CURRICULUM STUDIES, 1976, VOL. 8, No. 1, 35-44

The Place of Open Learning in SecondarySchool History

Christopher PortalUniversity of Manchester

Introduction

Westbury (1973) has described important limitations affecting "open" classrooms, particu-larly as these have developed in primary schools and suggests why extremely formal methods,like what he calls "recitation", remain so common among teachers generally. Historyteachers are not short of advice to be more adventurous but effective application of suchmethods can make unrealistic demands on resources in general, and especially upon thetime and energy of the teacher. "Coping strategies" are essential in self-defence, and thecommonest is still what was entitled "oral examination" in 1893 (Hoetker and Ahlbrand1969, p. 148), but which would probably now be called "question and answer". Friedlander(1965) reinforces this position by suggesting that even where "open" work is established asa viable method, it is by no means evident that this will lead to worth-while discoveries bypupils, or that "discoveries", when made, will be significant, or even correct. Both he andWestbury demonstrate the need for defining "concrete theoretical principles" and forapplying these to the "complex realities of the class-room" in such a way that the energiesof teachers are not soaked up in a multitude of improvisations, and so that learning outcomesare at least as significant as those found in formal instruction.

This paper is an attempt to make such an application for the teaching of history atsecondary level, particularly between the ages of 11 and 16. Through an analysis of one formof "project" work it is hoped to show that "open" work, largely self-directed, may beinitiated and guided by a formal programme of operation, and that such a programme,once established, may be maintained without much more difficulty than other methods ofteaching; that this may provide for discovery learning just that stiffening of purpose andintellectual grasp that is often lacking in "open" class-rooms. At the same time, such anoutline may present hypotheses against which we can, in the future, define and measure theoutcomes that might justify such work and allow meaningful comparisons to be made withother forms of teaching.

"Open" Learning in History

It remains to define "open" as a method of working in relation to school history. Muchwill be said below of the conditions necessary for such work and the distinct phases it may

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need to pass through, but perhaps the essential feature is for pupils to be faced with prob-lems, choices and assignments to which the answers are not determined in advance. So weare not merely concerned with work-sheets, now in common use, where pupils respond to aseries of questions, individually or in groups; there is, of course, nothing to prevent theinclusion of open questions in the sheets, but these tend to be a minor part of such pro-grammes and to be introduced, as in formal lessons, without recognition of the kind ofpreliminary teaching they require. Equally, "open" working is not synonymous with askills or "objectives" approach (see Coltham and Fines 1971), although there may becommon ground between them. Teaching "skills", in particular, may easily introduce anarrowness of its own, through breaking away too drastically from contexts such as narrativesequence that are implicitly historical in shape and manner of presentation and throughinhibiting "that feeling which respects the past as past, just as, in friendship, one respectsthe other as other" (Cameron 1975).

In terms of learning, a number of considerations appear important for an "open" approachto history:

1. Time. History is intimately committed to understanding developments in time. The wayin which classroom time is related to the historical events in question is probably a powerfulmodel for demonstrating the connexions between the events themselves (Barthes 1970,pp. 146-7). Thus questions about pace, sequence and selection will not seem to be merelya matter of administrative convenience, and considerations based upon this kind of aware-ness of the time process must take their place with those concerned with formal cognitivedevelopment. Friedlander (1965) has stressed the importance of "over learning" of simplefactual material as a foundation for the later development of "generic" connexions. Hesees this as an argument for retaining "rote-learning" of historical dates and facts as theequivalent of, for example, mathematical tables; but in history we may provide for this needin a different and more palatable fashion. As in everyday life we become familiar with a largerepertoire of loosely organised "situational" knowledge and use this when we come toconstruct more general hypotheses, so we may find value in an initially unsystematic explora-tion of an historical field. Arguing from the performance of computers, Neisser (1963)suggests that there may be great disadvantages in relying only upon "sequential" or strictlylogical processes of problem solving where elements of ambiguity are present, and that weneed to accept some redundancy of information in order to take advantage of the "multiple"capacity of the mind to follow several hypotheses simultaneously when allowed time forunconscious reflection.

Clearly this raises an important issue about the nature of history at school, but impliesthat we may need to follow "open" methods of teaching just insofar as we regard the subjectitself as open to reinterpretation. Neisser admits that there is a practical limit to our freedomto dispense with sequential thinking in any methodical study, if we hope to attain suchqualities as efficiency and clarity; and, since professional historians no longer regard accumula-tion of factual detail as adequate to achieve historical reality, Barthes (1970, pp. 208-13)suggests that "intelligibility" might be taken as the critical factor—a state that is normallyreached by employing, first, the informal and unconscious powers of narrative to order andinterpret reality (Auerbach 1946, Gay 1975), and, later, by subjecting the results to criticalanalysis and revision. So, also, students, in their comprehension of a new topic, may developa first, possibly naive interpretation on a personal level by attempting reconstructionthrough the viewpoints of participants, and, as a result of such empathy, may be able toachieve significant levels of understanding even before the attainment of competent abstractthinking. James Britton (1970), discussing Vygotsky's work on the relation between language

THE PLACE OF OPEN LEARNING IN SECONDARY SCHOOL HISTORY 37

and thinking, stresses the great importance of "complexes" as the elements of a stageprevious to conceptual thinking. The development of these superficial, perhaps arbitraryresemblances between items depends upon freedom to experiment, using the ordinaryassumptions of language and observation; through modification of these complexes, by aprocess of trial and error, the child will eventually hit upon true concepts with a measure ofstability and consistency.

But one may make higher claims than this for the value of thinking in associative patterns;Cameron (1975) takes this as the "language of poetry" and claims for it therapeutic value,as well, perhaps, as the power to initiate sequential thinking:

The language of poetry is accessible to the confused, the traumatized,the inadequately-educated. The language of mastery is not. Not atall ? Or not unless the language of poetry is first allowed to count ?(P- 74)-

while Susanne Langer (1967, p. 114, quoted by Britton 1970, p. 218) pinpoints the linkbetween natural language and the process of discovery itself:

Just as we may, in discourse, state a fact of which we are aware andthen find that we have stated, by implication, further facts of whichwe were not aware until we analysed our assertion, so an artist mayfind that he has articulated ideas that he had not conceived beforehis work presented them to him.

In this way, adolescents may proceed to the presentation of human-scale narrative in a formthat is autonomous and aesthetically satisfying, and hence to a structure of meaning withinwhich more general concepts can become significant and accessible to them.

2. Grouping. Individual interest, free choice and unfettered self-expression are sometimesregarded as the justifications for "open" working, and it may seem, on these grounds, thateach pupil should work alone. In practice, however, such qualities as these can only developwithin a well organised social and intellectual framework. Bronfenbrenner (1970) describeshow Soviet schools have developed the ideas of Makarenko in fostering pupil loyalty andcooperation within a group smaller than the whole class, and such a unit would appear tohave applications beyond the concern with conduct and social conformity evinced by theRussian authorities. Thus assignments forming interdependent parts of a group programmemight appear considerably more significant than those which merely fulfilled the require-ments of a teacher or a worksheet. Another advantage of working in groups rather thanindividually is the great emphasis that this places upon pupil-talk and discussion. Classteaching limits the average verbal contribution of the pupils very severely and generallyconfines it to the "language of secondary education" (Barnes, Britton and Rosen 1969),while it would seem that informal group discussion tends quite spontaneously to foster"complexive" thinking as described above (ibid. p. 43, for example), and will naturallypossess the advantages claimed by Lawton (1968, p. 81) for idiomatic verbalisation as a stepin cognitive development.

3. Aesthetic and expressive considerations. History involves, at every level, developing a justemotional response as well as some degree of articulate reasoning. It seems impossible toseparate these processes into "domains" with distinct objectives approached throughdifferent activities (see Coltham and Fines 1971, p. 5 and Jones 1968). "Open" work maynaturally allow for a wide variety of expressive activity, but this must be justified in terms ofappropriate aesthetic value and be central rather than peripheral to the main assignments of

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the class. William Lamont (1972, p. 196) has rightly stressed the dependence of historicalimagination upon detailed and accurate information, but this must not exclude the freedomto identify with or react against historical characters or the situations in which they have beenplaced. It is unfortunate that absorbing preformed historical conclusions implies also theacceptance of a fixed perspective in social values, whether a nationalistic point of view,or some commitment to the operation of "power", "progress", or similar concepts in humanaffairs; here, the possibility of developing an historical situation from two (or more) con-flicting but complementary points of view could provide an important step in developing a"heteronomous" standard of judgement in such matters (Bassett 1940).

As with moral judgement, historical understanding may perhaps involve the simultaneousemployment of a number of "cognitive styles" existing at first "in a simple form" and givingrise to a "parallel series of developmental sequences, which reflect the overall changes inthe child's maturation and growth", rather than "a series of transitions from one cognitivestyle to another" Williams (1973, P- 52)- Bruner (1966, p. 65) maintains the importance atany stage of cognitive development of reinforcing one system of symbolisation with another,while Neisser (1963, p. 11) suggests that the human mind may enjoy a constant advantagein using spatial rather than temporal symbols for classification which accords with theapparent difficulty for adolescents of abstract concepts in history (Hallam 1967). Evidentlythere is plenty of theoretical support for the present tendency towards the informal andpersonal, and particularly towards visual or "iconic" presentation, even for those sufficientlyliterate to employ formal language, and, particularly for history teaching, we should do wellto explore the potential of what has been termed "theatreless drama" (Baker 1973). Thesuggestion that its functions are "to enable the participants to explore, assimilate and ulti-mately accommodate new experiences" would make this activity a very suitable complementto the process of situational discovery described above, while it would hold obvious ad-vantages in depicting both the personal aspects of historical events and the conflicts ofdifferent interests or points of view.

4. Organisation of instruction. Organisation of resources and of working methods will bediscussed below, but one fundamental principle may be stated here. The more effectively ateacher can establish a programme in terms of the sequence of activities to be followed, theless he will be driven to exercise control through the learning process itself or find himself"doing most of the work instead of directing the pupils to do it" (Hoetker and Ahlbrand1969, p. 149).

Bruner (1974, p. 137) points out the advantages of being as explicit as possible about whatit is that we are learning, and it is a criticism often levelled at "open" learning that it isdeficient in this respect. This is always a difficulty in a subject as loosely organised ashistory, and it may be true that "open" working aggravates the problem by stressing indi-vidualistic topics and colloquial modes of expression. All the same, there are several pointsin the course of a project where learning may be made more explicit, either by incorporatingcontributions from the teacher, or by building into the work of the groups requirements toformulate what they are seeking or what they have achieved as separate steps in their assign-ments. It will be suggested that both means may be employed in the development of anenquiry.

5. Syllabus. The determination of which topics are the most suitable for study, in terms ofunderstanding the present, the nature of man or some later development in the curriculum,is outside the scope of this paper; there are however certain limiting factors where the natureof the topic may determine its suitability for study by "open" methods.

THE PLACE OF OPEN LEARNING IN SECONDARY SCHOOL HISTORY 3 9

1. We must be ready to accept the arguments stated by Lamont (1972) infavour of detailed and relatively prolonged study of selected topics rather thanaim for universal coverage of a period or theme. Nor is it sufficient to interposean occasional project within a more formal programme: the skills and attitudesnecessary to "open" working take time to establish, and the possibly con-flicting values of a "main" course tend to spill over into short term diversions.

2. The availability of suitable resources may, rightly, be a major determinantof what topics may be chosen. Without considerable variety of printed sourcesthis kind of work is virtually impossible, and it is highly desirable that theseshould include first-hand observations from more than one point of view.Chance may thus stake a strong claim for a topic which happens to be wellprovided in these respects or with visual material, or which features promi-nently in a local archive.

3. A suitable topic will need to possess a number of distinct but interactingaspects; virtually any subject may be divided into sub-sections, but it isimportant that each should have some logical shape and adequate supportfrom source material. At the same time, the topic, being among other thingsa model for the understanding of development in time, must exemplifysignificant historical change—however defined (as suggested by Watts 1972,p. 99, the criterion of an historical "event"). Thus, many "patch" studies or"portraits of an age" now selected for project work would be deemed un-suitable, and biography would only qualify where personal conduct couldprovide a coherent focus for events of wider significance.

Application of "open" method

In conclusion, an outline is given of the way in which an historical enquiry might be dividedinto five distinct phases of work. A particular topic has been taken for the sake of illustrationin terms of actual issues, reference books and methods of presentation, but the point of thissection lies mainly in the suggested sequence of activities.

The African Slave Trade would appear to fulfil at least the minimum conditions set outabove. Sources are abundant, many of them personal and primary, although it is difficultto achieve full reciprocity between European and African points of view for certain aspectsof the topic. The central issues are both clear and simple and involve a complete transitionfor some individuals from one mode of life to another, while interaction and conflict ofinterest may be found between black and white, as well as between traders, seamen, planters,and others. The background to the trade also involves several aspects of eighteenth-centurylife such as conditions in ships, navigation and plantation-economy about which vivid andconcrete information is available. A "spiral" dimension, connecting the work of severaldifferent years, could derive from the successive study in this manner of, for example,slavery in the ancient world, Inca civilisation, factory reform and the American Civil War.

A suitable objective for a class working on this topic might be to reconstruct the differentphases of an African's experience, from leaving his tribal society in Africa, through war andcapture, to a slave factory, a slave ship and ultimately to an American plantation. Such apersonal narrative could provide a framework of at least six episodes, each contributingimportant information, and each containing its own problems of interpretation and moralresponsibility. Where resources and ability-level admit, the pursuit of "background" studiessuch as international rivalry or European ideas about liberty may lead to some degree ofunderstanding about more general aspects of the eighteenth century.

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1. Introduction to topic. By selection of one incident, theme or problem suitable for presenta-tion to the whole class, the teacher must aim at arousing interest, at making explicit theimportant issues and at giving some lead to the class in imaginative methods of presentation;where a film is available, this might serve several of these objectives. For the Slave Trade,the teacher might try to reconstruct for the class a single but vivid incident from the voyageof a slaving ship, perhaps an attempted rising of the slaves or a storm at sea. Some form ofbrief dramatic improvisation with pupils, as soon as the central episode is understood, willhelp to establish personal involvement and will also provide a model for one form of appro-priate activity for the class in presenting their own work at a later stage. A period of formalteaching might follow, in which the class could respond, orally if possible, to the situationthey have encountered. The teacher will already be aware of the main aspects into whichlater study will be guided, and problems, questions and emotional reactions may be used toinitiate the work in some of these areas. Important terms for discrimination and concept-formation (such as "exploit", "colonise", "primitive", in relation to the slave trade) might beidentified through the oral responses, on a level appropriate for the class concerned, anddefined in a duplicated sheet as a contribution to the work of all groups.

The final requirement here is to establish as clearly as possible a common objective forthe work of the class as a whole. This will, to some extent, be in the mind of the teacher, butshould be open to modification by ideas and interests arising in the introductory phase or,subsequently, in the work of particular groups. Thus the question might arise as to whose"property" a slave might be at various points in his travels, and the work take shape aroundreconstructions of the interests and characters of his successive "owners". The form ofpresentation must also be agreed; in this case we will suppose a series of dramatic sketches,chronologically arranged, but variety of medium and of method between different groupswould be acceptable and possibly desirable.

2. Organisation of groups. At this stage the time available must be clearly allocated betweenthe two main activities—group work and presentation—and the general tasks common to allworking groups made clear, perhaps by means of a duplicated sheet. It is probably mostsatisfactory for groups to be selected upon some personal basis, so that the allocation oftopics becomes more or less arbitrary; in this way, emphasis is directed to the contributionof group-work to the final presentation, and the group topics will not appear exclusive andlimiting. It has already been suggested how the main stages of a slave's journey into captivitymight provide the central subjects for group study, with the possibility of diverging toinclude various aspects of "background" interest.

3. Exploration of sources. Each group has now to distribute responsibility for certain elementsof its work to individuals, although this might actually be undertaken in pairs, with each inturn actually recording the results. Thus, "conditions on a slaving ship" might break downinto physical conditions (food, exercise, routine); accommodation; discipline and punish-ment. Each individual should aim to become as familiar as possible with his area of investiga-tion and to make simple notes of his facts and sources. How far such independent investiga-tion is likely to develop "incisive" knowledge or inspire "good guesses" to serve as organisinghypotheses is a critical issue (Gagne 1963, p. 150), and no doubt largely dependent uponsuch factors as the abilities of the pupils and their experience in "open" work, as well as onthe success of the teacher's introduction to the topic. My own impression is that pupils arecapable of shaping their own work, and in a way that will be appropriate to their own levelof maturation, given encouragement in general terms, but it is open to any teacher to provide

THE PLACE OF OPEN LEARNING IN SECONDARY SCHOOL HISTORY 41

more detailed guidance and thus predetermine more closely the conceptual structure of theenquiry. Perhaps a minimum requirement for this stage would be to circulate a series ofdetailed references to the books and sources available.

4. Framing conclusions to group work. After collecting information about one aspect of thetopic, it is helpful for groups to present their conclusions in the form of answers to "how ?"or "why ?" questions. In this way, concepts of an explanatory or organisational function willbe introduced, while it may become clear that there are some questions to which no certainanswer can be given on account of defective evidence. These questions would, ideally,arise from the investigations of the group, as, for example "why was there so much inter-tribal conflict in Africa?", but they may also derive from the introductory sessions, as,perhaps, "how did the ships obtain slaves from Africa?" or "how long could the shipssurvive at sea without disaster ?"

Each group must then adapt their conclusions to contribute to the joint activity alreadyaccepted for the project as a whole. This will involve considerable selection from the informa-tion they will have obtained, and also the capacity to reshape their work, in this case as adramatic sketch, recorded narrative or visual display.

5. Presentation of conclusions. In the concluding phase, the most important objectives willbe to maintain interest in a topic where individuals may feel that their personal assignmentsare completed, to achieve some interchange of learning about the aspects studied by differentgroups, and to raise and make explicit, in various ways, conclusions about the topic as awhole. The teacher's contribution will again be of critical importance in bringing the classtogether and in organising time and space in such a way that each group has the chance ofmaking a worth-while contribution. Apart from straightforward dramatisation, oral presenta-tion may borrow techniques from the television documentary, from games like "TwentyQuestions" or from a musical such as "Oh! What a Lovely War!" All pupils might be askedto write a description or review of the final production, or to complete a questionnairerelating to this, again to make more explicit the main issues under consideration.

Sources

It is not intended to provide a systematic bibliography for the Slave Trade, or to list all theresources that might be valuable, but rather to show how different kinds of publication maybe used to supplement each other and to support the various phases of the work.

The last few years have seen a welcome development in educational publishing, wherebya large number of brief monographs, biographies, case-studies and scrap-books has beenissued for schools in addition to conventional text-books. In this case, Bernard Martin'sJohn Newton and the Slave Trade (Longman, THEN AND THERE series) would support intro-ductory work with the class about, say, a slave insurrection, using extracts from Newton'sjournal; this booklet could also provide the basis of a connecting narrative based on Newton'scareer, and it is rich in information about several aspects of the trade. Two booklets fromHarrap's WORLD HISTORY PROGRAMME, John Addison's Traditional Africa and DavidKillingray's The Slave Trade, are simpler in style, provide different and equally valuableperspectives and have useful extracts from original sources. Thus, if each group of, say,five pupils had one copy of each booklet, the elements of continuity and common activitybetween groups would be provided for.

Martin gives references to records of negro songs; the I.L.E.A. Resources Unit haspublished a collection of materials and working programmes on African history (a helpful

4 2 JOURNAL OF CURRICULUM STUDIES 8 : i

antidote to Captain Newton's European preoccupations), while the JACKDAW (Collins),The Slave Trade and its Abolition—one of the more successful in this series—is particularlyuseful for visual material about shipboard conditions. These publications would be valuablefor individual work, especially for those pupils who may depend mainly upon visual andaural sources, and could also help to introduce some variety at the concluding phase, wherework is presented to the class.

More advanced books, perhaps considerably beyond the level of the class as a whole, willbe valuable if they can be cross-referenced to apply to specific topics or questions. Thus,Julius Lester's To be a Slave (Longman) is designed for young readers yet gives absolutelyauthentic insight into the experience of slavery, as well as much information about slave-runplantations; three copies of this might be justified. For reference, a standard work such asOliver Ransford's The Slave Trade (Murray), which contains a useful bibliography, mightbe worth two copies, and one would wish to have available a special collection of about tenother reference works.

Conclusion

It is envisaged that a topic treated in this way would occupy a period of several weeks atleast, and that activities such as class teaching, group work and individual assignments wouldall be included at appropriate points in the programme. The stress placed upon discoverylearning and expressive presentation has not been intended to exclude the more conventionalobjectives of obtaining accurate knowledge (where relevant) or the development of charac-teristically historical skills such as observation, recording, narration and the use of evidence.At each stage it is important to be as explicit as possible about the nature of the task to beundertaken, and in this way we should try and meet the problem of diffusion and lack ofintellectual focus associated by Friedlander with "open" classes. The important issues ofspontaneous "false" discoveries and, in general, the tolerance of error that may be acceptablein this kind of work must depend upon further evidence about the learning that results from"open" working. I would suggest that critical discussion within working groups and theconstraints involved in presenting conclusions to the class as a whole can do much to correctindividual aberrations.

REFERENCES

1. AUERBACH, ERICH. Mimesis: The Representation of Reality in WesternLiterature (trans. Williard R. Trask). Princeton University Press, 1953.

2. BAKER, DONALD. "Drama and Theatre in Education", Journal of CurriculumStudies 5 : 1, 1973.

3. BARNES, DOUGLAS, BRITTON, JAMES and ROSEN, HAROLD. Language, theLearner and the School. Harmondsworth, Penguin, 1969.

4. BARTHES, RONALD. "Historical Discourse", in Lane, Michael. Structuralism:a Reader. London, Cape, 1970.

5. BRITTON, JAMES. Language and Learning. Harmondsworth, Penguin, 1970.

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7. BRONFENBRENNER, URIE. TWO Worlds of Childhood. Harmondsworth,Penguin, 1970.

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8. BRUNER, JEROME S. Toward a Theory of Instruction. Harvard UniversityPress, 1966.Beyond the Information Given. London, Allen and Unwin, 1974.

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15. HOETKER, JAMES and AHLBRAND, WILLIAM P. "The Persistence of theRecitation." American Educational Research Journal, 6, 1969.

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17. LAMONT, WILLIAM. The Realities of Teaching History. London, Chatto, 1972.

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