Exploring Teachers’ Epistemic Stances
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Running head: EXPLORING TEACHERS’ EPISTEMIC STANCES
Teaching History Using Multiple Sources: Exploring Shifts and Pedagogical Implications
of Teachers’ Epistemic Stances
Liliana Maggioni, Patricia A. Alexander, & Claudine Costich
University of Maryland
Manuscript submitted for publication
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Abstract
The study investigates what happens to teachers’ epistemic stances and to teachers'
pedagogical choices following participation in an intense program of professional
development encouraging teachers to include a variety of primary and secondary historical
sources in their classes. Data were collected from five elementary, eight middle-school,
and five high-school teachers. Teachers’ epistemic stances, their knowledge of heuristics
usually signaling expertise in the domain, and the pedagogical approaches they chose to
foster students’ historical thinking were investigated using a questionnaire, multiplechoice items, and qualitative analyses of historical narratives and lesson plans designed by
teachers in response to the program. Results showed that shifts in epistemic stances and
familiarity with domain heuristics varied across the three groups of teachers. However,
analyses of historical narratives and lesson plans suggested a fragile understanding of the
task of teaching students to think historically and of the pedagogical value of using
multiple sources in teaching history. Pedagogical implications of dwelling in this middle
ground are discussed with regard to teachers’ education, and students’ epistemic
development.
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The French historian, Régine Pernoud, recounts with amusement a little anecdote
that occurred while she was in charge of the museum of French history at the National
Archives. One day, she received a letter inquiring about “the exact date of the treaty that
officially put an end to the Middle Ages,” and the place where such treaty was signed
(Pernoud, 1977/2000, p. 9). The author of the request added that he urgently needed the
information for a presentation at a conference. The discussion of the most common
misconceptions regarding the “Dark Ages” that follows this introductory account is
beyond the scope of this paper; however, it is interesting to note that the writer of the
letter asked two questions that characterize historical inquiry and that are often taught in
history classes, the “when” and the “where” questions. Why does his request sound so
inappropriate, then?
In the context of the present study, this incident illustrates the role that epistemic
stances can play in learning and talking about history. In other words, what are the Middle
Ages in the mind of the inquirer? Are they an event, like the birth of a child, the eruption
of a volcano, and the election of a President, or are they a label, created by the interpretive
work of historians to refer to about ten centuries lying between the collapse of Roman
culture and the resurgence of the classical arts and letters in the sixteenth century?
Far from being a mere theoretical issue, interesting at most to people with a certain
philosophical bent, how people think about the nature of historical knowledge tends to
inform how learning develops. Specifically, in the former case, inquiring about the time
and place of the end of the Middle Ages seems proper. In the latter, other questions
emerge. For example, who invented this label? Why such a long period of human history
was named as something “in-between” two ages and not after an attribute characterizing
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the period? In turn, answers to these questions may facilitate the critical reading of
medieval histories, and place the issues of “who, what, where, and when” of specific
events within the context and method of historical inquiry. In other words, what is at stake
is not the formation of professional historians, but the possibility to read historical texts
meaningfully and the ability to evaluate their content.
Several studies on cognition and motivation support these intuitions, indicating
that beliefs generally influence the learning process and its outcomes (Hofer & Pintrich,
1997; Pajares, 1992). In particular, students’ epistemic beliefs have been related to key
components of learning such as comprehension (Schommer, 1990), strategic processing
(Davis, 2003; Kardash & Howell, 2000), interpretation of controversial issues (Kardash &
Scholes, 1996), and evaluation of arguments (Stanovich & West, 1997).
What fosters these beliefs? Although the literature provides some evidence that the
culture at large may play an important role in the development of students’ beliefs systems
(Alexander & Dochy, 1995; Maggioni, Riconscente, & Alexander, 2006), schooling also
constantly emerges as a factor related to the development of epistemic cognition (Perry,
1970; King & Kitchener, 2002; Jehng, Johnson, & Anderson, 1993; Paulsen & Wells,
1998). In addition, research specifically focusing on teachers’ epistemic beliefs has shown
that the more teachers are aware of the epistemic status of the discipline taught, the more
they tend to develop strategies aimed at fostering a similar consciousness in their students
(Brickhouse, 1990; Hashweh, 1996). This awareness usually goes hand in hand with a
greater knowledge of the subject matter and with the acknowledgment that the
development of epistemic cognition is a valuable educational goal (Gillaspie & Davis,
1998).
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At the same time, research has suggested that commitment to epistemic
development requires a view of learning that appreciates the active role of students in the
construction and reconstruction of knowledge (Buchanan et al., 1998; Davis & Wilson,
1999; Lipson et al., 2000; Zohar et al., 2001). While this belief contrasts with a view of
the teacher as transmitter of pre-digested knowledge, it is also far from a hands-off
approach, in which anything goes. Researchers found that commitment to epistemic
development required a more student-centered approach and thus a different presence of
the teacher in the classroom. Yet, it required that the teacher carefully plan and vigilantly
implement all phases of instruction. It also seems that while periodic activities dealing
with epistemic issues did not trigger epistemic development, successful interventions
tended to infuse the whole curriculum, from goal planning to assessment (Bain, 2000;
Elby, 2001; VanSledright, 2002).
Finally, research on expertise (Alexander, 2003; Wineburg, 2001) has supported
the hypothesis that epistemic thinking within a domain is closely related to the level of
expertise that people have in that domain, influencing, in the case of history, the way in
which people read and interpret historical texts. In previous studies, K-12 teachers have
manifested traits often typical of novices and acclimated learners, with only few research
projects reporting cases bordering on expertise (Hicks, Doolittle, & Lee, 2004; Husbands,
Kitson, & Pendry, 2003; Yeager & Davis, 1996). In other words, a fragile understanding
of the epistemic status of historical knowledge often emerged. Lacking familiarity with
the historical method, teachers tended to use historical sources as providers of information
and often interpreted the task of writing historical narratives as summarizing the content
of the documents at their disposal. When sources conflicted or instances of bias in the
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sources were identified, a few participants either took sides disregarding evidence
conflicting with their preferred argument, or they left the dichotomy unresolved. What are
the implications of dwelling in this middle ground for learning and teaching? More
specifically, how do teachers understand the task of fostering student historical thinking?
This study is an initial exploration of this question. It investigates what happens to
teachers’ epistemic stances when opportunities to delve more deeply in the discipline of
history are offered and how such learning experiences may be translated into pedagogical
practice. In particular, the study explores how teachers’ beliefs about the nature of history
and history learning changed (or not) following participation in an intense program of
professional development encouraging teachers to include a variety of primary and
secondary historical sources in their classes. History education research has suggested that
the use of these pedagogical tools might highlight the interpretive nature of history,
challenging the idea, typical of novices, that history is isomorphic to the past (Holt, 1995).
In addition, working with a plurality of sources may foster a view of history as a process
of inquiry based on the available evidence, a view that tends to characterize expertise in
this domain (Wineburg, 2001). Was this actually the case for teachers participating in the
program? If not, what kind of epistemological understanding did they seem to gain and
how did it inform their planning for instruction?
Method
Participants
Six elementary, eight middle-school, and ten high-school teachers participated in a
year-long professional development program for teaching American history. The program
consisted in an intensive ten-day summer course followed by a few workshops scheduled
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throughout the school year. Participants’ teaching experience varied from one to 22 years.
On average, their academic background included 5.5 classes in American history (SD =
3.15) and 2.3 history workshop (SD = 2.40). In addition, these teachers worked in a school
system that encourages the infusion of primary sources in the curriculum and promotes
vertical integration aiming at developing student readiness for AP history courses. Thus,
teachers are expected to include goals explicitly addressing the development of historical
thinking in the curriculum. One elementary teacher and five high-school teachers did not
complete all of the measures used in the study and were thus dropped from analysis.
Therefore, results refer to five elementary, eight middle-school, and five high-school
teachers.
Data Sources
Two quantitative measures and qualitative analyses of two performance tasks were
used as data sources for this study. Specifically, teachers’ epistemic stances were explored
using the Beliefs about History Questionnaire (BHQ) and multiple-choice items assessing
second-order concepts, such as historical evidence, historical explanations, and historical
accounts. Historical narratives written by participants after a process of research were
analyzed to assess how teachers selected and used evidence to build historical arguments.
In particular, signs of use of heuristics (e.g., consideration of multiple perspectives and of
historical significance, evaluation of sources, and contextualization) in the historical
narratives were noted. These data were used to triangulate results obtained from the BHQ
and the multiple-choice items, since the literature suggests that conceptions about the
nature of historical knowledge and historical evidence influence individuals’ ability to
think historically (Wineburg, 2001). Pedagogical implications of teachers’ epistemic
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stances were investigated by examining lesson plans developed by participants after
conclusion of the summer institute. The plans were analyzed looking for evidence of
pedagogical approaches that, according to extant research, may foster students' historical
thinking.
The BHQ and the multiple-choice items were administered as part of the Historical
Knowledge and Teaching Assessment (HKTA), a battery of measures developed to
evaluate the outcome of the professional development program. These measures were
administered twice; the first time prior beginning of the summer institute and the second
time toward the end of the academic year, after conclusion of the last workshop. Teachers
were encouraged to complete most of the research work and to write the relevant
historical narrative during or immediately after the completion of the summer institute.
Most lesson plans were developed during the summer and implemented during the school
year.
Beliefs about History Questionnaire (BHQ). This questionnaire comprises 22
statements about the nature of historical knowledge and the learning and teaching of
history. Twelve of these items are statements regarding history learning and teaching that
have been previously tested in a study exploring teachers’ epistemic reasoning in history
(Maggioni, VanSledright, & Alexander, 2007). Ten new items, which were statements
referring more directly to the nature of history were added for this study. Respondents
were asked to express their position relevant to each statement by means of a 6-point
Likert scale ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to 6 (strongly agree).
The statements aim at exemplifying three epistemic positions theoretically
deduced from the literature on epistemic cognition (King & Kitchener, 2002; Kuhn &
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Weinstock, 2002) and historical thinking (Lee & Shemilt, 2003; Wineburg, 2001; Stearns,
Seixas, & Wineburg, 2000). In particular, the first stance, called the Copier stance, is
characterized by an authorless view of history, simplistically conceived as “what it was.”
The historian is viewed as a transparent observer and faithful reporter of the past. Items
exemplifying this position are: “The facts speak for themselves,” and “Teachers should
not question students’ historical opinions, only check that they know the facts.”
The second stance, named the Borrower stance, is typified by awareness that the
past becomes visible to us mainly through the voices of witnesses and evidence is thus
conceived as testimony. Yet, whenever the attempt at discrimination between “good” and
“bad” witnesses fail, individuals tend to withdraw into the belief that history is
fundamentally subjective and the past is made by who writes it. Examples of items
mirroring this view are: “History is simply a matter of interpretation,” and “The past is
what the historian makes it to be.” Finally, the Criterialist stance is characterized by
awareness that history results from a process of inquiry, in which historical arguments
results from the interaction between the historian’s questions and the archive. Items
describing this stance are: “History is a critical inquiry about the past,” and “Reasonable
accounts can be constructed even in the presence of conflicting evidence.”
The factor structure of the BHQ was explored using a pool of 69 teachers, who
belonged to different cohorts participating in the same professional development program.
This group comprised 25 elementary, 15 middle, and 29 high-school teachers. Principal
Component Analysis with Varimax rotation suggested the emergence of two factors,
explaining 33.26% of variance. Items reflecting a Borrower and Copier stance loaded
together on the first factor; items exemplifying a Criterialist stance loaded on the second
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factor. Table 1 reports the complete list of the items with the respective loadings. A threefactor solution was also checked, but the loadings of the items were not compatible with
the theoretical model underlying the measure.
The results of the two-factor solution were compatible with theory about
development in historical thinking, especially considering the characteristics of the
sample. Based on previous research, we expected to find teachers at some middle point on
the path toward expertise. The lack of emergence of an independent factor for the Copier
stance may signal that teachers did not discriminate between the first two stances;
alternatively, this might be attributed to a lack of sensitivity of the measure or to a
statistical artifact, due to the smallness of the sample.
However, from a theoretical point of view, the first two stances share a view of
history in which the historian is at best considering a plurality of accounts, but still lacks
those criteria that enable an active interrogation of the sources. Thus, this position can
support statements such as “The facts speak of themselves,” whenever the primary
accounts agree. At the same time, whenever witnesses’ accounts clash, this set of beliefs
can back statements such as “Even eyewitnesses do not agree with each other, so there is
no way to know what happened.”
On the basis of these analyses, two scales were built by summing scores on items
loading on the same factor. Each scale was composed by 11 items. Reliability of the scales
measured using Cronbach alpha was .78 for factor 1 (Borrower/Copier stance) and .72 for
factor 2 (Criterialist stance). These scales were used to compute scores on the two factors
for teachers participating in the study.
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Multiple-choice items targeting second-order concepts. Five multiple-choice items
were designed to assess teachers’ familiarity with ideas that refer more to the “doing” of
history than to its substantive content. Labeled second-order concepts by a few
researchers, notions such as evidence, cause, and change are at the very core of the
discipline of history, even if rarely historians explicitly write about them (Lee, 2005). In
the study, multiple-choice items aimed at assessing concepts such as the evaluation of
sources in relation to a specific historical question, the characteristics of historical
explanations, and the relation between history and the past.
Each stem had four possible answers. One option was characterized by an element
of folk knowledge or played on some common misunderstanding about the nature of
historical knowledge and historical method, and was given a score of zero. For example,
one stem regarded the reason why original source accounts must be read critically. The
option “because they may distract historians from presenting the past objectively”
received a score of zero, since it hinted at the idea of history as an objective copy of the
past (presenting the past objectively) showing at the same time lack of awareness of the
material used by historians to generate historical knowledge.
The other three options offered plausible answers and were designed to illustrate
statements compatible with levels of historical thinking ordered according to a
hypothetical progression deduced from the literature (Lee & Shemilt, 2003) and reflected
in the factors emerged from the BHQ. These options received 1, 2, and 4 points,
respectively. The option receiving one point was compatible with what we have identified
in the BHQ as the Copier stance. In the example regarding the need to read original
sources critically that we are considering, this option read: “because documents are often
Exploring Teachers’ Epistemic Stances
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altered to change how past events are viewed,” an answer implying the idea that historical
truth is in the sources or is not. This position is compatible with the idea that the historian
is a chronicler, a copier of the past.
The option receiving two points reflected the Borrower stance. It underscored the
biased nature of the sources, but avoided any reference to the role played by the work of
the historian (thus, history was still viewed as residing solely in the accounts). In the
example, the two-point options read: “because history has often been told from the
perspective of the victors.” Finally, the four-point option was compatible with the
Criterialist stance, acknowledging the role of the historian or suggesting awareness of the
historical method. In the example, this option read: “because they are written from the
particular perspective of a historical actor,” an answer suggesting the use of a process
commonly demonstrated by historians reading primary documents.
The maximum score on this measure was 20. An additional example of multiplechoice item is reported below (answers are ordered from the lowest to the highest score).
One difference between history and the past is that history
a. has traditionally been produced only by literate peoples and civilizations.
b. includes only the most significant recorded and remembered events.
c. is always being reinterpreted and rewritten because new evidence is found.
d. is a reconstruction of past events based on the remaining evidence.
A professor and two doctoral students in history education provided expert
validation of the multiple-choice items. In the present study, results from this measure
were mainly used to identify the prevalent views of teachers with respect to the secondorder concepts tapped by the items and to check their compatibility with the epistemic
stances emerging from the analyses of the BQH.
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Analysis of historical narratives and lesson plans. At the end of the summer
institute, teachers were asked to prepare a lesson plan based on the use of primary sources.
The topic of the lesson needed to target the content standards of their respective curricula
and include goals promoting the development of historical thinking. Teachers were
required to do research on the topic of their choice, to prepare a historical narrative
regarding the content of the lesson (eight-ten doubled spaced pages, on average), to
include a brief annotated bibliography of relevant sources, to detail the sequence of the
lesson, and to provide primary sources to be used with students in class.
The purpose of writing a historical narrative was two-fold. On one hand, it offered
teachers an opportunity to practice historical research. As such, the assignment was
introduced by the historians who worked with the teachers during the summer institute
and it was understood as part of the development of content knowledge specifically
related to the curriculum taught at the various grade levels. On the other hand, since lesson
plans were to be shared with other teachers in the school system, the historical narrative
had also the scope to provide an overview of the topic of the lesson to colleagues who did
not go through the research process themselves. In writing the narratives, teachers were
asked to document their research by including references to primary and secondary
sources in the footnotes of the paper. During the professional development program,
historians specifically provided guidelines regarding the style commonly accepted in the
field. This practice of including detailed references to the sources used to build the
historical narrative is an important aspect of historical writing, since it provides the
evidentiary support on which historical claims rest. For the purpose of our study, this
requirement is particularly informative, since it may force teachers to explicitly
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acknowledge the role played by evidence in the construction of historical arguments, and
thus foster epistemic awareness.
Analysis of the historical narratives followed several steps. First, a holistic reading
of the papers looked for common trends in historical reasoning across the narratives (e.g.,
statement and discussion of a historical claim, corroboration and evaluation of sources,
and contextualization). Then, on the basis of the literature on historical thinking
development (Rouet et al., 1998; Stearns, Seixas, & Wineburg, 2000; Wineburg, 2001), a
rubric listing specific heuristics teachers may employ in their writing was developed.
In particular, the Developmental Rubric for Evidence-Based Historical Writing
(Monte-Sano, 2006) was used to identify a set of writing features that are considered
typical of historical reasoning. Developed to trace change in students’ writing in history,
this rubric generates synthetic scores of historical narratives (or essays). In the case of our
study, our interest was in identifying the characteristics of teachers’ historical reasoning
and not in producing an overall, synthetic evaluation of their writing; thus, we decided to
disaggregate the elements included in Developmental Rubric and to design an analytic
rubric.
Specifically, codes were created to identify instances in which the historical
narratives provided considerations of historical significance, inclusion and analysis of
multiple perspectives, reference and evaluation of sources, contextualization of the
historical issue examined, discussion of causation, and explicit mention of issues
regarding the nature of historical knowledge. These heuristics are not epistemologically
neutral and their use may signal a movement from a conception of history isomorphic
with the past to viewing history as a critical inquiry about the past.
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From the analyses of the historical narratives, a few additional codes were added.
A brief explanation of how one of these codes was created, provides the opportunity to
make the “thinking behind the rubric” more transparent. For example, we noted that
teachers often tried to foster understanding of the historical actors’ ideas and beliefs, and
thus facilitate the development of empathy. Lee (2005) describes empathy as a particular
kind of historical explanation that “involves showing that what people did in the past
makes sense in terms of their ideas about the world” (p. 46). Thus, historical narratives
demonstrating understanding of this second-order concept made use of a specific
heuristic, described in the rubric as an attempt at “explaining how the past made sense to
those experiencing it, in terms of their views of the world, ideas, values, and beliefs.”
Table 2 provides a description of the heuristics included in the rubric and examples
of their use in the narratives. In the case of empathy, the excerpt comes from a historical
narrative in which the teacher was explaining the difficulties encountered in building a
new social and economic order in post-war Southern society. She focused the explanation
on the attitudes of white planters and explained that their values (“they were eager to
reestablish themselves economically”), their world views (“[m]any white planters, while
intellectually acknowledging the rights of African-Americans to be free, did not
understand that freedom also meant that former slaves had the right to refuse to work”),
and their beliefs (“[w]hite planters also doubted the efficiency of freemen as laborers”)
concurred to build that mutual distrust that “made the creation of a social and economic
post-war Southern society difficult.”
In addition to empathy, two other codes were created to describe further heuristics
emerged from the historical narratives included in this study. They regarded the support of
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claims, and the provision of details broadly referring to the issue considered but not
directly related to a particular historical claim or piece of evidence. The breadth of the
sources included in the bibliography and the content of the notation provided were also
analyzed.
Finally, each paragraph of the narratives was coded according to the rubric.
Multiple codes were assigned whenever the paragraph suggested the use of more than one
heuristic. The first and the third author scored the narratives independently. Inter-rater
agreement, assessed using the Cohen’s Kappa index, was .93. Disagreements between the
raters were resolved through discussion.
Lesson plans were analyzed looking for characteristics identified in the literature
as indicative of promoting development of historical thinking (e.g., goals set, scaffolds
provided to guide students in the analysis of the primary sources, contextualization of
issues discussed, types of questions suggested in the work with students.) Additional
aspects emerging from the teachers’ plans were also recorded and their recurrence noted.
Results and Discussion
This section organizes the results around three main questions. Did teachers’
epistemic stances change after participation in the professional development program?
What epistemic stances can be inferred by analysis of the historical narratives written by
teachers after a process of research on a particular topic? What pedagogical choices are
described in the lesson plans and what epistemic stances seem to underlie them?
Shifts in Teachers’ Epistemic Stances
Scores on the two scales derived from the BHQ show that prior to participation in
the program the teachers tended to agree with items reflecting a Criterialist stance
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(M=56.06; SD=4.50) and somewhat disagree with items mirroring a Borrower/Copier
stance (M=31.75; SD=5.28). After participation in the program, the results remained
similar (M=57.83; SD=4.42 and M=33.35; SD=6.85, respectively), even though some
interesting trends emerged across different groups (i.e., elementary, middle school, and
high school). On average, elementary teachers’ agreement with Borrower/Copier
statements increased more than the other two groups, and high school teachers’ agreement
with Criterialist items increased more than the other two groups. However, even if
suggestive, these differences did not reach statistical significance. Given the exploratory
nature of the study, these differences are mentioned here as suggestions for future
research.
In addition, individual differences emerged within each group. Total difference
scores for the Criterialist and the Borrower/Copier factors were calculated for each teacher
by subtracting the scores obtained on the first administration of the BHQ from the scores
obtained on the second administration. Then, net shifts were calculated by subtracting the
difference score on the Borrower/Copier factor from the difference score on the
Criterialist factor. Thus, a positive score was interpreted as an overall shift toward the
Criterialist stance and a negative score as an overall shift toward the Borrower/Copier
stance. In this way, we tried to capture the prevalent epistemic move of each teacher.
Then, we analyzed what items in the questionnaire were mainly responsible for the
prevalent shift in stance (toward a Criterialist, or a Borrower/Copier stance).
For the elementary group, this analysis indicated a positive score for two teachers
and a negative score for three teachers. The analysis at the item level suggested that the
increased agreement with the Borrower/Copier stance was mainly due to higher scores on
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statements asserting the essentially interpretative nature of history. On the other hand,
increased agreement with the Criterialist stance was related mainly to higher scores on
items affirming the centrality of the historical method and its ability to deal with
conflicting evidence.
In the case of the middle-school teachers, net shift scores were positive for three
participants and negative for five. Item level analysis showed that shifts toward a
Criterialist stance were related to higher scores on items referring to the possibility of
dealing constructively with conflicting sources. On the other hand, movements toward a
Borrower/Copier stance were related to statements highlighting the essentially interpretive
nature of history and difficulties in dealing with disagreement among eyewitnesses.
Interestingly, after participation in the program, all middle-school teachers but one
disagreed with the statement “The facts speak for themselves.”
Finally, all but one high-school teacher moved toward a Criterialist stance. This
shift was mainly related to increased agreement with statements averring that history is a
critical inquiry about the past and with statements asserting the necessity to teach students
to deal with conflicting evidence.
Analysis of responses to multiple-choice items showed non-significant changes in
teachers’ understanding of second-order concepts (M = -.39; SD = 3.73; t(17) = -.44, p =
.66). Specifically, the mean score at the first administration was 12.78 (SD 3.02) and the
mean score at the second administration was 12.39 (SD 3.90). Differences across school
levels were not significant. Analyses at the item level showed that, on average, teachers
continued to have difficulties in relating historical sources to the questions asked by the
historian, a critical step in the process of building historical arguments based on evidence.
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Similarly, several teachers continued to conceive of history as determined by the available
remnants of the past, discounting the selective and interpretive role of historical
investigators; however, in this case, differences across school levels emerged (p=.054 at
the first administration; p=.075 at the second administration). Specifically, elementary
teachers’ mean score decreased from 1.80 to 1.60; middle-school teachers’ mean score
increased from 1.63 to 2.75; and high-school teachers’ mean score decreased from 2.80 to
2.00. Given the smallness of the sample, these results need further investigation; however,
they seem to suggest that specific epistemic beliefs may be influenced by the degree of
immersion in the domain and also by short term interventions.
In general, results on the multiple-choice items seem in contrast with the overall
Criterialist stance suggested by the analysis of the BHQ. However, previous studies in
epistemic cognition have shown that individuals tend to agree with statements reflecting a
level of epistemic cognition higher than the one they would demonstrate when asked to
perform tasks designed to evaluate epistemic thinking in action (Wood, Kitchener, &
Jensen, 2002). In addition, while the BHQ taps teachers’ epistemic stances, the multiplechoice items assess teachers’ knowledge of second-order concepts (i.e., a set of ideas that
require familiarity with the historical method). This occurrence and its pedagogical
implications are further discussed in the next sections.
Writing Historical Narratives
We report the analysis of the narratives in two subsections. In the first, we describe
some general trends that emerged from the first holistic reading of the narratives. The
second section summarizes results of the analysis at the paragraph level obtained by
applying the analytic rubric described in Table 2.
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General trends. The holistic reading of the historical narratives revealed a few
interesting trends. Twelve narratives had a clear informational tone, which means that
alternative perspectives were not assessed; references to sources (secondary sources, for
the most part) were included, but not critically evaluated; criteria to establish historical
significance of the topic chosen were not clearly discussed, but sometimes a celebratory
tone was employed (the excerpt below, provides an example of this tone). Overall, these
narratives conveyed an authorless view of history, typical of a Copier stance. The
authority of historians was not discussed, and sources were taken for the most part at face
value. Perhaps as a consequence, the narrative was presented as “the story” of the
particular issue investigated.
For example, the narrative of an elementary teacher about the role of women
during the Revolutionary War began in this way:
As the American War for Independence loomed darkly on the horizon, the
colonists braced themselves for the inevitable hardships that lay ahead.
A list of the hardships caused by the Intolerable Acts followed. The conclusion,
introducing the topic of the narrative, was that “these wartime conditions forced white
American women of all classes to take on new roles and new responsibility.” After listing
a few examples of women’s participation in riots, boycotts, and economic activity of their
families, the first part of the narrative concluded:
As America struggled to gain their independence from England, American
women took the first tiny steps toward their own independence.
Two narratives were constructed by comparing and contrasting sources having
different perspectives. However, no attempt at evaluating the reliability of the sources was
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made, leaving the reader with the impression that history is only a matter of perspective.
Two narratives pushed the comparison further, corroborating across sources and noting
the authors’ perspective. Yet, the dichotomy facts versus interpretation still emerged in the
annotated bibliography. For example, two articles published in The Baltimore Sun about
the Christiana Riot are described as “Very biased opinion of the Christiana Riot, facts are
accurate.”
Finally, two narratives provided a critical evaluation of the sources, placing them
within their historiographical context. They also contextualized the issue investigated and
discussed its significance. For example, after discussing the importance of the Slave
Narrative Collection in granting access to first-person accounts of slavery as remembered
by former slaves, a participant noted:
While the WPA [Work Progress Administration] interviews provide
primary source material to the post-Civil War era, a number of questions
can be raised as to the bias and accuracy of information found in these
interviews.
Points of debate among scholars were then discussed and the participant concluded by
stating:
The accuracy of the WPA interviews must be evaluated in terms of elderly
memories of childhood, seven decades’ of time lapse between event and
record, interviewees’ misidentification of the interviewer, interviewers’
skills, and society pressures on the interviewee.
It is interesting to note that, although this narrative cautioned against taking
the interviews at face value, it did not suggest how to overcome the possibility of
Exploring Teachers’ Epistemic Stances
bias (or even lies) contained in the source. What seems to be missing is the ability
to transform the source into evidence; a step that can be taken only if the powerful
role of the historian’s questioning of the sources is explicitly acknowledged. From
this point of view, it is suggestive to note that shifts toward a criterialist stance
were often signaled by an increased agreement with statements about the
possibility of dealing constructively with conflicting sources.
Use of heuristics. Results of the analysis of the historical narratives at the
paragraph level using the Analytic Rubric for Evidence-Based Historical Writing
are summarized in Table 3. The table provides the number of paragraphs in which
the use of a heuristic emerged expressed as absolute value and as a percentage of
the total number of paragraphs comprised in the narratives. It also presents data
disaggregated by school level. For example, teachers across all school levels
included in their historical narratives some considerations of historical
significance. In particular, elementary teachers used this heuristics in 12 of their
paragraphs (out of a total of 72 paragraphs written), which means that 17% of their
paragraphs contained some evidence of the use of this heuristic. Similarly, middleschool teachers included consideration of historical significance in 18 of their
paragraphs (out of a total of 91) and high-school teachers in 18 of their paragraphs
(out of a total of 56).
In this section, we describe a few commonalities and several differences in
the use of heuristics emerged from the comparison across historical narratives
written by elementary, middle, and high-school teachers. We just mentioned a case
of commonality. Almost all narratives, across all school levels, included
22
Exploring Teachers’ Epistemic Stances
considerations of historical significance, such as the exemplary character and the
relevance of specific events for the particular historical context or for the future
development of identifiable processes. The conclusion of a narrative about the life
and death of Robert F. Kennedy and the introduction to a narrative about the Pratt
Street riot illustrated this occurrence:
His death is important to our study of history because he is considered the
last hero for the downtrodden of the times after all other civil rights heroes
had also been senselessly slain. How would our lives have been different
without the election of Richard Nixon and as Robert Kennedy as President?
The implications are worth thinking about.
[…] Maryland, in particular, had strong secessionist feelings, and this
group along with groups favoring remaining loyal to the Union, had been
meeting and demonstrating in the streets of Baltimore, Maryland. One side
would put up banners or flags and the other side would tear them down,
then fighting would ensue. An incident at the beginning of the war called
the Pratt Street Riot dramatically illustrates this point.
However, few narratives justified the significance of the particular question
investigated. When this issue was discussed, teachers often appealed to the
pedagogical value of past experiences for our present lives. For example,
introducing her narrative about women’s contribution during the American
Revolution, a teacher wrote:
I recently overheard a fellow colleague state that she didn’t understand all
the fuss about women being oppressed. After teaching at the intermediate
level of elementary school, fifth grade students tend to have that notion as
well. Living through the sixties and seventies, I can attest that women
throughout history have indeed been oppressed and in many countries still
are struggling with that affliction. Therefore, it’s important to tell the
stories of women from our past, so that the knowledge gained will
empower the young to never tolerate such a position again.
All narratives also included several references to primary and secondary
sources. This result can be explained considering the emphasis of the professional
23
Exploring Teachers’ Epistemic Stances
development program and the specific instructions provided for this assignment.
Most teachers included citations of sources and incorporated quotes in the body of
the narrative to support or illustrate a specific argument.
In this February 1, 1784, letter to the Marquis de Lafayette, George
Washington mentions a pending visit from the Governor of New York and
writes “Mrs. Washington would cordially join me” in extending an
invitation to the Marquis to visit as well. This letter reflects Washington’s
pleasure at being a private citizen and his retirement from all “public
employments.” Unfortunately for Martha, who had hoped, as Patricia
Brady writes in her book, Martha Washington: An American Life, that they
“would grow old in solitude and tranquility together” their retirement
would last only a few years.
However, evaluation of the sources emerged only in few cases, suggesting
that teachers tended to treat primary and secondary sources as direct providers of
information. Very few narratives included examples of corroboration of sources.
This impression is supported by the analysis of the annotated bibliographies. In
describing sources, teachers often referred to the information offered, the details
included, the background provided, or the overview presented. In some cases, they
briefly summarized the content of the source. More rarely, they mentioned
perspective, interest, motivation, bias, and features of the account (e.g., explains
historical context, provides annotated bibliography, well written, and updated).
Another heuristic used across teachers of different school levels was
contextualization. With the exception of one elementary and one middle-school
teacher, all participants offered some description of the broader historical context
in which the specific events investigated took place. In the case of middle- and
high-school teachers, considerations about the context fostered empathy. For
24
Exploring Teachers’ Epistemic Stances
example, in examining the events that brought Baltimore under federal occupation
during the Civil War, a teacher wrote:
Central and Western Marylanders, because of their background and need
for farming and manufacturing, favored the North and sided with them
when the call came for Union support. The Northern, or Union, way of life
was one that these Marylanders loved and supported no matter what. To
them, supporting the South would be like turning their backs on their
struggle for freedom from oppression and embracing a cause that was
against everything that they believed and stood for.
Historical narratives written by elementary teachers rarely demonstrated
the use of empathy. Although extensive space was dedicated to framing the
historical context, these narratives contained several examples of presentism (i.e.,
they used present day standards to interpret and evaluate past actions),
unwarranted generalizations, judgmental language, and tended to offer only one
perspective. The excerpt that follows illustrates a few of these instances.
When England began to enact her various taxes and laws, women were
found wanting to, and ultimately, joining the effort to put an end to the
tyranny.
In this sentence, all women appeared to espouse the Revolutionary cause, an
unwarranted generalization, since some women were Loyalists; a harsh judgment
of the British colonial rule was conveyed by the use of the term “tyranny,” but no
discussion of the historical conditions justifying this evaluation was offered. It is
also clear that the narrative expressed only the perspective of American
revolutionaries.
Similarly, only high-school teachers included multiple perspectives in their
narratives and explicitly noted the possibility of multiple interpretations. However,
25
Exploring Teachers’ Epistemic Stances
although different historiographic traditions were noted, the competing claims
were, for the most part, left unchallenged.
Another heuristic used only by high-school teachers regarded looking for
causation. However, for the most part, these historical narratives suggested
possible relations of cause and effect between pairs of specific events or processes,
or individuated facilitating circumstances of particular state of affairs. Discussion
of causes as elements of a network without which certain events would not have
occurred did not emerge from the narratives. For example, discussing the
aftermath of the 1968 Baltimore riots, a narrative lists the successes enjoyed by the
African American population since 1968.
The number of black college graduates doubled between 1970 and 1990. In
addition, more job opportunities and higher class housing became available
to them. In fact, the famous Levitt development firm announced in April of
1968 that it would officially end its policy of building segregated housing
in Maryland as a “memorial” to Dr. King.
However, the relative weight of the riot in bringing about these developments is
not further analyzed.
On the other hand, elementary teachers seemed more explicit in mentioning
epistemic issues. In a few instances, their narratives referred to the role played by
historians especially in selecting the topics to investigate. This may be related to
the specific themes discussed by this group of teachers during the seminars with
historians. These themes regarded the history of groups usually marginalized by
mainstream historiography, such as women, African Americans, and Indians. In
26
Exploring Teachers’ Epistemic Stances
27
fact, awareness of the role of historians in selecting topics and evidence seemed to
fade once the narratives turned to events typically discussed in mainstream U.S.
history books. In these cases, teachers did not challenge the perspective of these
sources and accepted the mainstream narrative as “the past.” For example, one of
the few instances of consideration of bias appeared in relation to a British source.
Edenton Tea Party
This image shows women boycotting tea thus illustrating the role women
as boycotters. This image was created in England, however, so you will
also want to discuss bias.
Interestingly, the same annotated bibliography listed Paul Revere’s
engraving of the Boston Massacre saying that “This image shows women in the
role of rioters. She is in the middle, left-hand side.” Finally, high-school teachers
included in their narratives a great amount of evidence supporting their argument
and avoided to add details not explicitly linked to specific claims. On the contrary,
elementary and middle-school teachers dedicated almost a third of their narratives
to describing events and state of affairs that, although related to the topic
investigated, were not presented within an argument structure.
Making Pedagogical Choices
All lesson plans included the use of primary sources, since this was one of the
requirements of the program. How did teachers use them? In general, there is no evidence
that teachers used primary sources for fostering students’ epistemic development or for
the exploration of students’ current epistemologies. Lesson plans seem to suggest that
primary sources were used for two main purposes. On one hand, they served as sources of
information (alternative or complementary to the textbook) to convey an established
Exploring Teachers’ Epistemic Stances
28
narrative. On the other hand, they were used to document the point of views of different
groups on the issue discussed.
An example of the first approach is captured by an activity designed to explore the
political, social, and economic consequences of the Baltimore riots. In groups, students
would be asked to read newspaper articles of the time and to highlight in different colors
the three kinds of consequences discussed. The highlighted articles would then be taped
on the classroom walls and each student would be asked to complete a three way chart
about the consequences of the riots by taking notes from the articles. Interestingly,
students would not be prompted to discuss in their groups about the perspective of the
newspapers, nor they would be encouraged to corroborate information across the various
sources. This approach may prompt students to identify main ideas and consider multiple
factors, two necessary steps if one wants to explore questions about causation, for
example. However, if students do not interrogate the sources but treat them as aseptic and
decontextualized pieces of information, historical thinking may be seriously hindered and
students may end up with an uncritically selected collection of weakly structured details.
Examples of the second purpose were lesson plans using primary sources to
illustrate experiences of freed slaves, lives of women during the Revolutionary period,
perspectives of Marylanders during the Civil War, and thoughts of political leaders during
the Cuban Missile Crisis. The inclusion of multiple voices (e.g., women, ex-slaves, rioters,
secessionists, and unionists) would not call for a discussion of the nature of history and of
historical significance, since different perspectives would be often presented as parallel
stories. Thus, the epistemic message of the lesson would not change, even if new stories
had been added to the traditional textbook narrative.
Exploring Teachers’ Epistemic Stances
29
In addition to these general trends, other aspects of the lesson plans may be
interpreted as indicative of how teachers navigated the epistemic terrain in teaching
history. For examples, several plans included questions asking for students’ opinions and
feelings about the topic under investigation. This kind of questioning would be often used
to introduce the topic and would not require students to make any reference to evidence.
We conjecture that teachers would use this strategy for motivational purposes or for
activating prior knowledge. However, this pedagogical technique may lead to the idea that
opinions need no justification; a perspective that may hinder historical thinking or confine
its educational value within the boundary of specific academic tasks. Further, the activated
prior knowledge would be left unchecked, leaving open the possibility that the new
knowledge may be assimilated in the frameworks of previous misunderstandings.
Another issue regards the role that the question of the historian has in the inquiry
process. Most lesson plans would encourage students to analyze the sources, noting their
authors and their point of view. However, once a point of view was identified, the
evaluation of the source seemed complete. In other words, the reliability of the account
would not be discussed in relation to the question investigated, but conceived of as an
intrinsic character of the source. In addition, since sources were usually selected to
illustrate a pre-defined narrative, the lesson plans did not need to deal with the problem of
conflict among sources, an issue that would bring the investigator’s questioning to the
forefront. Finally, primary sources were defined in several lesson plans as documents
created during the time period that was being studied; a definition that does not consider
the specific question asked and thus the relation to the historical investigator.
Exploring Teachers’ Epistemic Stances
30
A view of history in which the historian is for the most part absent seems to foster
also the dichotomy between facts and interpretation, a feature already noted in the analysis
of historical narratives. Similarly, some forms of assessment would ask students to extract
pieces of information from the sources provided, without asking for any kind of
evaluation of the source; an assignment understandable if historical accounts are perceived
as authorless.
Finally, a strategy often included in the lesson plans for analyzing multiple sources
was the jigsaw (Aronson, 1978). Following this technique, students would be divided in
groups and, within each group, one student would become the expert for a particular
source. An alternative design would make students discuss one particular source within
their group and then they all would act as experts for the other classmates. In both
formulations, the result would be that each student were exposed only to one source and
accessed the other documents through the analyses of the other classmates. It is difficult to
evaluate whether this approach may foster or hinder historical thinking without seeing it in
action. However, one of the activities usually coupled with this approach would ask
students to copy the analyses or summaries prepared by their classmates in some form of
graphic organizer, a task that suggests acritical adding of information instead of careful
corroboration of sources. Reference to the subtext of the document and to the perspective
of the author were absent from these synthetic summaries, suggesting the idea that
discrete pieces of evidence can be extracted from the documents and treated
independently from their author and the circumstances of their production.
Exploring Teachers’ Epistemic Stances
31
Conclusions and Implications
Before discussing the results, it is important to contextualize the findings and thus,
state the limitations of this study. First, the sample is small and not necessarily
representative of other teachers in the school system. Some teachers volunteered to
participate in the program, while some teachers were nominated by their principals. Thus,
self-selection bias may have occurred. In addition, it is plausible to hypothesize that
teachers’ beliefs may be influenced by the curricula they are asked to teach, further
cautioning against generalization. However, given that the study aims at exploring
features of teachers’ epistemic thinking and the relation between epistemic stances and
pedagogical practice, this instance does not invalidate the results, even if participant
characteristics may have constrained the features emerged. Nevertheless, it limits the
generalizability of the results.
A second limitation regards the fact that teachers’ pedagogical choices were
inferred from written lesson plans. The plans detailed a sequence of activities to be
implemented. However, sections of the plans regarded class discussions or exchanges
between teacher and students that could not be observed. These dialogues are potentially
very informative to deepen understanding of teachers’ epistemic stances and of their role
in classroom settings and may influence the effect that activities included in the plans
have on students’ historical thinking.
Third, the instrument used to measure epistemic stances is still exploratory and the
amount of variance explained was low. However, the reliability of the data from the scales
was acceptable and the overall consistency across administrations may be considered a
further indication of the reliability of the data produced by the BHQ. Finally, the nature of
Exploring Teachers’ Epistemic Stances
32
the task and the contingencies in which it was approached may have influenced teachers’
performance. In particular, it is possible that the purpose of producing lesson plans (and
related historical narratives) reflecting curriculum goals may have affected teachers’
choices. On the other hand, from the point of view of this study, this circumstance might
have enhanced the ecological validity of the task.
These limitations notwithstanding, the study raises some compelling questions
about the impact of professional development programs on teachers’ epistemic stances
and on the influence that epistemic beliefs may have on the use of specific pedagogical
tools, such as the introduction of primary sources in the history curriculum. As a corollary,
the study suggests a few considerations in terms of research methodology for studies
addressing the investigation of epistemic cognition in history.
A first issue regards the assessment of teachers’ epistemic stances. The results of
the BHQ indicated that teachers agreed with statements describing a Criterialist stance and
mildly disagreed with statements illustrating a Borrower/Copier stance. However, results
on multiple-choice items assessing knowledge of second-order concepts, a fundamental
component of expert thinking in history with a critical epistemic component, and several
features of the historical narratives and lesson plans suggested otherwise. In particular, we
found little evidence that teachers were aware of the role played by the historian in writing
history. Even if they considered multiple sources and in some cases purposefully searched
for multiple voices, history seemed to reside in the texts. Conversely, the idea that history
was the outcome of a process of inquiry in which the investigator’s questions and the
archive were in reciprocal relation did not emerge.
Exploring Teachers’ Epistemic Stances
33
For example, teachers’ historical narratives included footnotes citing the sources
used to build the accounts. However, even if specifically required to provide an annotated
bibliography, participants rarely provided an explicit evaluation of the primary or
secondary source cited. At best, the bibliography described the source’s content in terms
of information provided, but the authority of the text was taken for granted. This attitude
toward the history text has been observed in previous studies and found particularly
resilient in novices (VanSledright, 2002).
How can the contradiction in terms of assessment of epistemic stances be
explained? One hypothesis regards the possibility that the familiarity of teachers with
domain discourse promotes preference for statements reflecting the stance typical of
domain experts. However, once they are called to participate in the activities of the
domain (e.g., by writing historical narratives) and experience the discomfort of operating
in an unfamiliar and uncertain epistemic terrain, they tend to revert to the stance typical of
novices or acclimated learners. In other words, teachers may know about expert ideas, but
lacking experience in operating on the basis of those criteria, they do not necessarily act
on them.
Moreover, research on the perceived relation between knowledge and beliefs has
shown that individuals rarely consider these two concepts completely overlapping
(Maggioni et al., 2007). People may know about various ideas; however, and especially
when ideas are value laden, people do not necessarily believe in them. If this were the
case, it is possible that the BHQ taps into teachers’ epistemic knowledge of domain’s
epistemic ideas, more than into teachers’ beliefs.
Exploring Teachers’ Epistemic Stances
34
An alternative hypothesis has been suggested in the previous section and regards
the instruments used to capture teachers’ epistemic stances. It may be that agreement or
disagreement with the statements in the BHQ was prompted by reasons that did not deal
exclusively with teachers’ ideas about the nature of history, but with the way in which the
items are worded. The low variance explained might lend support to this interpretation,
and further work at validation is necessary to explore this possibility. On the other hand,
the overall theoretical consistency of the two factors extracted seems to support the
construct validity of the measure.
At a broader methodological level, results of this study suggest that self-report
measures may be insufficient to assess epistemic stances. Triangulation with results
provided by analysis of performance on relevant tasks afforded a rich and more nuanced
description of this complex construct.
In terms of shifts of epistemic stances after participation in the professional
development program, comparison of the results on the two administrations of the BHQ
showed overall small shifts; an occurrence signaling that changes in epistemic stances
may need time and repeated exposure to the tasks typical of expertise. Changes at the
epistemic level may also require that teachers’ awareness of their epistemic stances is
encouraged and epistemic issues are openly discussed. In the absence of such experiences,
teachers may well rely on the ideas and approaches they know best to make pedagogical
decisions.
On the other hand, little change at the epistemic level does not necessarily mean
little change in terms of pedagogical strategies employed once teachers go back to their
classrooms. Teachers searched for new material, familiarizing themselves with the use of
Exploring Teachers’ Epistemic Stances
35
several search techniques; spent a considerable amount of time looking for primary
sources; and developed worksheets and designed activities and assessments to
accommodate the use of primary sources in the curriculum. Finally, in analyzing primary
accounts, they used several of the heuristics employed by experts in the domain.
Consequently, these teachers’ students were probably exposed to a greater variety of texts
and perhaps found the history class more engaging. However, the kind of thinking
promoted by these pedagogical approaches seems to be fundamentally different from the
historical thinking described in the educational research (Donovan & Bransford, 2005;
Wineburg, 2001).
In other words, it seems that something gets lost once the goals promoted during
the professional development program are translated into pedagogical practice. In
particular, the value in terms of epistemic development of exposing students to primary
sources almost disappears from the lesson plans. Thus, at the surface level, the tasks
planned may resemble the approaches suggested in the literature to foster historical
thinking. Primary sources are included in the curriculum and scaffolds are provided to
guide the analysis of the sources. Assessments also change, asking students to write their
own narratives based on the information provided in the documents.
However, with an interesting linguistic twist, students are often prompted to look
for information (or for facts) and not for evidence, a crucial difference in terms of learning
to think historically. As long as students look at sources as information, and evaluate them
only on the basis of the truthfulness and accuracy of the story told, they remain unable to
deal with contradiction among sources. It is only by understanding that accounts can be
Exploring Teachers’ Epistemic Stances
36
asked questions their author never set out to answer that sources become provider of
evidence, and the process of inquiry into the past can continue (Lee & Ashby, 2000).
A few examples of how this step can be facilitated are provided by the literature
(Bain, 2000, 2005; VanSledright, 2002). Comparing the descriptions of these approaches
with the lesson plans written by participants in the study a crucial difference emerge.
While the primary goal of these educational researchers was fostering students’ reflection
on the nature of historical accounts and thus facilitating critical evaluation of any history,
the lesson plans analyzed in this study seem to suggest that the primary goal of teachers
was some form of “content coverage,” together with training in the use of specific analytic
skills.
We interpret this occurrence as symptomatic of an understanding of historical
reasoning still fragile. It appears that at the root of this fragile understanding may lay
misunderstandings about the nature and justification of historical knowledge. The analyses
of historical narratives and multiple-choice responses documented some aspects of this
fragility and illustrated its epistemological component. The analyses of the lesson plans
displayed the influence of such understandings in the history classroom. In a way, teachers
circumscribed the challenge to think historically to the development of discrete abilities,
such as searching for sources, reading sources, extracting information and main ideas
from sources. In epistemic terms, these tasks well fit the ideas characterizing the Copier
stance. The introduction of multiple perspectives may perhaps signal an epistemic move
toward the Borrower stance. However, there was little evidence in the lesson plans that
steps would be taken to provide students criteria to progress further.
Exploring Teachers’ Epistemic Stances
37
Educational researchers acknowledged the difficulties inherent in facilitating
students’ movement toward a Criterialist stance. In particular, students found it difficult to
acknowledge the interpretive nature of history without falling into a helpless relativism
(Bain, 2000; VanSledright, 2002). At the pedagogical level, this study encourages to
consider what kind of epistemic stances may be fostered by instructional strategies that,
on the surface level, may appear very similar. For example, one wonders what students’
epistemic stances are encouraged when issues about the nature and certainty of historical
knowledge are suggested by exposure to primary sources, but epistemic development is
not explicitly pursued. In this situation, will the exposure to multiple sources foster the
belief that history is just a matter of interpretation and, in the end, what can be known
about the past is just a matter of opinion? Alternatively, will students just ignore the
epistemological question and use sources as additional texts providing bits of information
necessary to complete assigned tasks? In this regard, future research on the relation
between teachers’ epistemic stances and student historical thinking development seems
warranted.
A further set of questions that emerged from the study regards implications for
teachers’ education and professional development programs. What conditions may help
movement from fragile understanding to well structured knowledge of what historical
thinking entails, so that pedagogical practice can foster students’ historical understanding?
The analysis of the historical narratives underscored broad differences across teachers
working at different school levels. In part, this outcome was expected, given that highschool teachers are required to have a higher specialization in the area they teach. Thus,
differences in historical reasoning may just signal differences in expertise, implicit in the
Exploring Teachers’ Epistemic Stances
38
requirements for teaching at various levels of the school system. However, whereas
unfamiliarity with content not addressed by the specific curriculum taught does not affect
(or, only marginally affects) what happens in the classroom, the overall ability of the
teacher to reason historically may influence the pedagogical approach in a first-grade class
as well as in a twelfth-grade Advanced Placement class.
The problem is particularly vexing if we consider that it is impossible to teach any
kind of historical content (or any content, for that matter) without simultaneously
conveying also a particular view about the nature and the justification of that knowledge.
This process is often embedded in the language used to define the tasks students are asked
to accomplish in schools. The fact that this process does not require self-awareness on the
part of the teachers (nor of the students) makes the issue even more pressing. For example,
extracting information from a document and analyzing that document to test a historical
claim (i.e., looking for evidence) are two very different processes. Similarly, writing a
thesis statement, supporting it with appropriate evidence, and explaining the connection
between the two (i.e., writing a good argumentative essay) does not necessarily exhaust
the characteristics of historical writing, since the nature of the claims, their justification,
and what is considered evidence is specific to a discipline (Monte-Sano, 2006). In schools,
however, these two tasks may both be called constructed responses.
The historical narratives written by high-school teachers offered a good example,
in this respect. In fact, these narratives emphasized the relation between claims and
supporting evidence without necessarily engaging in the analysis of the sources,
considering different perspectives, or discussing causal relations. Evidently, the problem
goes beyond a labeling or stylistic issue. Nevertheless, the fact that words signaling
Exploring Teachers’ Epistemic Stances
39
familiarity with the heuristics typical of the domain rarely emerged in the study suggests a
weak knowledge of those second-order concepts that lie at the heart of the discipline.
Whereas some heuristics appeared more easily available to teachers and while it
was possible to foster the acquisition of specific competences in a relatively short period
of time, it seems that epistemic stances do not easily change. This occurrence is
particularly problematic in the case of historical understanding, since the development of
historical thinking seems to require specific epistemic assumptions. Would a heightened
competence in the history domain aid this process? If this were the case, how would this
increased competence look like and what could facilitate it? In other words, would it be
enough to include explicit discussions of epistemic issues in teachers’ education programs
or should teachers also be exposed to the practice of historical research and experience the
epistemic challenges that it implies first hand? Is a broader content knowledge a necessary
condition to engage in these activities? Finally, what pedagogical knowledge should
teachers and their educators possess to facilitate the development of historical thinking?
Being explorative and descriptive in nature, this study does not provide answers to
those questions. Nevertheless, it offers evidence suggesting that there are no easy
shortcuts to promote epistemic development in history. Teachers’ beliefs, as well as
students’ beliefs, cannot be ignored if the outcome of the educational process wants to be
progression in thinking. Inadequate questions may occasionally amuse an archivist. Yet,
investigations regarding history teaching need to include questions about what kind of
epistemic beliefs are promoted in schools; this seems a necessary step for an increased
understanding of how historical thinking can be fostered within the classroom context.
Exploring Teachers’ Epistemic Stances
40
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Exploring Teachers’ Epistemic Stances
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Table 1
Two-Factor Solution for the BHQ
Factor
Item
1
2
________________________________________________________________________
History is simply a matter of interpretation.
.117
.673
Students who read many history books learn that the past is what the
.265
.744
historian makes it to be.
Disagreement about the same event in the past is always due to lack of
-.149
.498
evidence.
Good students know that history is basically a matter of opinion.
-.211
.529
Historical claims cannot be justified, since they are simply a matter of
-.527
.548
interpretation.
Good general reading and comprehension skills are enough to learn
.000
.354
history well.
The past is what the historian makes it to be.
-.202
.529
It is impossible to know anything for sure about the past, since no one
-.315
.545
of us was there.
The facts speak for themselves.
.000
.309
Students need to be aware that history is essentially a matter of
-.111
.616
interpretation.
Even eyewitnesses do not always agree with each other, so there is no
-.280
.485
way to know what happened.
It is fundamental that students are taught to support their reasoning
.164
.327
with evidence and ask that history textbook authors do so also.
A historical account is the product of a disciplined method of inquiry.
.221
.606
Students need to be taught to deal with conflicting evidence.
.000
.424
History is a critical inquiry about the past.
-.248
.510
Comparing sources and looking for author subtext are essential
-.105
.464
components of the process of learning history.
Knowledge of the historical method is fundamental for historians and
.258
.600
students alike.
Reasonable accounts can be constructed even in the presence of
-.220
.338
conflicting evidence.
History is the reasonable reconstruction of past occurrences based on
-.206
.381
the available evidence.
Since there is no way to know what really happened in the past,
.181
-.640
students can believe whatever story they choose.*
Teachers should not question students’ historical opinions, only check
.356
-.497
that they know the facts. *
There is no evidence in history. *
.330
-.649
*Items reverse coded in the reliability analysis and scale building.
Exploring Teachers’ Epistemic Stances
47
Table 2
Analytic Rubric for Evidence-Based Historical Writing
Heuristic
Description
Example
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Consideration of historical
significance
The narrative explains the relevance
of the topic investigated and of the
evidence selected with reference to a
plausible argument and the broader
historical context.
“One such instance of boycotting was administered by the
women of Edenton, North Carolina. They signed an agreement
in which they declared that it was ‘their duty’ to do ‘every thing
as far as lies in our power’ to support the ‘publick good’. This
was the first time that women had ever made a public statement
about a political matter and thus it is a significant event in the
history of American women. Women were expected to be
unfamiliar to political ideas and if for some reason they were
knowledgeable about them, they were not to talk about them
outside of private conversations with friends. By signing the
document in Edenton, these women were making a loud and
public statement.”
Inclusion and analysis of
multiple perspectives
The narrative refers to different points
of view about a specific issues or
different interpretations of historical
events. It may also evaluate different
perspectives and propose a new
interpretation on the basis of such
analyses.
“This event brought an end to the major dealings the
Eisenhower administration had in the Middle East and left open
the door to potential policy in the region. In Eisenhower’s
defense, he was wandering in heavily untreaded waters there
and that his aversion of any military occurrence during his time
could be considered a victory. The more prevalent theory,
however, is that Eisenhower was acting in the interest of the
Soviet threat to the region, and that every decision he made
there was guided by his thoughts on the impact that
communism might have in light of an American absence.”
Exploring Teachers’ Epistemic Stances
48
Reference to and
evaluation of sources
The narrative cites relevant primary
and secondary sources. It may also
interpret them or evaluate their
reliability with reference to the
question investigated.
“Martha [Washington] received a letter from her husband in
June explaining that he must accept the position because of
destiny and a sense of civic duty. He expresses his
unwillingness to part from her and the ‘real happiness’ that he
finds with her at home, his uneasiness knowing that she will be
left alone and writes that he will return safe to her in the fall.
Martha’s ‘uneasiness at being left alone’ refers to the bond
between husband and wife, not her ability to manage in his
absence. Martha was considered by George to be a full partner
in their relationship.”
Contextualization
The narrative provides descriptions of
the historical context in which the
particular event takes place and
interprets evidence avoiding
presentism.
“The background history of the laws of the time helps clarify
the range of views about slavery in the time period leading up
to the Civil War. The United States Constitution, ratified in
1788, said that just by escaping from a slave state into a free
state does not make the slave free: “No person held to Service
of Labour in one state, under the laws thereof, escaping into
another, shall, in consequences of any law or regulation therein,
be discharged from such service or labour, but shall be
delivered up on claim of the party to whom such service or
labour may be due.’”
Looking for Causation
Within a net of relations among
events, processes, and state of affairs,
the narrative identifies a few elements
without which a certain event would
not have occurred or suggests a
relation of cause and effect among
some of these elements.
“Some historians have stated that the anticommunism hunters
were much more of a menace to society than the communists.
Millions of Americans civil liberties were violated trying to
eradicate the country of a minute number of subversives. Others
have stated that the red scare was an elite crusade; most
American families were too busy bettering themselves by going
to college and purchasing consumer goods to care about
supposed communist takeover. If American citizens did not
care why did politicians not let the red scare die? The reason
Exploring Teachers’ Epistemic Stances
49
could be that politics after 1948 was dominated by the anticommunist hunt and defending your constituents from the reds
would pay off at the polls.”
“Martha [Washington], the woman, is not easily known because
she destroyed nearly 40 years of her correspondence before her
death and perhaps also because of what Carol Berkin refers to
as gender amnesia. Since women of the eighteen century did
not have a political, economic or social standing apart from
their husbands there is not the kind of documentation about
women that there is about men.”
Explicit mention of
epistemic issues
The narrative refers to the interpretive
role of the historian and to how
historical claims are generated.
Empathy
The narrative attempts explaining how
the past made sense to those
experiencing it, in terms of their views
of the world, ideas, values, and
beliefs.
“Another obstacle to the smooth transition of African
Americans into free society was the attitude of white planters.
Because white planters were eager to reestablish themselves
economically, they wanted to obtain labor at the lowest possible
prices. Many white planters, while intellectually acknowledging
the rights of African-Americans to be free, did not understand
that freedom also meant that former slaves had the right to
refuse to work. White planters also doubted the efficiency of
freemen as laborers. The mutual distrust between newly freed
African Americans and white planters made the creation of a
social and economic post-war Southern society difficult.”
Support of claims
The narrative offers details supporting
the thesis statement or other related
historical claims.
“Frustrated by a variety of the characteristics of urban poverty
[…], they decided they had ‘nothing to lose.’ Infused with rage,
they adopted a ‘gladiator attitude,’ and lost inhibitions. They
would ignore the moderate voices in their own communities.
As the riots evolved, people continued to steal from the
business establishment while throwing Molotov cocktails on the
street and smashing a vending machine. Firefighters attempting
to contain the flames of emerging fires, cautiously dodged
Exploring Teachers’ Epistemic Stances
50
bottles pelted from windows. At one point, the firemen
demanded that police officers accompany them into certain
areas. Tense moments such as these tested the policy of
restraint adopted by city, state, and federal officials.”
Non-structured details
The narrative offers details related to
the topic investigated, but not
necessarily linked to a specific
historical claim.
The Cost of Slavery: The Origin and Economics of the African
Atlantic Slave Trade
Slavery is an ancient system developed by humans of various
cultures as a way to capitalize on conquered or disadvantaged
peoples or suppress those who might pose a threat to an existing
power. The Old Testament of the bible gives numerous
accounts of slaves and slaveholders, the most famous probably
being the enslaved Hebrews under the control of the Egyptians.
Slavery has been found throughout the ancient world of Europe,
Asia, the Middle East, and Africa. There is even evidence of
slavery in the Ancient empires of the Americas among the
Aztec, Maya, and Inca.
Exploring Teachers’ Epistemic Stances
51
Table 3
Use of Heuristics
Paragraphs Using the Heuristic
_____________________________________________
Heuristic
Elementary
Middle
High
________________________________________________________________________
Consideration of historical
significance
12 /72
(17%)
18/91
(20%)
18/56
(32%)
Inclusion and analysis of
multiple perspectives
0/72
(0%)
0/91
(0%)
4/56
(7%)
Reference to and evaluation of
sources
20/72
(28%)
29/91
(32%)
25/56
(45%)
Contextualization
20/72
(28%)
19/91
(21%)
9/56
(16%)
Causation
0/72
(0%)
0/91
(0%)
5/56
(9%)
Explicit mention of epistemic
issues
6/72
(8%)
2/91
(2%)
1/56
(2%)
Empathy
2/72
(3%)
13/91
(14%)
14/56
(25%)
Support of claims
3/72
(4%)
8/91
(9%)
24/56
(43%)
Non-structured details
26/72
(36%)
24/91
(26%)
4/56
(7%)
Paragraphs not coded
6/72
(8%)
5/91
(5%)
0/56
(0%)