By Carrie Franzwa and Leonia Meek
The most sure way to make history learning fun at any age, is to employ the three easy stages of The Alluring Approach to History. This teaching approach puts academics last, and creative arts first, and is based on the observation that young and old alike invariably derive greater enjoyment out of history when they are allowed to follow their curiosity, rather than endure forced reading.
However, as you will see, going with The Alluring Approach to History doesn’t mean that educators must let go of the important objective of instilling certain facts of history.
Furthermore, The Alluring Approach to History can be initiated at any age level, including adult, and it can be implemented in a very short time span at the teen and adult levels. However, for the purpose of addressing educators, I will lay out a progressive plan that starts with young children, and moves with them into adulthood.
STAGE ONE: Playful Introduction and Use of Antiques
Your creative educational ploy begins with children between the ages of 3 and 10 years old. At this stage you will offer them the discovery of social charm, amusement, or interesting tools from the past. In this first stage you aren’t “teaching” anything as far as your students are concerned. To them it appears you are allowing the opportunity to “pretend” history, or in other words to “play.”
For example, what little girl doesn’t love a pretty, very polite tea party? Tea parties can be an introduction to charming, proper Victorian culture, which can become a back door “hook” leading down the road to more specific events in history, such as the American Civil War.
And little boys, for example, love Native American artifacts and tools. Teach a little boy how to make various colors of Native American mud paint, and then arrange the opportunity for them to paint a big, friendly dog like a pony would have been painted in preparation for a buffalo hunt. An interest in Native American arts can become a back door “hook” leading down the road to specific events in history, such as the American-Indian Wars that followed the Civil War.
Things like a child’s (or adult’s) love of horses lends itself naturally to the study of many eras and events in history, while antique machinery, tools, and gadgets also spark natural inquiry.
Note: Adults have no troubles finding antiques of interest to collect if you’ll just point them to eBay!
Make these kinds of things the basis for introducing history to young children, and for them history will start out of the gate owning the magical word “fun.”
STAGE TWO: Experiencing Authentic Living History
Between the ages of 10 and 15, allow interests to lead the way in hands-on historical research and studies. This stage should include learning as many old-world skills and social customs as can be afforded.
For example, young ladies might enjoy learning the skills of Dutch lace making, or of sewing on a treadle machine. They will further appreciate things like the women’s liberation movement as they learn what social customs suppressed women, and what it was really like to do laundry before the invent of the washing machine.
Young men might enjoy learning the skills of natural hide tanning, and furniture making using antique hand and treadle tools. They may also relish an understanding of progression in war tactics and customs over time.
The possibilities during this stage are absolutely endless. The basic idea is simply to bring authentic history alive again, for real-life experiences.
STAGE THREE: Arrange Facts around Interests
In this stage you’ll begin to easily line up historical facts for your maturing “students.” They will have had numerous positive emotional encounters with learning history, and will naturally and effortlessly begin to make connections with major events in history.
A fantastic activity in this stage is the ongoing creation of a wall sized timeline of A.D. history events.
To create this A.D. timeline, start with appropriately placed pictures of major events or eras (Vikings, Crusades, Slave Trade, American Colonization, American Revolution, French Revolution, Napoleon, Civil War, American-Indian Wars, WWI, The Great Depression, WWII, Civil Rights, etc.).
Next, allow students to do research on both things of interest, and things assigned, and add interesting notes to the timeline. Things like the first guns made, beer becomes Europe’s staple drink, horses introduced to America, the Black Plague, introduction of photography, introduction of abstract art, first trains, introduction of sewing machines, introduction of washing machines, germs discovered, titanic sank, women’s lib, tea rooms become fashionable, examples of clothing and shoes for each era (where did “Goth” start?), the baby boomers, the printing press invented, first public library, cars, planes, submarines, dirigibles (Hindenburg crash), etc., etc..
This becomes a visual tool for placing “facts” of history along side things of interest in the minds of students.
By this stage any assignments of in-depth study on major events will be looked upon with positive emotional connection; more akin to a natural flow of learning.
Additionally, “students” in this stage gain a great deal more out of watching the best of modern history-based movies and documentaries, and are able to dissect and assimilate the context and messages much more readily.
In Conclusion
Long before reading assignments are handed out, students should have the opportunity to discover history experientially. While young children need direction because they have no idea where to begin, an adult can start on their own at any time with The Alluring Approach. They need only find antiques or old-world hobbies of interest, and begin re-creating living history around those antiques and hobbies.
Granted, there will always be reluctant learners. But I dare say that even reluctant learners can be brought out of their shells when The Alluring Approach to History is employed.
The Alluring Approach to History is how to make history fun at any age.
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About the Authors: Carrie Franzwa is a successful home educator, and the Founder of www.LetsPlayHistory.org , an American on-line club dedicated to history preservation and exchange. She is the author of several e-book titles, including, “How to Re-create an Authentic 1621 Thanksgiving,” and “A Combo Guide for Beginning Sewing and Authentic Period Costuming.” Leonia Meek is a student of Early Childhood Education at George Fox University in Newberg, Oregon. She graduates Spring of 2008.
