The development and progress of the ‘source method’ as a history teaching method: Practical classroom examples from malta

Abstract

History teaching in Malta has gone through quite a change in the past 40 years and this chapter will describe the metamorphosis of the pedagogy of the subject, from a traditional approach, which sees history as the work of Historians to be presented as a ready product to students, to one which embraces fully the ‘New History’ teaching approaches with an emphasis on thinking history skills and interaction of students with the primary and secondary sources of history. Historical concepts like change and continuity, empathy, and historical interpretation can be difficult for students to understand. The author, a history pedagogist, will share some of her research in trying to find meaningful ways of teaching the subject. This will include targeting new challenges in the Maltese classroom. Similarly, to most European countries today, Malta has become a multicultural society and, hence, practical examples of history teaching which promotes democratic values in history lessons in Malta will be explained.