Toward Meaningful Accounts in History Texts for Young Learners

This examination of instructional sequences from four 5th-grade textbook series' treatments of the American Revolution is the center-piece of a larger in-depth analysis of content and presentation of commercial social studies programs for elementary grades. Our work has drawn on cognitive research on comprehension and learning in order to bring into focus issues of learning that have direct bearing on textbook content and organization. Our analysis uncovered lack of clarity in the relation between the content presented and the instructional goals, assumption of an unrealistic variety and depth of background knowledge, and inadequate explanation of significant events and their relationships. An approach to improving instruction is embedded in the examination of the text's coverage of the chain of events leading to the American Revolution.