Historical thinking skills of pre-service teachers in secondary school social studies methods course

This study examined the historical thinking skills and pedagogical reasoning of pre service teachers in a social studies methods course. The purpose of this study is to describe and compare the historical thinking skills and pedagogical content knowledge of the participants. Differences in the level of historical thinking abilities and pedagogical reasoning illustrated the differences between the participants. This study adds to current research about the teaching and learning of history by focusing on the relationship between historical thinking abilities and the ability to plan effective history lessons.; Along with interviews and lesson plans, through this study I identified that participants with very strong and robust historical thinking skills possessed not only excellent historical knowledge but also excellent general knowledge that includes political, economic and geographical knowledge. In possessing a varied repertoire of knowledge enable their mind to flexibly make in depth and critical analysis, and interpretation of historical primary sources. Participants that were able to select appropriate numbers of primary sources which represent different perspectives were able to plan potential effective teaching and learning activities to develop historical literacy. Participants who possessed the two above abilities seems able to translate the abilities into sound pedagogical reasoning by developing lesson plans that are potentially effective.