Flipping the Textbook:
Replacing Textbook-Thinking with Thinking Historically
Patrick W. O’Neil
Methodist University
Title III Teaching and Learning Symposium
April 9, 2014
Classic New-Style US History Textbook
From Keene et al., Visions of America: A History of the United States,
Second Edition (Boston: Pearson, 2013), pp. 192-93.
Sample from one of my old Syllabi: Focus on Reader
American History II: 1865 – Present (Spring, 2013)
Reader:
Kevin J. Fernlund., Documents for America’s History, Vol. 2: Since 1865, Seventh Edition.
Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2011.
Wednesday, February 6: The Middle Class and Its Ideology
•Schaller, 688-89
•Fernlund: 18-1, The Christian Family; 18-2, The Solitude of Self; 18-8, Evolution and
Religion; 18-9, The Forgotten Man
DUE IN CLASS: PAPER 1 (FINAL)
Monday, February 11: Responses to Changes in Urban America
•Schaller, 671-75, 681-85 (up to “The Peopling of American Cities”), 689-707
•BLACKBOARD: Riordan, from Plunkitt of Tammany Hall
•Fernlund: 17-10, On Chinese Immigration; 17-13, Testimony Before the U.S. Strike
Commission on the Pullman Strike; 20-3, Wealth Against Commonwealth
Wednesday, February 13: Responses to Changes in Rural America
•Schaller, 668-69, 713-17
•BLACKBOARD: Mitchell, Negro Supremacy
•Fernlund: 16-4, Nuestra Platforma: Hispanics Protest Anglo Encroachment in New
Mexico; 20-5, People’s (Populist) Party National Platform
Sample from one of my old syllabi: focus on Textbook
American History II: 1865 – Present (Spring, 2013)
Textbook:
Michael Schaller et al. American Horizons: U. S. History in a Global Context, Volume II.
New York: Oxford University Press, 2013.
Wednesday, February 6: The Middle Class and Its Ideology
•Schaller, 688-89
•Fernlund: 18-1, The Christian Family; 18-2, The Solitude of Self; 18-8, Evolution and
Religion; 18-9, The Forgotten Man
DUE IN CLASS: PAPER 1 (FINAL)
Monday, February 11: Responses to Changes in Urban America
•Schaller, 671-75, 681-85 (up to “The Peopling of American Cities”), 689-707
•BLACKBOARD: Riordan, from Plunkitt of Tammany Hall
•Fernlund: 17-10, On Chinese Immigration; 17-13, Testimony Before the U.S. Strike
Commission on the Pullman Strike; 20-3, Wealth Against Commonwealth
Wednesday, February 13: Responses to Changes in Rural America
•Schaller, 668-69, 713-17
•BLACKBOARD: Mitchell, Negro Supremacy,
•Fernlund: 16-4, Nuestra Platforma: Hispanics Protest Anglo Encroachment in New
Mexico; 20-5, People’s (Populist) Party National Platform
Textbook-thinking: How a textbook presents the origins of the Civil War
“The Civil War began in 1861 as a conflict over whether Southern states possessed the right to
secede from the Union. But when Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation took effect on January
1, 1863, it became a war against slavery.”
From Keene et al., Visions of America: A History of the United States, Second Edition
(Boston: Pearson, 2013), pp. 374-75.
Textbooks vs. Academics
“The Civil War began in 1861 as a conflict over whether Southern states
possessed the right to secede from the Union. But when Lincoln’s
Emancipation Proclamation took effect on January 1, 1863, it became
a war against slavery.”
- Keene et al., Visions of America: A History of the United States, Second
Edition (Boston: Pearson, 2013), pp. 374-75.
“[T]here now exists a large inventory of previously suggested
interpretations building upon such diverse mechanisms as slavery,
sectionalism, political ineptitude, a slave-power conspiracy, economic
conflicts and abolitionist activism .”
- Gerald Gunderson, “The Origin of the American Civil War,” Journal of
Economic History 34, No. 4 (Dec., 1974), 915.
Textbook-Thinking
vs.
Thinking Historically
Changing Syllabi to Emphasize Thinking Historically:
History 201
American History to 1865: (R)Evolutions in Citizenship
Summer 2013
Professor Patrick W. O’Neil
Students, Familiarize Yourselves with this Site.
Deciphering Historical Sources:
Thing 1:
Student-Led Research of Scholarly Sources
Thing 2:
Videos on Trends in Historical Writing
Thing 3:
Opening Up Primary Sources
Thing 4:
Helping Students Synthesize Ideas into Narratives
Thing 1:
Student-Led Research of Scholarly Sources
Friday, June 21:
RESEARCH:
Show-and-Tell 1 Due in Class: Find one relevant scholarly article on JSTOR or
Project Muse, and bring it to class. “Relevance” might mean a number of things,
but it has to address at least one of the primary documents we’ve been looking at
in class and, ideally, address an issue we’ve been talking about.
***WRITE***:
Write a paragraph-long summary of the article and a suggestion of how the article
affects your view of the relevant primary documents (or vice versa).
•PAPER 1 (3-4 pages) DUE IN CLASS: on Native American life,
European colonization of America, contact between Native Americans and
Europeans, or some related topic. You must base your argument on at least
three primary documents and refer to at least one scholarly article, and cite
all sources according to the Chicago Manual of Style. (You may find
examples of Chicago Style here:
http://www.chicagomanualofstyle.org/tools_citationguide.html .)
Scaffolding Student Skills
Friday, June 21:
RESEARCH:
Show-and-Tell 1 Due in Class: Find one relevant scholarly article on JSTOR or
Project Muse, and bring it to class. “Relevance” might mean a number of things,
but it has to address at least one of the primary documents we’ve been looking at
in class and, ideally, address an issue we’ve been talking about.
***WRITE***:
Write a paragraph-long summary of the article and a suggestion of how the article
affects your view of the relevant primary documents (or vice versa).
Thursday, June 20: LIBRARY DAY: MEET IN THE UPSTAIRS L.I.C. ROOM.
RESEARCH:
• Explore the library website, especially the Electronic Resources section. Make
sure you know how to log in from off-campus.
Friday, June 21:
RESEARCH:
Show-and-Tell 1 Due in Class: Find one relevant scholarly article on JSTOR or
Project Muse, and bring it to class. “Relevance” might mean a number of things,
but it has to address at least one of the primary documents we’ve been looking at
in class and, ideally, address an issue we’ve been talking about.
***WRITE***:
Write a paragraph-long summary of the article and a suggestion of how the article
affects your view of the relevant primary documents (or vice versa).
Thing 2:
Videos on Trends in Historical Writing
Wednesday, July 10: The Civil War: From Sectional Conflict to Racial/Labor Crusade
READ:
•Yazawa, 350-51 (The Crisis at Fort Sumter), 352-53 (Slave Runaways in South
Carolina), 353-45 (A Northern Black Woman Teaches Contrabands in South
Carolina), 364-65 (Letters to the Editor)
BLACKBOARD:
•South Carolina Secedes from the Union
•Lincoln, 63-70 (First Inaugural Address), 125-29 (Address on Colonization to a
Delegation of Black Americans), 130 (Letter to Horace Greeley), 140-42
(Emancipation Proclamation), 36 (Order of Retaliation), 163 (The Gettysburg
Address), 200-201 (Second Inaugural Address)
WATCH:
•Video on Civil War Historiography
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3oYGr7nsucY&list=PLpeHL1H-cZAIFCa63Kbcy5nqEFuEwBtJH
Start 5:25.
Thing 3:
Opening Up Primary Sources
(From my Women’s History Syllabus – Spring 2014)
Week 2: English Settlements
READ:
•Evans, Born for Liberty, 21-34
•Mary Rowlandson, Narrative of the Captivity, Sufferings and Removes: Read Opening
of Narrative, First Remove, Third Remove, Fifth Remove, Eighth Remove, Nineteenth
Remove; Skim the Twentieth Remove
http://books.google.com/books?id=lIVlnMU3snwC&printsec=frontcover&source=gbs_
ge_summary_r&cad=0#v=onepage&q&f=false
•Plymouth Colony Archive Project – Probates and Wills: Read a Probate Inventory of
at least one woman, and at least two Wills.
http://www.histarch.illinois.edu/plymouth/index2.html
Mary Rowlandson, Narrative of the Captivity, Sufferings and Removes:
Read Opening of Narrative, First Remove, Third Remove, Fifth Remove, Eighth
Remove, Nineteenth Remove; Skim the Twentieth Remove
Plymouth Colony Archive Project – Probates and Wills:
Read a Probate Inventory of at least one woman, and at least two Wills.
(From my Women’s History Syllabus – Spring 2014)
Week 13: Outside Perspectives
READ:
•Rosie the Riveter WWII American Homefront Project: Read one of the oral
history interviews with a woman from the website.
http://bancroft.berkeley.edu/ROHO/projects/rosie/
•Japanese-American Relocation Digital Archive: examine any texts you find
interesting under “Personal Experiences,” but definitely look at The Amache High
Onlooker yearbook.
http://www.calisphere.universityofcalifornia.edu/jarda/browse/personalexperiences.html
Rosie the Riveter WWII American Homefront Project:
Read one of the oral history interviews with a woman from the website.
Japanese-American Relocation Digital Archive:
Examine any texts you find interesting under “Personal Experiences,”
but definitely look at The Amache High Onlooker yearbook.
Thing 4:
Helping Students Synthesize Ideas into Narratives
Thursday, June 27: SYNTHESIS, IDEA GATHERING
THINK:
Come to class able to make an interesting point connecting two or more of our
class documents to each other.
Thing 1:
Student-Led Research of Scholarly Sources
Thing 2:
Videos on Trends in Historical Writing
Thing 3:
Opening Up Primary Sources
Thing 4:
Helping Students Synthesize Ideas into Narratives