Researching for History Curriculum

Thanks Penrith Library!

I thought I'd share with you today one of my current methods for researching and writing History curriculum. There's no single way to program, of course, but I do know that if someone had outlined a few methodologies to me back in my university days then it might have made things a little easier. I've experimented with various ways of writing programs for teaching and I guess that 2020-21 was the moment where I finally became happy with an approach to researching for the subject of History. So I thought I'd share it!

There were a few contributing factors that helped me arrive at the method I now use... 

• In 2019 I was commissioned to write some chapters for the Cambridge History Transformed series. In order to feel comfortable in providing a baseline from which other teachers could work, I knew that I would have to undertake a considerable amount of research.
• At my new school I was placed onto Ancient History, a subject I hadn't taught for at least 9 years. For all intents and purposes I'm basically teaching it for the first time so I needed to refresh my approach.  
• I fortuitously attended some online PL conducted by the History Teachers' Association of NSW. This 'Introduction to Ancient History' module was run by Dennis Mootz, who highlighted the use of Excel Spreadsheets as a powerful aggregation tool for historians to use. 

My approach isn't revolutionary but I'm finding it increasingly useful and it's something I'll be teaching a variation of to my students for the upcoming Historical Investigation component of Ancient History. I'll also teach it when I next have a History Extension class. 

Step 1: Look at the syllabus. 

I start by reading through the part of the syllabus I'll be teaching. In this case, for example, it's the introductory Nature of Ancient History topic 'The Treatment and Display of Human Remains'. 

Then I code the content dot points within the syllabus for my own reference, using the following schema: 

• 1 = The Nature of Ancient History as it's the first module in the Preliminary course. 
• 6 = The Treatment and Display of Human Remains as it's the 6th topic within the module. 
• The four main dot points within this topic are then labelled A, B, C, D.
• Any sub-dot points within these are labelled with a further number, EG. 1, 2, 3, 4. 

Here is what it looks like after I code it...

Students investigate:

• The condition of the human remains and how they were preserved, discovered and/or removed from where they were found 1-6-A
• The methods and results of scientific analysis (dating of finds and forensic techniques) and modern preservation of the remains 1-6-B
• The significance of the human remains and other sources, for examples written, for an understanding of the life and times in which they lived, including: 1-6-C
• The social status of individuals 1-6-C1
• The beliefs and practices of the society 1-6-C2
• The health of ancient populations 1-6-C3
• The nature of the environment 1-6-C4
• The ethical issues relevant to the treatment, display and ownership of the remains, for example the use of invasive methods of scientific analysis 1-6-D

Step 2: Read.

I recently read a tweet where the poet Eileen Chong made reference to a creative process figuratively labelled as 'wool-gathering'. This refers to the necessary time that writers need to spend on reading, gathering up the intellectual resources that will allow for creation. In preparing to teach an area of history I will gather together any available resources I can find, place them in a stack on my table, and start reading. 

Step 3: Raw notetaking. 

I find that, without focus, examining history can become quite overwhelming. Reading one thing will lead to another and I'll be fascinated by the minutiae of particular events only to realise (when it's too late) that it has no relevance to what I need to teach. This is where the above coding from Step 1 comes into play.

Using an excel spreadsheet, I will keep one eye on the syllabus content points and make notes on what I'm reading. Each separate entry is coded with one of the 8 codes from the above syllabus. This is what it looks like:

Click to enlarge.

The columns are as follows:

• Information: My notes from the source in question. This can be a summary, or a quote, or a suggestion.
• Key Word: In something like this topic it's useful to be able to separate the entries geographically as the plan is to examine significant bodies from different parts of the world (EG. Bog Bodies from Europe, Mungo Man from Australia, etc.).
• Reference: This lets me know the source I've used. I keep another tab in the Excel spreadsheet running to collect together my sources as a proper bibliography. 
• Page Number: So I can follow up in case I come back to the entry and realise I need more context, or need to check if I've quoted something correctly. After all, I don't want Keith Windschuttle to come after me (that's a joke for the History Extension teachers).
• Syllabus: The coding from Step 1. This becomes most important in the next step.
• Format: The type of source it's from. This can help me evaluate how I plan to use the information.
• Category: A categorising column additional to the Key Word column can be useful when it comes to sorting the document afterwards, in case there are different ways of ordering the information (EG. By culture/body rather than by geography).

Step 4: Sort.

The final step before I start programming my unit (in other words, planning out my sequence of lessons and populating it with resources) is to take all the raw information and make some sense out of it. This is a simple but powerful step where the spreadsheet is re-sorted by using the coding. All the entries are then reorganised in order of the syllabus, allowing me to work through it methodically. 

I then move onto creating my unit of work. Recently, for example, while creating a unit for the Boudicca Case Study, I've been able to refer back to all my entries on Boudicca's representation through history and use this to create a lesson focused on just this one aspect of the syllabus. It's been incredibly useful. 

And that's it. I have other ways of using the spreadsheet but I think this will do for today :)