This qualitative case study sought to analyze and describe both the quantity and quality of African American history curriculum integration into Virginia's U.S. History curriculum standards at three points in time (2008 standards, 2015 standards, and revised 2020 standards) in the three U.S. history courses (USI, 5th; USII, 6th; VUS; 11th).…

Fear has shaped events throughout U.S. history, as those who have possessed fear have weaponized this emotion to justify violence and oppression while others have used fear as an impetus for radical resistance. Fear, however, has been an under-researched emotion in history education. Using critical discourse analysis methods, in this article I aim…

This study employs a multiple case study approach to examine the use of history of Mexican American and Muslim middle school students vis-à-vis Donald Trump's 2016 presidential campaign. The findings suggest the participants used historical examples of discrimination to contextualize candidate Trump's rhetoric and to bolster their identities as…

This article discusses offering the History of the American Deaf Community class several times since 2012 at the University of Virginia. While I change the syllabus each time, I have found a few constants in my approach: I stress that students work with primary sources whenever possible, that they read influential secondary texts, that they watch…

"Slavery is the ground zero of race relations," declared James and Lois Horton in their groundbreaking book, "Slavery and Public History." Engaging the history and legacy of slavery is a crucial step in understanding current U.S. society especially race relations. Historic sites that have connections to slavery have begun to…

This paper reports results from a six-state study of 62 USA social studies classrooms. We examined the extent to which intellectually challenging authentic pedagogy was present in study classrooms, the characteristics of classroom practice at different levels of authentic pedagogy, and how those characteristics may promote or inhibit high levels…

John Dewey said that "democracy needs to be reborn in each generation and education is its midwife." While there has been criticism of the Bush administration's post-9/11 agenda, there is little recognition of the role that his education policy played to rebirth democracy for a nation in crisis. This paper analyzes the ways that 9/11 has…

In this reflective essay, the author addresses fellow educators and their responsibility to students on issues surrounding the ongoing struggle for civil rights. She links the integration of Little Rock, Arkansas schools in 1957 with the 2018 student protest against gun violence following the Parkland, FL mass shooting. As a facilitator of…

Jamestown is at the heart of any teaching and learning of colonial American history. Stories of John Smith and Pocahontas are learned by elementary and secondary students across the United States. In Virginia, Jamestown is first taught in third grade and revisited five more times from historical, political, economic, and geographic perspectives.…

This study examined the 4th-grade National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) assessments (history, geography, and civics) and 3rd- and 4th-grade social studies standards from nine randomly selected states and organized the content around three global concepts (conflict, movement, discovery) and six specific concepts (war, rebellion,…

Developing disciplinary literacy in history requires that classrooms become an environment where students can engage in discursive practices typical of the profession. Disciplinary literacy refers to the specialized ways of reading and writing used in history to construct historical arguments and ways of reasoning. Learning history includes using…

This study is a mixed-methods text analysis of African American representation within K-12 U.S. History content standards treating the revolutionary era, the early U.S. republic, the Civil War era, and Reconstruction. The states included in the analysis are Michigan, New Jersey, South Carolina, and Virginia. The analysis finds that the reviewed…

This article frames history education as a social construction designed to create a national identity through the inclusion, exclusion, and treatment of various societal groups. Using this lens, the author analyzes curriculum standards from nine states that annually assess student knowledge of American history to better understand the depiction of…

This study seeks to understand the ways nine states represent African Americans within their standards for U.S. History. Previous research on the effects of high-stakes assessment on social studies educators suggests teachers align their instruction with information found in state standards. Therefore, an understanding of the way African Americans…

It is often difficult for Americans to find the secrets for addressing issues relevant to the contemporary United States. However, in every generation, individual citizens in their communities, states, and national institutions have debated values that are central to the nation. By studying American history as a sequence of case studies, students…