Evoking Students’ Curiosity and Complicating Their Historical Thinking through Manageable, Engaging Confusion

John H. Bickford; Molly Sigler Bickford

Evoking Students’ Curiosity and Complicating Their Historical Thinking through Manageable, Engaging Confusion

Eastern Illinois University

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

Abstract

 STATE AND NATIONAL educational initiatives have increased
 expectations for students’ historical thinking and civic involvement. 1
 Guidance for relevant, purposeful classroom experiences with age
 appropriate, rigorous content has never been clearer, 2 yet teachers
 still feel unprepared.3 Towards these ends, we direct attention to the
 antecedent of discovery: confusion. Confusion sparks the motivation
 to explore and solve mysteries. Manageable, engaging mysteries
 provide students the space and incentive to explore for answers they
 know are discoverable. Teachers can position students to identify
 the enigma as they scrutinize the documents; educators should
 recognize, and ease, students’ emergent frustration with clues. Using
 Lev Vygotsky’s zone o f proximal development as a guide,4 educators
 should provide students suitable levels of challenge and support.

Original language	American English
Journal	The History Teacher
Volume	49
State	Published - Nov 2015

Disciplines

Education
Curriculum and Instruction
Curriculum and Social Inquiry
Educational Methods

Access to Document

Bickford Bickford (2015) Rosa.pdfFinal published version, 9.55 MBLicense: CC BY-NC-ND

Cite this

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title = "Evoking Students{\textquoteright} Curiosity and Complicating Their Historical Thinking through Manageable, Engaging Confusion",

abstract = " STATE AND NATIONAL educational initiatives have increased expectations for students{\textquoteright} historical thinking and civic involvement. 1 Guidance for relevant, purposeful classroom experiences with age appropriate, rigorous content has never been clearer, 2 yet teachers still feel unprepared.3 Towards these ends, we direct attention to the antecedent of discovery: confusion. Confusion sparks the motivation to explore and solve mysteries. Manageable, engaging mysteries provide students the space and incentive to explore for answers they know are discoverable. Teachers can position students to identify the enigma as they scrutinize the documents; educators should recognize, and ease, students{\textquoteright} emergent frustration with clues. Using Lev Vygotsky{\textquoteright}s zone o f proximal development as a guide,4 educators should provide students suitable levels of challenge and support.",

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AB - STATE AND NATIONAL educational initiatives have increased expectations for students’ historical thinking and civic involvement. 1 Guidance for relevant, purposeful classroom experiences with age appropriate, rigorous content has never been clearer, 2 yet teachers still feel unprepared.3 Towards these ends, we direct attention to the antecedent of discovery: confusion. Confusion sparks the motivation to explore and solve mysteries. Manageable, engaging mysteries provide students the space and incentive to explore for answers they know are discoverable. Teachers can position students to identify the enigma as they scrutinize the documents; educators should recognize, and ease, students’ emergent frustration with clues. Using Lev Vygotsky’s zone o f proximal development as a guide,4 educators should provide students suitable levels of challenge and support.

M3 - Article

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JF - The History Teacher

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