CHAPTER 16
HISTORICAL RESEARCH
TEACHING ACTIVITY FOR CHAPTER 16
Activity 1. Constructing an oral history.
You can give your students an understanding of historical research by having them produce a brief oral history
in class. Ask students to recall a specific event in recent history. For example, you might ask, “What do you
remember about the day when the 9/11 tragedy happened?” or “What do you remember about the day that Barack
Obama was inaugurated as president?” If you can think of an eventful day in education for your class, that would be
a good subject, too.
Form your class into pairs. One member of the pair can interview the other, using the stimulus question to
initiate the interview. The interviewer should take notes and feel free to ask follow-up questions based on the
interviewee’s responses. After 5 or 10 minutes the students in each pair can trade roles, so that each student can
Activity 2. Analysis and evaluation of the article reprint.
You can ask students to read the reprinted article about the history of the school principalship at the end of
Chapter 16 and evaluate it using the criteria in Appendix 4 and those specified on pages 457-458. In class, you can
MULTIPLE-CHOICE TEST ITEMS FOR CHAPTER 16
1. Unlike other qualitative research traditions, historical research typically involves the
a. creation of data.
b. reanalysis of data that has been previously analyzed.
c. discovery of already existing data.
d. reinterpretation of past events based on current concepts.
2. In contrast to historical literature of previous centuries, contemporary histories
a. emphasize the collection of facts and validating their authenticity and accuracy.
b. rely on archives as their primary source of historical facts.
c. subordinate historical facts to an interpretive framework that gives them meaning.
d. focus on chronicling events by thick descriptions of “who, what, where, when, and why.”
3. Educational historians generally believe that
a. we should study the past for its own sake, not for any utilitarian purpose.
b. it is not possible to apply past events to current conditions, because the past and the present are
discontinuous.
c. their primary mission is to look for educational achievements in the past in order to promote
a positive view of the education profession.
d. historical research involves a continuing dialogue between the present and the past.
4. The goal of revisionist history is to
a. make people aware of past practices that had unjust aims and effects.
b. correct factual errors contained in historical studies conducted prior to the twentieth century.
c. move historical research methodology from an interpretivist epistemology to a positivist
epistemology.
d. promote the use of quantitative methods in order to describe the role of ordinary people in
the past.
5. In historical research, a primary source can be
a. an oral history by someone who witnessed or participated in the past events that she describes.
b. a diary kept by an individual who documented past events that she witnessed or
participated in.
c. census data from a previous era.
d. All of the above.
6. The purpose of external criticism is to
a. use a peer-review process to judge the quality of a historical report and decide whether it should be
published.
b. determine whether the interpretations presented in a historical report are biased.
c. determine whether the claimed origin of a primary source corresponds to its actual origin.
d. judge whether the facts presented in a primary source are accurate.
7. The purpose of internal criticism is to
a. use a peer-review process to judge the quality of a historical report and decide whether it should be
published.
b. determine whether the interpretations presented in a historical report are biased.
c. determine whether the claimed origin of a primary source corresponds to its actual origin.
d. judge whether the facts presented in a primary source are accurate.
8. Presentism occurs when a historian
a. places too much emphasis on recent sources to describe or explain past events.
b. interprets past events using concepts that originated at a later point in time.
c. searches for past events that appear relevant to a current problem of practice.
d. All of the above.
9. Historians generally find cause-and-effect relationships in past events by
a. making interpretive inferences from their data.
b. identifying plausible cause-and-effect relationships stated in primary sources.
c. identifying similar events in the present, inferring causal patterns, and generalizing them to past
events.
d. drawing on sociological theories of how societies change over time.
10. One of the main advantages of quantitative approaches in historical research is that they
a. provide data that are amenable to electronic analysis.
b. shed light on the history of ordinary people rather than just a few prominent individuals.
c. enable the use of statistical techniques to validate causal inferences about past events.
d. do not require the use of historical archives for data.
11. In general, reports of historical research studies
a. are similar to reports of studies that draw on other qualitative research traditions.
b. follow the organization specified in the publication manual of the American Psychological
Association.
c. are organized as a chronology of events or time periods interwoven with the historian’s
interpretations.
d. begin with a chronology of events or time periods, followed by the historian’s interpretations.
SHORT-ANSWER TEST ITEMS FOR CHAPTER 16
1. Describe two ways in which historical research contributes to education.
2. Describe two types of primary sources studied by historical researchers.
3. Describe the difference between external criticism and internal criticism in historical research.
4. Name two criteria that are used to judge the trustworthiness of a historical source’s author as part of the
internal criticism of the source.
CHAPTER 16
HISTORICAL RESEARCH
Multiple-Choice Test Items
Short-Answer Test Items