Terry Haydn

One criterion which could be applied to democratic (and other) systems of government is the extent to which they make possible and support a civilised society. It seems to me that the Scandinavian countries have fairly healthy, robust democracies in terms of a system that delivers social justice, a tolerant liberal society with a fair degree of freedom, local community empowerment and responsibility. Some democracies have democratic systems and the appearance of democracy, but the democracy has been traduced by the might of the rich and powerful which is able to manipulate and subvert the democratic system. The key point is not how 'democratic' the systems are (universal suffrage, secret ballot etc) but whether they deliver government 'of, by and for (all) the people'. Some democracies in effect support the rule of a corrupt and selfish corpocracy (see Chomsky, Galbraith etc). As Marcel Berlins has pointed out (Guardian, 17 October), 'a nation's level of civilisation is to be judged not by the way it treats the majority of its citizens, but what it does to its minorities, its criminals, its troublemakers, its misfits.' One could add, the degree to which its education systems provide a good education for all its children and young people. Sweden, Finland, Norway and Denmark seem to do very well in these areas.

Just to say that I agree with John, I have rarely seen so many good ideas for teaching history effectively delivered in such a short time. I really enjoyed the presentation (just wish I could remember everything more clearly).

I should perhaps add that 'impact resources' are not just about video extracts, powerful though the moving image is. Some of Ian Luff's roleplays (see Teaching History and SHP Conferences) are very powerful and memorable, well chosen quotes can stick in pupils' minds, as well as pictures, cartoons and extracts from newspapers. I still feel that many teachers are so overwhelmed with work and admininstration (in spite of the rhetoric of workload reform) that they do not have enough time to build up (and exchange) really well developed collections of resources, plus as Doug points out, the copyright problem. Terry

Terry Haydn: Socialist/Social Democrat I grew up in a Labour household; my dad worked for the Labour Party all his life and was on the local council. He was a big Nye Bevan fan and one of my regrets is that I never got to hear Bevan speak.(I used to teach 'A' level government and politics and it is worth remembering that back in the 70s and early 80s, nine out of ten people voted the same way as their parents and voting behaviour was much less volatile). It always seemed to me as I grew older, got interested in politics, read the papers as I was delivering them, that the Conservative Party represented the rich and privileged and that Labour stood for social justice and the more equitable distribution of wealth. It makes me smile when speakers at the Conservative Party Conference and in the right wing tabloids describe themselves as epitomising tolerance, 'fair play' and inclusive, 'one nation' Britain. Their policies, as in Bush's neo-Con corpocracy almost invariably favour those who have more or who are best placed to get more wealth and high quality primary social goods such as healthcare and education. I am now 'middle class', but still believe that if you are lucky to have a good well paid job and are well off, the least you can do is pay more tax to help those who have been less fortunate, had fewer chances in one way or another. As J.K. Galbraith has pointed out, the idea that the poor aren't working because they are too well off on the dole, and the rich aren't working to optimum efficiency because they don't get sufficient incentives to work hard because of high taxation seems an implausible. The 'trickle down' theory of wealth doesn't work because the fat cats keep most of their money for themselves. From what I read in the media, the Scandinavian countries seem to have the best systems of government, very good state education and healthcare, a concern for disadvantaged groups and a fairly tolerant, liberal and civilised society. If only they could move Scandinavia south about a thousand miles, I would want to live there. I've added Social Democrat because I think that most of the awful things done in recnet years have been the fault of extremist groups, of both right and left. More moderate parties might be a bit 'wishy-washy', but they generally do less harm.

I think that this is an interesting and important area for school history. Just as part of a historical education in the 21st century should be that young people should be aware that the internet is not the ultimate repository of truth and wisdom, pupils should also be educated about the reliability of information from newpapers, films, television and textbooks. A really good text for exploring this issue is Graham Lyons' book, 'The Russian version of the second world war: the history of the war as taught to Soviet schoolchildren' (1976, London, Leo Cooper). The back cover gives several reviews of the book which make an interesting point about 'interpretations': 'The book must stand as a condemnation of Soviet historians and their educational system' - Soldier Magazine 'It is to be hoped that Lyons' book will be widely used in schools and in undergraduat courses' Hugh Seton-Watson, THES. ' A shocking book, full of such jolts to Western readers as the assertion that the Allied forces advanced into Normandy after D-Day with "practically no opposition"'. Douglas Orgill, Daily Express. 'What is really frightening is that this version is being lapped up by youngsters of the nation with whom the western democracies are now engaged in trying to achieve detente' Stephen Roskill, Sunday Telegraph. 'The Soviet version is nearer to the truth than most versions current in the west' A.J. P. Taylor. It is important that if we use such material, we stress that it is not just communist or fascist texts that are subject to distortion, and that we try and move pupils from thinking about 'bias' to 'position'. Ben's suggestion is a powerful example of US texts being subject to the same pressures. Newspapers as well as text books can be powerful resources; see for instance http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,,939608,00.html, 'Our last occupation' , for a reappraisal/different view of a) British policy in Iraq Winston Churchill as a 'Great Briton'.

I like the top and bottom one of Doug's suggestions from the five shown on his post.

Part of a historical education ought to be to get young people to think beyond the idea of 'goodies and baddies' and towards the idea of realpolitik and complexity. Salman Rushdie made an interesting point post 9/11 about two films which were popular at around the same time: 'Gangs of New York' and the film derived from the Lord of the Rings books. The first was about an amoral battle for power, the second was about 'goodies versus baddies'. This is not to argue for moral relativism, or that 'they are all as bad as each other'. There should be judgements on good and evil in history, but children should not be taught that, for instance, Britain is good and Germany is bad. All national histories have their skeletons, and children in Britain should be taught about Amritsar, Suez etc, as well as about the more glorious bits of British History. Similarly, they should be taught that in wars, atrocities are generally committed by sections of most armies, although particular regimes may encourage different scales and forms of atrocity.

I think it is interesting that although we probably don't feel that we 'censor' history textbooks as much as some other countries, it you look at what is in our textbooks, many of the 'skeletons' of British history don't appear. How many pupils learn about the Suez crisis, or the Amritsar massacre, colonial atrocities etc?Most national pasts have 'skeletons', and it is a sing of a robust, healthy democracy that these can be acknowledged and discussed. One of the things that school history can give to young people is an understanding that it's not about 'goodies and baddies' but about the nature of power and 'realpolitik'.

I read Ricahrd Drayton's article and thought it was excellent; I will certainly use it with my trainees next year. I try to collect articles which demonstrate how difficult it is to exercise power and yet keep your hands completely clean. John Morrill's account of Cromwell in Ireland is a good example of this. It is important to problematise issues such as this through school history to teach young people about the moral and ethical complexity of power, democracy, war etc. and get them beyond 'two legs bad, four legs good' type thinking. One grimly ironic quote from a U.S. soldier recently, bemused by the furore over Falluja, 'What do they expect, we are soldiers, we kill people and break things.' There are also things like the recent documentary on Sky history about American brutality and war crimes in the Korean War, extracts from Graves' 'Goodbye to all that' to suggest the hypothesis that as Drayton points out, it's not about 'goodies and baddies', but about war having a brutalising effect on human beings.

I think the smaller one is fine; they are both clear enough for it to be no problem for the viewer, Terry

I thought there were some interesting issues about the tensions between 'cutting edge' or 'pioneer' practitioners operating on the frontiers of what is possible in history and ICT, 'consolidators' who are more interested in what uses cutting edge stuff can be put to to help 'average' history teachers and departments, and those whose main concern is to get the whole army of history teachers making the most of ICT to improve teaching and learning in school history. In this respect, collaboration and the forum are particulalry important. A key way forward is the development of powerful examples and models, that make history teachers think 'I would like to be able to do that', complemented by thoughtfully constructed 'idiot's guides' , online tutorials or face to face sessions to help them through the technical side of things. People who are good at the latter of these skills are particulalry valuable to projects.

I have found this strand really interesting, partly because the main bit of my job is training history graduates to be history teachers. In my experience, even very bright and capable graduates can sometimes be hesitant and nervous about experimenting with teaching approaches which go beyond the straightforward and the safe. Unless they are given good models, examples and prompts, there is a danger that they can stick to a staple diet of 'bread and butter' lessons based on talking a bit, showing a video, getting the pupils writing, with perhaps some question and answer between teacher and pupils (a very different matter to active discussion between pupils moderated/guided by the teacher). Getting discussion going and sustaining it requires really high-level planning and teaching skills. Even at undergraduate level, many seminars are characterised by fairly desultory and formulaic conversation after the lead presentation - how much harder to get younger and less able pupils talking, discussing and arguing. One of my ways forward is to invite into the sessions history teachers who are particulalry accomplished at particular aspect of pedagogy. I've got someone who comes in to do a session on roleplay which is delivered with such skill that it disturbs their perceptions about roleplay (as something difficult and 'iffy') and persuades them to have a go at it. Once they realise how fulfilling and liberating it is to try things out and explore different approaches, they become more open minded about exploring a whole range of teaching approaches, although there are always some who are more adventurous than others.

I think that Alf's seminar made an important point; our project should not just be about developing things at the 'cutting edge' of ICT and history, but persuading the massed ranks of history teachers, not all of whom are confident in the use of ICT, that if you are a history teacher, ICT is your friend and ally. Alf's ideas are excellent examples of ICT use that will make lots of history teachers think i) I'd like to be able to use that in my teaching, and ii) it doesn't look scary or difficult.

I think that one very important point coming out of Andy's seminar was the danger of history teachers making assumptions about what pupils understand, and his materials and approaches offered a powerful tool to avoid this danger. A few years ago I did a survey of year 7 pupils' understanding of some basic time concepts and found that there were some big gaps- large numbers of pupils didn't know what words like 'reign', 'decade', 'century' meant, they didn't understand the term A.D. or have any idea about dating systems and conventions. In no school (out of 10) did all of the pupils know what century they were living in and in one school less than half of the pupils knew what century they were living in. (the 'basic' test I used can be accessed at http://www.uea.ac.uk/~m242/historypgce/time/t1/time1.htm) Andy's seminar also convinced me about the importance of ICT in getting pupils to make an effort/become engaged which would be less feasible using older methods (for instance, pencil and paper tests). You could just tell that as well as helping pupils forward in history, they would also be really enjoying the subject and would be engaged in a way that does not always occur with less able pupils in secondary schools.

I found it a very interesting presentation and thought that the site was a stunning resource, and a powerful demonstration of the power of ICT to build a collection of material which would enable history teachers to teach an important topic more powerfully and more effectively. (You could also easily someone doing a whole PhD study, just using this resource. However, I don't think that resources like this are unproblematic. Much of the material seemed as if it might be quite 'dense', and easier to use with undergraduate students rather than pupils in schools. Perhaps something is needed to provide accessible and purposeful 'pathways' through the materials, similar to the 'Shapes of Time' site which has been put in place to help history teachers make best use of the Pathe archive. One other point - how effective the use of maps is to demonstrate change over time (as in the Korean War animation). Her Majesty's Inspectorate in the UK have commented that teachers don't make as much of maps as they might, ironic as ICT has now made the format and scope of historical maps much stronger than ever before.

One of the really interesting bits of the seminar as a whole was the breath of aspects of ICT use in history whch were being explored. Sometimes you tend to plough your own particular furrow and not keep an eye out for, and an open mind about all the other strands where interesting things are being developed. I found Anders' presentation fascinating and very powerful; I would not have dreamed about taking my pupils to an archive. When I got back to England I found an article in the Times Educational Supplement describing a visit to the National Archives by a Norfolk school, led by one of the heads of department that I work with. Again, it sounded like a really powerful learning experience, the sort which is seared across pupils' brains for years, rather than forgotton by next week.

I agree with Andy's point that a key element of the success of web trails is getting the pupils to think, making them select and prioritise from the materials selected, and asking them particular questions, so that they have to do something with the information beyond just cutting and pasting. Another good idea which I came across was to have 2 separate trails on the same topic but which point the enquirer in different directions (e.g. was General Haig a butcher or a genius), and then getting the 2 groups to discuss their findings with each other.

Just to respond to Dan's point about not being able to just share/disseminate 'collections which have been built up of video extracts or pictures; it would be nice sometimes to just do that, but part of the point is to show history teachers how easy it is to build up their own collections of powerful 'impact' resources using various forms of ICT. I think that it is actually this 'creative' approach to devising and building up learning packages which is really enjoyable and fulfilling for teachers. Also, a quick point of clarification about newpaper articles; I'm not saying that they can all be used 'neat'; just given out for pupils to read, but more like John Fines' idea of the teacher being able to tell a powerful story by taking pupils through the text picking out key bits. An alternative is giving the URL of really good newspaper articles to bright or very committed pupils who want/need extension work. Terry

History, ICT and ‘Impact’ Learning Terry Haydn, University of East Anglia, E-HELP Seminar,Toulouse February 2005 1. Influences on my thinking about history and ICT i) Politicians’ misconceptions about the educational uses of ICT “Ever since Harold Wilson spoke of the white heat of technology, politicians and decision makers have assumed that silicon offers a hot-wired short-cut to voters’ hearts… A succession of ministers from Benn to Baker embraced technology with photogenic relish; when did you last see an education minister in the media without a computer in the background?’ (Stephen Heppell, Observer, 8 January 1995). ‘The psychologist Weigenbaum observed in the 1960s that computers seemed to have a powerful delusional effect on some people and should not be allowed near the weak minded or gullible’ (Guardian, December 1996). In the UK, insufficient heed has been paid to the views of practising history teachers on what they want in terms of ICT. Politicians have tended to view ICT as an unproblematic educational miracle and as something that is principally about training pupils to use computers for employment purposes (one of my sad little hobbies is collecting quotes by politicians about the educational uses of ICT). As John Naughton pointed out (Observer, 22 March 1988) ‘It’s not every day you encounter a member of the government who appears to understand the net. Most politicians (Clinton, Blair, Blunkett, to name but three) see it as a pipe for pumping things into schools and schoolchildren.’ ii) The importance of ‘impact’ learning Philip Sadler’s research (Sadler, P., 1994, Simple Minds, QED, BBC2, 19 September) had a big influence on my teaching. He found that often, pupils understood less at the end of a series of lessons than before they had studied a topic. What percentage of what we teach pupils do they learn, know, understand and apply? Often very little: in Fontana’s words, ‘we each of us receive a constant and varied stream of experiences throughout our waking moments, each one of which can potentially give rise to learning, yet most of which apparently vanish without trace from our mental lives’ (Fontana, D., 1993 Psychology for teachers, London, Macmillan: 125). Sadler’s research made me aware that most of what we teach pupils, they either don’t understand in the first place, or they forget. My subsequent teaching made me aware that ICT can provide teaching resources which enable us to make particular points in a very vivid, powerful way, so that the learning experience is seared across the pupils’ minds in a way that they will not forget – ever. iii) Pupil attitudes to history as a school subject • Several studies over a period of time have shown that many pupils find history ‘useless’ and ‘boring’ (Schools Council, 1968, Aldrich, 1987, Haydn, 2002). Many pupils do not understand why they study history; they literally don’t see the point of it. In a recent survey, only a handful out of 1,400 year nine pupils could give cogent reasons for studying history (Adey and Biddulph 2001). Many facets of ICT offer powerful opportunities for teachers to persuade pupils that history is very important, and very relevant to the lives they will lead outside school (see second section). If history teachers exploited these opportunities thoroughly, it could make a very big difference to pupil attitudes to history as a school subject. iv) Feedback from history teachers and trainees Over the past several years, I have surveyed approximately 300 history teachers about their use of ICT. The following points emerged from the study, and I think they are worth keeping in mind when we are thinking of ways forward for the use of ICT in school history: • The new technology application which has had most impact on history teachers’ practice over the past decade is the use of television and video. Most history teachers and trainees made regular use of video/TV in their teaching. This was partly because it was easy/convenient compared to using computers, and because departments often had rich ‘archives’ of video extracts. But it was also about the power of the moving image. Many history teachers remarked that it enabled them to make a particular point in a very vivid and powerful way, and in a way that influenced the emotions of the pupils as well as their intellects. • They wanted ICT for better teaching and learning in history, not to help pupils become good at ICT. • They wanted ICT ‘on tap’ in the classroom, not in ICT suites, so that they could use it as a ‘component’ of a lesson, rather than as an occasional ‘special event’ ICT lesson, where you had to book the room weeks in advance and march all the pupils down to the ICT room for the ‘event’. • Overall, there was a preference for ‘straightforward’ as against ‘cutting edge’/sophisticated applications. Also, a preference for applications which were not too time consuming – which would allow them to make a particular teaching point quickly and effectively. v) Deficits in pupils’ ‘information literacy’ Developments in new technology have had an influence on pupils’ views about the reliability of information from different sources. One of my students, Matt Howe, surveyed all the pupils in an 11-16 school and found that three or five years of school history had not apparently changed their ideas about the reliability of information from different sources. At the age of 11, most pupils thought that the internet, CD-roms and text books were the most reliable forms of information. At the age of 16, they still thought this. This was a small-scale enquiry, conducted within one school, but it nonetheless raises interesting questions for history teachers. Given that one of the aims of school history is to help young people to handle information intelligently, there is perhaps a need to address the issue of ‘media literacy’ more explicitly, and make connections between the reliability of sources ‘from the past’, and the sources from which they derive information in their day to day lives. Part of a historical education in the 21st century ought to be to teach pupils that the internet is not the ultimate repository of truth and wisdom. • 2. Implications of these influences: how can we use ICT to persuade pupils that history is: i) interesting and enjoyable, and ii) very relevant to the lives they will live outside the classroom? i) ‘Impact’ resources, not just ‘more stuff’ One of my interests in history teaching is the collection of resources that have a powerful impact on learners, that help history teachers to make a particular point in a vivid, memorable and effective way. This can be through the use of quotations, pictures, cartoons, interactive exercises on the internet and (in particular) short moving image extracts. Of my ‘top 100’ new technology resources, probably over 90 are in the form of short video extracts. The facility to put VHS video extracts into DVD format, and into powerful ‘collections’ on, for example, The Holocaust, Propaganda, War etc has further enhanced the potential of such resources. There is no necessary correlation between the sophistication of technology and the potential of ICT for enhancing teaching and learning in history. One of my mentors reckons that the purchase of a couple of speakers and really ‘big screen’ projection via the data projector has transformed the impact of his collection of VHS video recordings. One or two examples (there are dozens I could mention): the section on ‘Blast’ from the BBC QED documentary about a one megaton nuclear bomb going off over London. No matter how good a teacher’s skills of exposition and questioning, it would be virtually impossible to get the scale of the atomic bomb over as effectively without these moving images. Another memorably powerful extract: the ‘blue eyes – brown eyes experiment’ shown as part of Channel 4’s documentary, ‘5 steps to tyranny’. I had heard of the experiment, but it’s a different thing seeing the moving pictures record of it. In terms of making a powerful point about the creation of ‘outsider groups’, I believe that most people who saw it would remember it for as long as they lived. So yes, ICT has brought us lots of new ways to make our teaching effective, but don’t let us forget the power of the moving image. ii) Using ICT to build up powerful ‘collections’ Phillips’ (2002: 22) has argued that the key ICT skill for history teachers in future will be ‘integration literacy’, meaning ‘the ability to use computers and other technologies combined with a variety of teaching and learning strategies to enhance students’ learning’ (in the words of Ben Walsh, building up powerful ‘learning packages’). It will not be about whether they use application A more than application B, but the skill with which they exploit the potential of a whole range of ICT resources to achieve real ‘impact’ learning: quotes, pictures, cartoons, newspaper articles, video extracts, high quality active learning activities from the web which makes pupils have to think and which disturb their preconceptions. One collection which I am currently trying to build up is an archive of quotes about the usefulness of studying history, which might be used to make it easier for teachers to be explicit about why history is relevant and important to pupils’ lives, even if they are just printed off and used for classroom display. Another is a set of resources aimed at developing pupils’ understanding of democracy (i.e. that it’s not just about having the right to vote). Other collections are simply collections of images on particular topics. I am also trying to build up a collection of resources which help history teachers to develop pupils’ internet/media literacy (see for example, the ‘spoof’ Oliver Cromwell website at http://freespace.virgin.net/susan.inwards/index.htm, the world’s shortest political quiz at http://www.self-gov.org/quiz.html, and the Dave Birch article at http://search.guardian.co.uk/search97cgi/s...ltArchive%2Ehts (this last example shows the advantages of hyperlinks). iii) Using ICT to ‘open up’ topics and provide overviews, connections over time and links to the present This relates to Richard Aldrich’s idea of the usefulness of ‘historical perspectives’. Is there any problem, issue, question into which one cannot gain more insight by looking at what has gone before? Too often we ‘pull up the drawbridge’ instead of linking the past to the present. If we use ICT to do this, it can mean that potentially ‘dry’ topics like roads and canals in the C17th, Hargreaves’ Spinning Jenny’, the Agrarian Revolution, can be opened up and made relevant to the parallel problems of the present. If we are going to get pupils to examine and analyse portraits of Elizabeth I, shouldn’t they also explore contemporary iconography? A combination of a Google images search and the scanner makes it very easy to put together a collection of pictures of Elizabeth II which shows how attitudes to the monarchy have changed over the past 50 years, or pictures of contemporary politicians which show how the visual image can be manipulated. If we are trying to teach pupils about the meaning of ‘right’ and left’ as political concepts, from the French Revolution to the present, the interactive exercise at www.politicalcompass.org can be a powerful resource. History ought to contribute to the political literacy of young people, and ICT can make a significant contribution to this aim. In particular, the newspaper archives provide some fantastic examples of high quality writing which can get pupils beyond the emaciated sources which some text books provide. A few examples: A review of the views of a range of British historians on the Iraq War: http://www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,,898341,00.html Interesting article on the historical background to the Dylan song, The lonesome death of Hattie Carroll): http://www.guardian.co.uk/arts/fridayrevie...1424244,00.html A brilliant piece of writing by Phillip Pullman on Reading and Democracy: http://books.guardian.co.uk/review/story/0,,1343733,00.html Michael Young article, Down with meritocracy: http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,,514207,00.html Review of Anthony Sampson’s ‘Who runs this place? The anatomy of Britain in the 21st Century http://books.guardian.co.uk/review/story/0,,1188975,00.html iv) Using ICT to develop pupils’ information literacy A recent report by the Historical Association argued that ‘History is an essential component of the values that underpin democratic societies and as such should be central to the compulsory years of education’ (History 14-19: Report and recommendations to the Secretary of State, Executive summary, London, Historical Association, 2005: 2.4.1). ICT could play a valuable part in developing pupils’ democratic ‘vocabulary’, their understanding of political concepts, and their understanding of different views about the pros and cons of democracy (democracy is not unproblematically ‘a good thing’ and many societies, including our own, are not ‘perfect’ democracies). At the moment, how many young people leave school with an understanding of the ideas of, for example, Eisenhower, Lamartine, De Toqueville, Fukoyama, Chomsky and Hobsbawn, on the subject of democracy ? How many of them understand words and phrases such as ‘realpolitik’, ‘demagogue’, ‘plutocracy’ the manufacture of consent’, ‘playing the race card’? As well as providing pupils with a body of knowledge and a mental map of the past, and a sense of identity and heritage, school history should provide pupils with an understanding of history as a form of knowledge, so that they can handle information intelligently, and so that they can ascertain the validity of claims about the world that they are going to live in. In the words of Norman Longworth, ‘It does require some little imagination to realise what the consequences will be of not educating our children to sort out the differences between essential and non-essential information, raw fact, prejudice, half-truth and untruth, so that they know when they are being manipulated, by whom, and for what purpose.’ (‘We’ re moving into the information society- what shall we teach the children?’, Computer Education, 1981, June: 17-19). ICT can play a big part in helping history teachers to achieve the 4 aims outlined above, and to teach history more powerfully and more effectively.

Thoughts on the evaluation of the project Just picking out some points that were made over the course of last week’s meeting with regard to evaluation as a sort of aide-memoire. Some of these things might seem to be stating the obvious, nonetheless…… • Evaluation needs to run through the project from the start, to be planned into it, rather than being tacked on at the end as an afterthought. • Richard made the important point that it is as much about compliance as quality and impact: we have to make sure that by the end of the project, we have done what we said that we would do in a way that the commission cannot dispute. There are all sorts of things which we might add and develop as the project unfolds which were not originally envisaged given the pace of change in this area, but we should not lose sight of what we have said we will do in the contract. • Richard distributed a commission approved evaluation form (Appendix 4: ‘Evaluation form – how good was the event?’). This specified 12 ‘performance indicators’ and asked them to be ranked on a 4 point scale. We were pushed for time on Sunday and did not complete or hand in this form at the event. 1) Are people happy to use this form as the basis of the summative evaluation of the event? 2) If so, it is essential that we try and get as complete a set of returns of the form as possible (from members and associates) so that they can become part of the evaluation ‘archive’ for the project. Although we don’t want evaluation to become a bureaucratic monstrosity, I think that it is important that we have more than just a set of numbers and ticks for the evaluation. Ideally there should be reflection and constructive comment/suggestions from participants. It would be enormously helpful if everyone involved in the project thus far could post some reflections on the Toulouse seminar, the project thus far, and their thoughts on future priorities, directions, things to keep in mind. These comments are much more helpful than grades/ticks in terms of providing a basis for formative evaluation This might include comments on some of the areas outlined in the ‘4 point score’ evaluation form. Other things to mention might include: Success criteria for the project A balance between internal and external evaluation (‘how was it for us?’ ‘What beneficent impact might/will it have on history and ICT in Europe, history teachers’ practice?’) What might we tweak/change to make the next seminar equally/more successful? How can we make sure that we get best ‘return’ from associate members? How can we make sure that we ‘capture’ the successes of the seminar? How to make best use of the forum between seminars? More thought on what the website might contain other than the content suggested in the bid? How to keep in touch and ‘sub-contract’ work on women’s history? This are just suggestions; I don’t think that everyone needs to write about all these things but people might comment on at least three or four things which they think are important. I am teaching all day today and tomorrow, I will try and put up my thoughts on things so far as ‘my two pennorth’ on Thursday.

The strand which I would like to pursue is the use of ICT in school history to develop pupils' political/information literacy. Although citizenship is now part of the National Curriculum in the UK, and political literacy is one of the three main strands, there is some evidence to suggest that many pupils leave school with very little understanding of the basic tenets of (or threats to) democracy. For many of them, their understanding of it is little more than 'the right to vote'. Linking the past to the present, and using the resources which are available on the internet could go a long way to redressing this situation. Picking up and developing this strand of citizenship could go some way to justifying (yet again) history's place on the school curriculum against the 'predator' subjects such as vocational ed and psychology/sociology. History ought to make a contibution to pupils' political literacy, but at the moment, it does very little. The future offers the chance to build up powerful, high impact resources in this area by the incorparation of television, newspaper and internet archives into powerful 'learning packages' (A Ben Walsh term). At the moment, nobody is really bringing these resources together in a purposeful and meaningful way. I hope to give some brief examples of the potential of such material at the seminar.

One of the things I fogot to mention in my original list was the facility which ICT offers for 'problematising' the past. Jim Schick in the US has argued that the eye-catching features of multimedia have deflected attention away from more meaningful facets of interactivity. Does the activity force the learner to think, rather than simply remember, does it put the seeds of a new idea in learners’ minds? Does it make them think about ‘connections’ (either temporal or geo-political) that had not occurred to them before- including links to present day problems and dilemmas? Does the question posed intrigue the learner in a way that encourages them to read in more depth, and persevere in a difficult enquiry? Does it disturb their preconceptions? In his 'History a short introduction', John Arnold points out that the Greek word which has become ‘history’ originally meant ‘to enquire’, ‘and more specifically, indicated a person who was able to choose wisely between conflicting accounts’ (Arnold, 2000: 18). The ‘Communications’ strand in ICT has transformed the scope for presenting pupils with a range of differing interpretations and representations of the past, and ‘conflicting accounts.’ Given limitations of space in even the best of text books, it increases the opportunities for pupils to learn history ‘by reading multiple texts on the same topic, and by discussing controversies of interpretation’. (Britt et al, 2000: 438) The internet, and some of the more recently produced history CD-roms make it much easier for the history teacher to set up an argument or problem relating to the past, in such a way that pupils have to think, reason, and make judgements and decisions about information, rather than simply ‘learning it’. This is the ‘real’ interactivity that Jim Schick refers to in his papers on interactivity through the use of ICT, not the Tony Blair (1995) definition ('The other important thing about CD-roms of course is that they are interactive. Learning is no longer a matter of passively receiving information; you can become actively involved in the process, answering quizzes, manipulating images, summoning up pictures or music and pasting together your own notebook of words, images and sounds on screen.', or the Bill Gates (1995)definition: ‘the person controls what he or she sees or hears’. In defence of the 'World's shortest political quiz', whenever I have used it it has generated argument and discussion (real human interactivity), it makes the point that political position is not just a matter of where you are on the left-right wing continuum, but whether you believe in 'statism' or laisser-faire' (an important part of understanding, for example, what happened over the course of the French Revolution, Fascism etc). As for the quiz being politically biased, this is part of its use in developing/sharpening pupils'/learners' internet literacy. It is only after I have pointed out, at the end of the activity, that the site is the home of the Libertarian Society, that pupils grasp that the quiz was not neutral, that they have been manipulated. Even PGCE trainees have not questioned the provenance of the questions. The other advantage (although it makes it crude and limited in scope), is that it is quick to do. 'Political Compass' is a more elaborate exploration of political position but there are six pages of questions and it takes a long time for pupils to work through it. In England now, developing pupils' political literacy is part of the responsibilities of school history, and I think that these forms of quiz can help to develop pupils' understanding of some political concepts. How many of your pupils have a sophisticated understanding of the political concepts which are part of these exercises? Compared to 'Throw the teacher' etc, I still feel that such activities have more potential to be meaningfully interactive, if accompanied (as always) by intelligent teacher questioning and exposition. Anyway.... I've overexplained enough.

It looks a realy interesting collection on an important and highly relevant theme to young people growing up at the start of the 21st century. One of the tensions of the dataset is its integrity as a historical overview of the whole topic, i.e. its use to historians and scholars, and its usability in schools. As John suggests, if it is to be optimised for use in schools, it might be helpful to invest some time in devising 'pathways' through the material, trying to problematise some of the questions the resource poses, and focusing on high inpact and accessible elements of the dataset.

Biggest single thing; for it to be easy to transfer VHS video clips into digital files to play on PC, integrate into PowerPoint etc. I am aware it is doable, but have not yet found time to master the technology for myself.

6 things spring to mind. 1) The HiDES ‘A’ level/undergraduate packages which enabled learners to explore controversies of historical interpretation in a very sophisticated way, particularly in terms of developing learners’ ability to synthesise a range of historical sources in answer to particular historical questions. 2) Use of the web to build up collections of images on particular historical themes; capable of improving out of all recognition the quality of visual images available to the history teacher. 3) Facility of ICT to ‘integrate’ resources to enrich lessons; in Ben Walsh’s phrase ‘building learning packages’ from a range of sources so that the teacher has a powerful combination of pictures, cartoons, texts, moving images to bring topics alive. 4) Use of newspaper archives to access high quality writing about history/politics/’the big questions’ of history. Ability to access these via URLs gets round some copyright problems. 5) If I’m honest about the way in which new technology has most contributed to improving my history sessions, probably over 90 of the top 100 resources would be extracts from TV programmes, played at the moment using TV and video. The moving image is just so powerful, rich source of ‘impact’ materials. 6) Genuinely interactive web activities such as, for example, ‘The World’s shortest political quiz’ (www.self-gov.org).