Beyond Academia: Fostering Critical Thinking in Secondary Education

Moving from higher education to teaching in a secondary school is often spoken of as a transition, a finite shift from one thing to another. In my opinion, it is more productively viewed as a process of metamorphosis, an ongoing change in nature both of oneself and of vocation. Whereas a scholar is always pushing forward, striving to be at the edge of knowledge in a particular niche, a teacher often has the opportunity to return to the moment when her interest in her broader field was first kindled and reevaluate the path of her education. There are opportunities to question not only what students learn, but also how and why they learn it.

Archaeology and research have both taught me the incomparable beauty of discovery, and for me the reward in secondary education is to be found in sparking and nurturing a love of discovery in students. In designing curriculum, I prioritize teaching a critical and reflective way of thinking that students will carry with them wherever their path may lead. In each of my classes, I challenge students to engage in the productive struggle of thinking through problems with no clear answer. Students undertake simulated archaeological digs and analyze their findings to better understand how historical knowledge can be created from material culture. As students learn the features of early civilizations, they interrogate the very definition of civilization and the biases implicit in its application solely to societies whose urban characters reflect modern nation-states. In an analytical and creative project, students consider the ways that popular media like TV, novels, and film (mis)represent antiquity; they demonstrate their understanding by collaborating with peers to craft a fictional ancient civilization based in reality and then argue persuasively how their modifications make their concepts marketable to a contemporary audience.

As a teacher, I may not be a scholar responsible for advancing a field of research footnote by footnote – although I enjoy the freedom to continue what research appeals to me – but my responsibility is one that arguably has a broader impact. To create an opportunity for students to feel an authentic sense of discovery, one must offer chances to engage meaningfully with the many and varied ways that history matters today. To challenge each student to become a critical consumer of history is to create a more thoughtful—and, in my opinion, better—world.