Participation as a Pathway to Content Knowledge : Engaging All Students in Disciplinary Literacy Practices

Abstract

In this article, the authors assert that one important way to bring students to a level of caring about history is through participation. They discuss conceptual considerations and pedagogical possibilities of disciplinary literacy with a focus on transforming students into engaged participants in the practices of historical thinking and learning. The authors are concerned with ways disciplinary teachers can engage all students, including those who are struggling and reluctant, in the demanding practices of expert communities through active participation and by making connections to their personal lives. The article is based on international collaboration between language and literacy researchers, historians, and teacher educators from the U.S, and Finland in a project that aims to study and support the teaching of disciplinary literacy in high school history. The authors’ ideas and recommendations are punctuated by short vignettes of actual classroom practice by secondary history teachers in the U.S. and Finland.