Using Literature to Teach History.
Although there may be excellent textbooks out there for teaching history, I prefer using literature whenever possible. The reasons I prefer literature are first of all, interest: children are more interested and fascinated with what they are learning when learning it out of real, “living” books rather than textbooks. Textbooks by their nature are stripped down to the bare bones facts, devoid of life or color, which, let’s face it, are boring, boring, boring. “Living books”, literature, makes historical figures come alive, giving them depth and character and thoughts and feelings and struggles and joys in ways that textbooks cannot possibly do. We see historical figures as real people we can relate to, facing many of the same kinds of life situations we have to face. Literature paints us a picture of a time and place, of customs and society and manners. With literature we get local color and the big picture. All of this translates into greater interest for our children in what they are learning.
Interest is important because it leads to the next advantage of using literature to teach history: retention. Many of us can recall our own history lessons in school and remember struggling over history texts and tests, but what actual facts do we remember from all the hours spent with texts and classroom lectures? I would bet not a high percentage for the time involved. And yet we recall with fondness a treasured book such as Little House on the Prairie by Laura Ingalls Wilder, and ingrained in our memories are tidbits of American history and a mental picture of vast prairies, along with familiarity of a way of life since gone by. While reading Little House on the Prairie, we learned naturally and effortlessly with interest and pleasure many of the same facts that we struggled to learn from the texts, and with a much higher percentage of retention of those facts.
A third advantage to using literature to teach history that is often difficult if not impossible for textbooks to emulate, is understanding. An understanding is planted which begins to grow over time of the cause and effect nature of history, how an event can snowball and lead to other events, how choices an individual makes for good or ill can set mankind on a path from which there is no turning back. Literature by its very nature asks questions of us that keep us reading to find the answers. Very often we ask why someone chose this path or that one, and we strive to understand the choice. We begin to see not only the events themselves, but the why underneath the events. We begin to see that history is not just a separate subject in its separate compartment, but that history has had an effect on science, and math, and politics, and economics, and geography, and grammar (my children always loved the explanation of the soft c’s and g’s we have in English; it led to the story of the Norman Invasion of England in 1066, and the gradual picking up of French pronunciations in English.) And we also begin to see that politics and economics and science and math and geography and grammar have had their effect on history as well.
There are many ways to integrate literature in the study of history. Use a book that provides a narrative overview of the history of the era under study as a basis, such as Greenleaf Press’ Famous Men series, or H. A. Guerber’s Story of series. This method accommodates itself well to the problem of teaching multiple grades and varying reading abilities. Begin each history class by reading a few pages outloud to all the children of all the grades together. Then after a bit of discussion, let the children settle down to read their own books silently. For example, while studying the French and Indian War, we used Struggle for a Continent by Albert Marrin as a narrative basis. Then my upper elementary children read Kateri Tekakwitha: Mohawk Maid by Evelyn Brown, and Roger’s Rangers and the French and Indian War by Bradford Smith, and my junior high child relished Calico Captive by Elizabeth George Speare and The Last of the Mohicans by James Fenimore Cooper. When the children finished a book, they did some writing on what they had read, or a project inspired by the book. When that had been completed, they eagerly went on to a new book; all the while the daily outloud readings continued until we finished that era of history.
Literature could be used to supplement a textbook in the same way. Supplement a unit study with literature. Read outloud to your children every night before bed, covering history chronologically over the years. Or just let them read historical fiction and wonderful biographies for fun. There are a myriad number of ways to incorporate great literature into history lessons, only a few of which have been mentioned here. Experiment, discover, and most of all enjoy “living” books and great literature with your children, and watch history come alive!
