“I know it when I see it”
This statement was coined by United States Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart in 1964 to describe his threshold test when discussing obscenity and pornography. This is how the public has been taught, from the highest court in the land, how to deal with complex issues. If we can’t define it, we will simply go on instinct and deal with it when we see what we think falls into that category. This thinking is applied to many other topics as well. With history in general, Americans think history is the American Revolution or the Vietnam War or 9/11. These are historical points, don’t get me wrong, but are they the only historical points of American history? No, and we can expand our learning to not only examine the major events of history, but the ones that have seemingly been declared as minor.
In my high school history class, I was always told “we won” the Vietnam War but it was unanimously disliked and protested. But that’s just not true and when I was taught of domestic support and failures of the war, my brain was scrambled. However, as a researcher and historian, my interested was piqued and instead of pushing back, I asked more questions. I was able to read and learn more of the real story.
Research and Question!
When asking historians what are traits that we gain in the profession, I believe most would answer curiosity, never taking the easy answer and understanding that there will be ambiguity in everything. Historians know that perspective matters and can change a story to varying degrees so we teach students to have as many sources to prove their point as possible. Another part of teaching history that hopefully will never change is that moment that the sources don’t prove what you hoped they might. Some students want to give up and change their research, but this is also a positive break through! The information you do not have is just as important as the information you do have.
Technology and History in The Classroom
Now, I have talked about researching and learning in the traditional sense so far for one major reason, there is no other major learning format in classrooms yet. Sure, when students present their final papers they use slides with images, quotes on the screen, and maybe a video. Then, a game called Kahoot! gained in popularity as a way to involve the audience into the presentation or lecture. But it is still sandwiched in-between the classic formats.
In the next few years, I would love to see that pushed and changed. How can we include students who learn differently like Deaf and Blind or simply ask students to think critically? We can start by using what is already available. I have started to use some things in graduate school like hands on learning modules. We no longer have to say “I will know it when I see it,” but attempt to define these complex topics in words, images, coding, or data.