Textbook Perspectives

This week we have examined interpretation in textbooks and made a first foray into 'reading' or interpreting primary sources. Texts do not clearly state their goal or perspective but as we discovered in class the perspective or interpretation can be found in the selection of material and its arrangement in the text. What was striking to you about this exercise? What did you learn? Should textbooks come with a warning about 'hidden perspective'? Do we need to teach students how to 'read' these texts? To me this exercise is like reading or listening to the news - I don't typically question the truthfulness of the news but am aware that perspective and interpretation is often evident - in the choice and presentation of stories, the selection of material and in the emphasis


As I already mentioned in a previous post, its so much easier to pick up perspective when talking about recent history than the ancient past. Its because when we talk about things we can still relate to, we are much more likely to have perspectives than when talking about a time and culture that we know nothing about. Along the same lines,  a student who has a very limited knowledge of history is more likely to believe everything he or she hears, as opposed to someone who has a good handle on background knowledge and can focus their thinking energy to ask more analytical and interpretive questions. This week's exercise was very interesting to me because of how easy it was to pick about perspective when talking about the causes of  The Great Depression. I never really thought about it that way, although I was aware that even textbooks can be slanted. I suppose I just never thought about it as deeply as I did during this exercise. It really reinforced the power of omission when it comes to talking about history. Even the failure to emphasize something can give a totally different impression.

I think its really important to expose students to the idea of perspective in history, and exercises like we did in class are great for the high school level, especially because textbooks are usually used heavily in high school classrooms. Its a little different for the elementary school level because from my experience, history textbooks are seldom used, and in my opinion, even in cases that they are available, teachers should use them with extreme restraint. Instead, teachers should focus on giving their students a multifaceted story, where many different perspectives are taken into account, without the teacher trying to force or trick the students to develop the same opinions that she/he has. At the middle school level, where textbooks are usually used, teachers should begin to expose students to the idea of perspective, but students should not necessarily be expected to understand the subtle differences that we touched upon in class.

I also agree with Jessica's idea about bringing in more primary sources into the classrooms. Primary sources are a great way to get students to understand the idea of perspective, even at the middle school level, often because the differences can be so obvious. Its much harder to recognize the subtle differences in a textbook, since textbooks writers at least try to be objective. In regards to the controversies about how much should textbooks be used in the classroom, I agree with Mike's general statement that teachers should stay away from both extremes, although I think the degrees of usage should vary by grade level.