Geography to History Content and Instruction
History also differs from content-area subjects such as mathematics and science in that
historians are not problem solvers as such. The task of historians is to understand the context in
which past problems existed and the factors that led to their solutions or alternative courses of
events. Making connections with geography is essential to a deep understanding of history.
Throughout history, humans have been affected by geography in many and various ways, and
have, in turn, made deep marks on the geographical elements around them. The topography,
climate, soil, vegetation, and other natural resources of different areas led to settlement and
migrations between areas; human movements between areas and settlements created the
regional boundaries that we study in geography. One cannot understand history without an
understanding of geography.
Ancient Civilizations SE: pp. 18—19, 212—213, 260—261, 301, 433
World History SE: pp. 384—385, 501, 544—545, 594, 670—671
Example: History and Geography feature: The Hajj (Ancient Civilizations SE, pp. 86—
87)
Research Base for Holt Social Studies: World History
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Bibliography
Holt Social Studies: World History
Pedagogical Research Report
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