Teaching history is a rather difficult task for anyone as its complicated messy and in general not easily summarized one way or another. Everything in history is filled with so much nuance and different interpretations that you will never be able to get kids who aren’t passionate to have one. Some people frankly don’t care about history and to me those people also have to be considered when making a lesson plan. Trying to find ways to make kids who hate history at least be able to take away from it and to be knowledgeable on the subject is the goal which is why I love the idea of teaching history out of order.
It is nice to be able to focus on the big ideas of history and to get to the parts you want to teach and begin to get them to take away from. If you hard focus chronology your students will miss out on the big themes and ideas at work here for no more gain than a list of facts on a piece of paper. But the ability to skip around and not be bound to order of events or even any one particular time period can work wonders. Instead of a list of facts you have provided them the ability to pick up on big themes and ideas. Which in turn will prepare them for the future much better than simply knowing facts to know facts sake. I also would like to take some time in this space to discuss my thoughts on the exit ticket reading.
I really want to use this to stand atop mount education and scream my praises of exit tickets as I find them to be very useful and enjoyable. I geniuenly enjoyed a little exit ticket right at the end of class it not only helped me to retain information but its a nice way to let students know class is almost over and get them mentally prepared for the next class. Ultimately we are in a service type of work so anyway we can help the students out should be used. I believe my personal exit ticket method will be questions as I believe these are the most effective. although I will be also utilizing Flipgrid from time to time purely because I like the idea of it.
Every now and then I think about just how much history we could potentially know, and how much we will have to cut down to fit within a single semester or school year. If a teacher gets too bogged down in irrelevant details that don’t contribute to the greater lesson, then switching the curriculum format might be helpful. If lessons jump around time, though, it would probably be a good idea to give a brief little rundown of the state of the world for context.
As you described, history is like a puzzle that can never be finished. There are so many angles and pieces that can be connected, but it would take too much time to try and fit them together. That is why it is great to take a “step back” and focus on the main aspects of history instead of trying to figure out which names and places are more important to mention within a limited number of class days.
In reference to your statements about the exit tickets, I never really encountered them in classes but I did enjoy it whenever my teachers would ask for a brief summary of the day’s information or a general question about what I found to be most interesting, so I will be including them in my future lectures.
I love your idea of having your lesson plan focus on the students who aren’t very passionate about history. That is something I feel can benefit not only history teachers but teachers of other subjects as well. The ability to have someone who isn’t typically an enjoyer of history feel they came out learning at least a little bit is a success. For example, I am awful at math and even though I learn all these formulas, once I get past an exam I forget everything. That is something that I feel as a teacher we need to attempt to fix. We instead should be able to leave an impression on our students and have them retain the information even after finishing the class.