Date: Sun, 5 May 1996 20:21:52 -0500
Sender: H-NET List for World History <H-WORLD@msu.edu>
From: “Patrick Manning, Northeastern University” <MANNING@neu.edu>
Subject: Practitioner's Guide for World History
To: Multiple recipients of list H-WORLD <H-WORLD@msu.edu>

From: Ross Dunn, San Diego State University
dunn@mail.sdsu.edu

To: World History Colleagues

Practitioner's Guide for World History

By Ross Dunn, San Diego State University, 5 May 1996

The National Center for History in the Schools is in the process of developing a “Practitioner's Guide for Teaching World History.” As some of you know, the Center recently published a revised “basic edition” of the National Standards for History. This book combines the standards for K-4, U.S., and world history in a single volume, but it excludes the teaching examples that were part of the first edition. As part of its continuing program to produce useful materials for teachers, the Center will publish the new Practitioner's Guide partly in order to get the best of the exemplars into teachers' hands.

This handbook will also include some other features, and this is where I would like to ask for your suggestions. We would like to include nine scholarly or pedagogical essays, each one correlated to one of the nine eras of world history presented in the standards. These essays might be reprints of articles from journals, newsletters, or even newspapers, but we would also be happy to consider unpublished pieces. We are looking for essays that meet the following criteria: 1) relatively short as journal articles go, 2) useful primarily to middle and secondary school teachers of world history, 3) have a world-historical focus, that is, cross-cultural, comparative, interregional, environmental, etc. If you know of a short piece that you think illuminates an aspect of world history particularly well or perhaps that works well in your classroom, please let me know about it. Essays can be about world history teaching strategies as well historical topics.

The new edition of the standards presents nine eras of world history rather than eight because the 20th century has been cut into two parts:

Era 1 Beginnings of Human Society
Era 2 4000-1000 BCE
Era 3 1000 BCE—300 CE
Era 4 300-1000
Era 5 1000-1500
Era 6 1450-1770
Era 7 1750-1914
Era 8 1900-1945
Era 9 1945-present

In the Practitioner's Guide we will include just one essay for each era, plus an array of teaching ideas correlated to the standard.

Any ideas for the new handbook will be much appreciated.

Ross Dunn
dunn@mail.sdsu.edu (This is a new email address.)