“Back When God Was Around and Everything”: Elementary Children’s Understanding of Historical Time

Abstract

In order to investigate elementary children’s understanding of historical time, we conducted open–ended interviews with 58 children from kindergarten through sixth grade. In order to overcome the limitations of previous research in this area, we asked children to place pictures from various periods of American history in order and to talk about their reasoning. We found that even the youngest children made some basic distinctions in historical time and that those became increasingly differentiated with age. Dates, however, had little meaning for children before third grade, and, although third and fourth graders understood the numerical basis of dates, only by fifth grade did students extensively connect particular dates with specific background knowledge. At all ages, children’s placement of most pictures revealed substantial agreement with one another and with the correct order; this agreement indicates a significant body of understanding of historical chronology. History instruction in the elementary grades, then, might productively focus on helping students refine and extend the knowledge they have gained about history; information which relies on dates, however, is unlikely to activate their temporal understanding.

Learning history in early childhood: Teaching methods and children’s understanding

“…This distinction is well known from other studies (Barton and Levstik, 1996;Wilschut, 2012). The understanding of historical time is divided into two main categories -'now' and 'before' -and, for most children, there is no form of differentiation between the two: 'First they didn't have cars and then they got cars!'…”

“…However, the conclusions of this study are quite the opposite of those of Piaget. While Piaget (1969) concludes that small children under the age of eight do not have a self-concept of time, Barton and Levstik (1996) and Langeveld (1960) claim that there is another way of understanding time, and that children are able to understand the order of happenings or objects even if they do not have a clear idea of the proportions of time. Létourneau (2001) emphasizes narratives, and particularly the child's own life story, as essential for the child's understanding of chronology in a larger context, and states that it is possible to observe a child's emerging historical consciousness when she or he is five to six years of age.…”

“…However, one's inability to develop a time concept according to Piaget's definition does not mean that one cannot grasp historical time: 'Time is a cultural construction with different aspects and there is no reason to assume that these cannot be learned independently from each other' (Wilschut, 2012: 115). As Barton and Levstik (1996) note, there is no empirical research that proves a necessary connection between the learning of clock time and calendar time and the ability to learn history (see also Cooper, 2002;Wilschut, 2012). Thus, children may understand historical time and a sense of chronology even if they do not perceive time as a measurable unit.…”

“…According to statements by teachers in this study, some of the children had this kind of experience of time, even though they did not have an abstract or metric concept of time. Nevertheless, this could be interpreted as a sense of historical time (Barton and Levstik, 1996;Wilschut, 2012).…”

“Anyone Can Be an Expert in Something”: Exploring the Complexity of Discourse Conflict and Alignment for Two Fifth Grade Students

“…Greenberg (1989) wrote that funds of knowledge are "the essential cultural practices and bodies of knowledge and information that households use to survive, to get ahead, or to thrive" (p. 4). Much research has been conducted on the effectiveness of integrating learners' cultural, racial, social, political, and economic history across the curriculum--in social studies (e.g., Barton & Levstik, 1996), language arts and literacy (Pappas & Zecker, 2001), and math (e.g., Moses, 2001). …”