History-as-process in a multicultural, academically diverse fifth-grade elementary class: A case study

The purpose of this dissertation was to investigate what effect, if any, history-as-process might have on the comprehension, interest, and attitude of a multicultural, academically diverse fifth grade class toward history. Using a collection of primary and secondary sources pertaining to one era of American history, students were provided opportunities to formulate questions, to examine and analyze the sources, to evaluate the sources in terms of accuracy and credibility, and to make interpretations about people and their lives during the historical era being studied.;Student investigations using the history-as-process method for an indepth study of the antebellum South era were conducted during a twelve week period during the 1995-1996 second semester in a rural Southern, elementary school. This eclectic method allowed students to experience a sampling of life as it might have been according to primary and secondary sources from each of the three major locales in antebellum South history: plantations, towns, and backwoods. Through the use of the five senses, Gardner's (1995) seven intelligences, the arts, reading skills, writing skills, and the historical method, students explored the three major themes of family, education, and work. Multiple sources of data were collected from four case study participants chosen as representatives of their multicultural, academically diverse fifth grade class.;The results of the data analysis indicated that history-as-process was a developmentally appropriate method for teaching this class of students. Given opportunities to explore history as the study of people rather than as traditional cut-and-dried textbook facts and dates, these students clearly demonstrated that they were able to understand more about themselves, more about those who lived before them during the antebellum South era, and more about the distinctions between the present and the past. Throughout their engagement in the history-as-process method, students demonstrated positive changes in attitude toward, interest in, and comprehension of history. They also demonstrated positive changes in attitude toward, interest in, and comprehension of both reading and writing. In sum, the history-as-process method encouraged these elementary students to think historically, and thus, they were able to demonstrate a basic understanding of history and the work of historians.