Teaching U.S. History Beyond the Textbook: Six Investigative Strategies, Grades 5-12

Yohuru Williams has developed an approach to teaching history that makes it easy to get students actively engaged, to think critically, and to become accountable for their own learning. This indispensable guide demonstrates how to turn students into investigators of history, rather than memorizers and regurgitators of dates and disconnected facts. Teaching U.S. History Beyond the Textbook presents six powerful teaching strategies, each with many sample lessons suitable for grades 5-12, that tap into students’ natural curiosity and investigative instincts.Your students will become detectives of the past as they: ghost-hunt in their neighborhoods, researching mysterious buildings, monuments, and other ‘haunted’ spaces; solve historical crime scenes, or ‘cold cases’; analyze primary and secondary sources using fingerprinting techniques; reconstruct ‘accidents’ that occurred at important intersections in history; prepare arguments as defenders or prosecutors in famous court cases; and, undertake paranormal investigations to communicate with figures from the past.