MAKERS OF HISTORY

When teachers ask students to journal—in writing, sketches, videos, or other forms of expression—they are harnessing a powerful tool for providing an outlet for kids’ feelings. At the same time, journaling allows students to create a record of their daily lives at a time when the new normal stands in stark contrast to life even just one month ago. “When future historians look to write the story of life during coronavirus, these first-person accounts may prove useful, ” writes Amelia Nierenberg for The New York Times. “History isn’t usually told by the bigwigs of the era, even if they are some of its main characters. Instead, it is often reconstructed from snapshots of ordinary lives. ” Bryan Shaw, a social studies teacher at Ygnacio Valley High School in Concord, California, created a Covid-19 Student Journal assignment—a simple one-pager that provides guidance for students to record changes in their communities, in the country, and the world at large, and then asks them to critically analyze it and develop their own interpretations. The document recently went viral and has been adapted into ten versions in at least four languages, says Shaw. “I’ve always been interested in rethinking history curriculum: how can we make it interesting?, ” says Shaw. “At least 85 percent of my students are on Free and Reduced Lunch and so there are real Wi-Fi access issues, and I’m not a fan of too much learning on a computer. So this is something kids can do without a computer, a way to think about what’s going on in my family, my neighborhood, the world around me. ”

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