Synthesis Blog #4: Historical Fiction in English and Social Studies Classrooms: Is It a Natural Marriage?

FOCAL AREA

Summarize:

The article addresses the concerns of using historical fiction in the curriculum. Three important sentiments in the article that are translated throughout include: first, that it is imperative students cultivate background historical knowledge before asking them to engage with historical fiction; second, a critical goal of historical fiction is to create historical empathy; and lastly, pairing historical fiction and nonfiction has benefits in social studies and ELA classrooms. It goes further to say that not only do teachers need to build background knowledge with the students but also contextualize the information and its relativity to the fiction piece. It is much easier when social studies and ELA teachers are able to work together to allow knowledge building and contextualizing in the history class and focus more on historical empathy and reading skills in the ELA classroom. It continues to say that historical fiction should also be viewed as literature of the time, and with nonfiction context, students begin to understand the behaviors and feelings of the characters in the historical fiction.

Connections:

My biggest connection to the article was the continued example of The Book Thief  by Markus Zusak. It continues to be one of my favorite books since middle school. We had to choose a historical fiction book that related to one of the three units we worked on in social studies class—which shows a great connection of teachers. I believe reading The Book Thief  at a young age helped create great historical empathy for me. It focuses on girl around the age that I was also reading it; I put myself in the characters shoes. Historical fiction engaged me in a way that nonfiction never could.

Critique:

This article did not focus on the potential difficulties of always ensuring ELA and social studies classes coordinate. Sometimes that is not plausible. Who then does it fall upon to help students read historical fiction?

Why is this important? :

This is important topic of discussion in the academic world because there are different ways of teaching. There are needs for cooperation in different classrooms that cannot happen in some school districts. Sometimes the standards will not line up between different classes because this partnership between ELA and social studies is new. In conclusion, it is important in my opinion because of how much it affected me as a student. I want my students to make those connections in their own ways and find ways to create their own historical empathy.

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