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Synthesizing Historical Significance
American History FoundationsAugust 8, 2012
Fran Macko, [email protected]
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Framing the Session
• What historical events, people, themes and issues are important to remember?
• How do historians determine historical significance?
• What strategies can history teachers use to help their students understand and reflect historical significance?
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What is Historical Significance?
• The concept of historical significance is a variable, not a fixed one.
• Historians select and emphasize certain facts and information and de-emphasize others.
• The resources that historians value the most become the basis for their accounts of an event.
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What are the criteria for determining historical significance?
• Contemporary significance– How important was it to
the people of the time?
• Profundity– How deeply were
people affected?
• Quantity– How many people were
affected?
• Durability– How long lasting were
the effects?
• Relevance– How does it help us
understand current issues and events?
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How does understanding historical significance support learning?
• Central to the critical reading and analysis of history is an understanding of historical significance.
• Understanding historical significance:– supports students in making connections across texts.– supports students in moving beyond the memorization of
facts and dates.– supports students in thinking critically about content.
• Once students have acquired new content information and concepts they can use the framework of historical significance to rework, apply, and extend their understandings.
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What are some strategies for teaching historical significance?
• Popular strategies for understanding historical significance are:– Fact Pyramid– SPAWN– Timelines– RAFT
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What is RAFT?
• RAFT is a writing strategy that:– gives students the opportunity to project themselves into
unique roles and look at content from unique perspectives. – can be used to explain processes, describe a point of view,
envision a potential job or assignment, or solve a problem.– can be used for assessment, class presentations, portfolio
projects or as a response to content.– provides a focus for writing.
• RAFT requires students to think critically about their reading or viewing in order to take on a new role, match the audience to the role, create a format that would fit that role, and cover specific topics from the content.
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What are the steps in the RAFT strategy?
• Review the RAFT acronym with students, explaining what each letter stands for:– R – Role (role of the writer)– A – Audience (to whom or
what the RAFT is being written)
– F – Form (the form the writing will take, as in letter, song, etc.)
– T – Topic (the subject focus of the writing)
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• Scaffold the strategy by beginning with a prescribed RAFT to model the process.
• Use a specific text or image to model the strategy.
• Provide a completed RAFT graphic organizer.
• Stress that RAFT writing allows for creativity, but must accurately reflect the content just learned.
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• As students become more proficient in the strategy, have them develop their own list of possible roles and audiences, formats and topics.
• This allows students to demonstrate their understanding of historical significance and multiple perspectives and synthesize their learning through writing.
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What types of sources can be used as prompts for RAFT?
• RAFT is a flexible strategy that can be used with a variety of sources.
• These sources can be used as prompts for RAFT writing.
• Primary Sources• Non-Fiction• Fiction• Interviews• Artifacts• Videos• Periodicals• Poetry• Music• Art
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The RAFT Graphic Organizer
RAFTR A
F T
R= Role What role (s) will you assume as writer?
A= Audience Who or what will be the audience for writing?
F= Format What format will the writing take?
T= Topic Define the topic, determine questions to be answered and point to be made.
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Modeling the Strategy The Stamp Act
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Modeling the Strategy: Using an Image as a Prompt
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Prescribed RAFT Assignment
RAFT
RReporter for a Boston Newspaper
APeople who read the newspaper
FInterview
TPublic Reaction to the Stamp Act
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• Working with a partner generate a list of interview questions that would match the role, audience, and content of the RAFT assignment.
• What factors would influence what questions a reporter would ask of the people in the image?
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On Your Own
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• Working with a partner:– discuss the image
and create 2 possible RAFT assignments.
– select one of the two texts from the document packet and create 2 possible RAFT assignments.
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Adapting RAFT to Your Classroom
• How might you use RAFT in your social studies classroom?
• What adaptations to the strategy would you make?
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Extension and Differentiation
• The student selects the role and audience and the teacher selects the format and topic.
• Students write the RAFT in small groups.
• Students write from the perspective of an historical character.
• RAFT is used a pre-writing activity before a small group or class discussion.
• What other extensions or differentiations can you think of?
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