Historyandsocialstudiescurriculum ORE Ross2020
Historyandsocialstudiescurriculum ORE Ross2020
Historyandsocialstudiescurriculum ORE Ross2020
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Summary
Social studies education has had a turbulent history as one of the core subjects in the school
curriculum. The fundamental content of the social studies curriculum – the study of human
enterprise across space and time –however, has always been at the core of educational endeavors.
It is generally accepted that the formal introduction of social studies to the school curriculum
was instigated by the 1916 report of the National Education Association's Committee on Social
Studies, which emphasized development of citizenship values as a core aim of history and social
science education. Earlier commissions of the N.E.A. and American Historical Association
heavily influenced the Committee on Social Studies recommendations. The roots of the
contemporary social studies curriculum, therefore, can be traced to two distinct curriculum
reform efforts: the introduction of academic history into the curriculum and citizenship
education. There is widespread agreement that the aim of social studies is citizenship education,
that is the preparation of young people so that they possess the knowledge, skills, and values
necessary for active participation in society. This apparent consensus, however, has been
described as almost meaningless because social studies educators continue to be at odds over
curricular content as well as the conception of what it means to be a good citizen. Since its
formal introduction into the school, social studies curriculum been the subject of numerous
commission and blue-ribbon panel studies, ranging from the sixteen-volume report of the
American Historical Association's Commission on Social Studies in the 1930s to the more recent
movement for national curriculum standards. Separate and competing curriculum standards have
been published for no less than seven areas of that are part of the social studies curriculum:
United States and global history, economics, geography, civics, psychology, and social studies.
Social studies curriculum is defined a lack of consensus and has been an ideological battleground
with ongoing debates over its nature, purpose, and content. Historically there have been a diverse
range of curricular programs that have been a prominent within social studies education at
various times, including the life adjustment movement, progressive education, social
reconstructionism, and nationalistic history. The debate over the nature, purpose, and content of
the social studies curriculum continues today, with competing groups variously arguing for a
social issues approach, the disciplinary study of history and geography, or action for social
justice as the most appropriate framework for the social studies curriculum.
Keywords
The fundamental content of the social studies curriculum—the study of human enterprise across
space and time—has always been at the core of the school curriculum, but social studies as a
distinctive subject in the curriculum has a relatively brief and turbulent history.
Social studies education as a field has a history marked by battles over its identity, nature,
and purpose. As a school subject, the field encompasses the teaching of history and the social
sciences, but not merely as disciplinary knowledge made appropriately accessible to children and
adolescents. Social studies has always been a vehicle for the transmission of values, social
2
mores, and worldviews. It was invented as a school subject in the second decade of the 20th
century, with the purpose of advancing social improvement and democratic citizenship by
providing young people with the knowledge, skills, and values necessary for active participation
in society. But social studies was not created out of whole cloth; rather, the stated aims of social
studies were part of schooling in North America from the colonial era. Early education laws in
the United States specified religious and moral instruction, and the curriculum of Latin grammar
schools in New England included catechism and Bible instruction along with geography and
moral philosophy. Nationalistic education was a key part of school curriculum from the late 18th
century and has persisted as a key part of the social studies curriculum.
The term “social studies” was first used by Thomas Jesse Jones in his book Social Studies in
the Hampton Curriculum (1906), in which he expressed his concern that young African
Americans and Native Americans would have difficulty becoming integral members of the
broader society unless they learned to understand that society, the social forces that operate
within it, and the ways to recognize and respond to social power. The traditional view of the
origins of the contemporary social studies curriculum is that the National Education
Association’s 1916 Committee on Social Studies introduced the term “social studies” and
created the scope and sequence of courses that define the contemporary curriculum. The origin
of the contemporary social studies curriculum has been a flash point between advocates of a
history-centered social studies curriculum and those calling for a curriculum based on the
interdisciplinary study of current social studies (Evans, 2004). Whelan (1992) points out that
contemporary social studies has roots in both the movement to include the academic study of
history in the schools (through the work of the National Education Association’s [NEA’s] 1893
Committee of Ten and the American Historical Association’s 1899 Committee of Seven) and
ideas drawn from social welfare and social improvement movements of the 19th and early 20th
centuries, which influenced the report of the NEA’s 1916 Committee on Social Studies.
Whelan suggests that both sides (e.g., Ravitch, 1989; Saxe, 1991) in the debate over the
origins of social studies have drawn somewhat extreme and misleading portraits of the roles
and differences between historians and progressive social meliorists in the development of
social studies as a school subject. In a more recent account of the origins of the field,
Jorgensen (2012) argues that John Dewey’s thought and work was a much stronger influence
on the 1916 committee than most contemporary scholars have previously recognized.
Jorgensen examines all three of the 1916 committee reports and argues the operational
microcosm that emanated from the work of the committee members involved with
the third report could be considered a synthesis of educational philosophy and ideas
in which John Dewey directly and indirectly wielded the single most important
within the context of the economic, political, and social issues in place during the
The tensions and contradictions inherent in the establishment of social studies in schools does
help to explain the internal conflict that has shaped the field since its beginnings. Disagreement
over curricular issues in social studies has characterized the field since its birth, and these
4
disagreements and diversities of opinion regarding the nature, purpose, and organization of social
There is widespread agreement that the aim of social studies is “citizenship education,” or the
preparation of young people to be active and engaged democratic citizens. This apparent
consensus, however, has been described as “almost meaningless” (Marker & Mehlinger, 1992)
because social studies researchers continue to be at odds over the curricular content as well as the
conception of what a “good citizen” is. For example, the curriculum history of the field includes
advocates for exploration of “closed areas” or taboo social issues (Hunt & Metcalf, 1955);
decision-making (Engle, 1963); public policy (Oliver & Shaver, 1966); moral development and
values clarification (Raths, Harmin, & Simon, 1979); social roles (Superka & Hawke, 1982);
informed social criticism (Engle & Ochoa, 1988); social transformation (Hursh & Ross, 2000);
diversity in the purposes, content, and pedagogy of social studies education—social studies
educators have devoted considerable attention to identifying categories and descriptions of the
major traditions within the field (Vinson, 1998). Various schemes have been used by researchers
to make sense of the wide-ranging and often conflicting purposes. The most influential of these
was developed by Barr, Barth, and Shermis (1977), who grouped the various positions on the
social studies curriculum into three themes: cultural transmission, social science, and reflective
inquiry. Martorella’s (1996) framework extends the work of Barr, Barth, and Shermis, and
includes social studies education as (a) citizenship or cultural transmission, (b) social science, (c)
reflective inquiry, (d) informed social criticism, and (e) personal development.
Social studies as citizenship or cultural transmission is a tradition within social studies that
promotes student acquisition of certain nationalistic or “democratic” values via the teaching and
learning of discrete, factual pieces of information drawn primarily from the canon of Western
thought and culture. Content is based on the beliefs that certain factual information is important
to the practice of good citizenship; the nature of this information remains relatively constant over
time; and this information is best determined by a consensus of authorities and experts. From this
challenged. Cultural and social unity are proclaimed and praised. In the curriculum, history and
literature dominate over such considerations as learner interests, the social sciences, social
criticism, and personal-subjective development. This perspective has long been dominant in the
field and has seen a resurgence in recent revisions to social studies curriculum in Texas and
Social studies as social science is a tradition that evolved during the Cold War and directly
out of the post-Sputnik effort of social scientists to have a say in the design, development, and
implementation of the social studies curriculum. From this viewpoint, each individual social
discipline (e.g., political science, history, economics, geography) can be considered in terms of
its own distinct structure of concepts, theories, and modes of empirical inquiry. In educational
scholarship, this idea was most widely and successfully advanced by psychologist Jerome Bruner
and curriculum theorist J. J. Schwab; it formed, in part, the basis for what became known as the
“new social studies” (Fenton, 1966). In this tradition, citizenship education includes mastering
social science concepts, generalizations, and processes to build a knowledge base for later
6
learning. Social studies education provides students with the social scientific content and
procedures for successful citizenship, and for understanding and acting on the human condition
in its historical, contemporary, political, social, economic, and cultural contexts. In general,
instructional methods include those that develop within learners the characteristics of social
methodologically on “ethnography,” as was the case with the curriculum project Man: A Course
of Study). Social studies scholars have recently moved away from the more traditional social
studies as a social science approach to disciplinary structure and toward increasingly complex
interrogations of the importance of particular constructions of the specific social and historical
disciplines. From this newer perspective, academics, teachers, and students all have some
understanding of the structure of the various social sciences that relates to how they produce,
influence all individual modes of teaching and learning. Thus, it is impossible to teach social
studies according to any other approach without simultaneously maintaining some structural
comprehension of the knowledge and modes of inquiry of the various academic disciplines.
There are, however, competing and dynamic possibilities such that teachers and students may
each possess a unique orientation. Within the social studies, much of this contemporary work has
focused on history education and has emphasized multiple, complex instructional approaches,
Social studies as reflective inquiry is an approach to social studies developed originally out
of the work of John Dewey, particularly his socio-cognitive psychology and philosophical
pragmatism. From this position, citizenship remains the core of the social studies. But unlike
and content, or social science, where citizenship involves the range of academic social
within a specific sociopolitical context. From this perspective, the purpose of social studies
education is nurturing within students abilities necessary for decision-making in some specified
sociopolitical context (e.g., liberal democratic capitalism), especially with respect to social and
personal problems that directly affect individual students. This presupposes a necessary
connection between democracy and problem-solving, one in which the key assumption behind
this link is that within the social-political system significant problems rarely imply a single, overt
and/or “correct” solution. Such problems frequently require decisions among several perceived
good solutions and/or several perceived bad solutions. Democracy thus necessitates a citizenry
capable of and competent in identifying problems; collecting, evaluating, and analyzing data; and
making reasoned decisions. Dewey’s work on democratic reflective thinking led to the evolution
of a powerful pragmatic theory of education, prominent during the early to middle post–World
War II era, spearheaded in social studies education by Hunt and Metcalf (1955) and Engle
(1963). By carrying forward Dewey’s legacy, these scholars offer an alternative to the social
sciences per se and to contemporary “back to basics” movements, one grounded in reflective
The framework of social studies as informed social criticism is rooted in the work of social
reconstructionists (Counts, 1932) and related to the more recent work of “socialization-
countersocialization” theorists (Engle & Ochoa, 1988) and critical pedagogues. The
contemporary literature primarily addresses themes such as the hidden curriculum, sociocultural
8
transformation, and the nature and meaning of knowledge and truth. The work of Stanley and
Nelson (1986), and Hursh and Ross (2000) perhaps best represents the current status of this
tradition. From this standpoint the purpose of social studies is citizenship education aimed at
providing students opportunities for an examination, critique, and revision of past traditions,
toward
applying social criticism and ethical decision making to social issues and using the
values of justice and equality as grounds for assessing the direction of social change
Social studies content in this tradition challenges the injustices of the status quo. It counters
knowledge that is generated by and supportive of society’s elites; rooted in logical positivism;
and consistent with social reproduction and the replication of a society that is classist, sexist, and
racist. Although it is specific to individual classroom settings and students, it can include, for
example, redressing the needs of the disadvantaged, increasing human rights conditions, and
stimulating environmental improvements. Moreover, teachers and students here may claim their
Instruction methods in this tradition are situational but are oriented away from lecture and
information transmission and toward such processes as “reflective thinking” and the dialogical
Social studies as personal development reflects the belief that citizenship education should
consist of developing a positive self-concept and a strong sense of personal efficacy among
students. It is grounded in the idea that effective democratic citizenship involves understanding
one’s freedom to make choices as well as one’s obligation and responsibility to live with their
ultimate outcomes. Social studies content is selected and pursued by the students themselves so
that it is embedded in the nature, needs, and interests of the learners. Instructional methods are
shared between teachers and students, but include techniques such as Kilpatrick’s “project
method,” various forms of individualized instruction, and the Socratic method of dialogue. In
essence, this approach evolved out of the child-centered progressive education movement of the
early 20th century and within the settings of humanistic psychology and existential philosophy.
Its best-known contemporary advocates include Nel Noddings (1992) and in the social studies
Given the history of the field, it is not surprising that there is no consensus definition of
social studies, but the National Council for the Social Studies (NCSS), the largest professional
organization in the field describes social studies within the school curriculum as
the integrated study of the social sciences and humanities to promote civic
mathematics, and natural sciences. The primary purpose of social studies is to help
young people make informed and reasoned decisions for the public good as citizens
10
The dominant pattern of social studies instruction is characterized by text-oriented, whole
many social studies educators have long advocated instructional approaches that include active
learning and higher-order thinking within a curriculum that emphasizes gender equity,
multiculturalism, environmentalism, and informed social critique, the dominant pattern has
persisted. This pedagogy is primarily the result of socioeconomic and political realities that
produce conditions such as large class size, a lack of planning time for teachers, a culture of
teacher isolation, the expectation that the curriculum present the celebratory history (and myths)
of Western Civilization and the United States, and a strong emphasis on standardized test scores
as the only legitimate measure of educational achievement. The traditional pattern of social
studies instruction is, however, also sustained by the fact that it is easier for teachers to plan and
teach in accordance with a direct instruction approach that focuses on information transmission
and coverage of content and that encourages teachers’ low expectations of students.
Reinforcing these tendencies is the conservative restoration of the past two decades that has
produced the “educational excellence” and “curriculum standards” movements, which have
placed an emphasis on high-stakes testing and student recall and identification of social studies
facts, persons, and events, diverting attention away from the ways in which the conditions of
teaching and learning might be transformed to encourage critical, active, and democratic
The social studies curriculum has been heavily influenced by policies of curriculum
centralization and standardized testing. The roots of the contemporary social studies curriculum
are found in the 1916 report of the NEA Committee on the Social Studies as well as the NEA
Committee of Ten (1893) and the AHA Committee of Seven (1899), which preceded it. The
current pattern of topics and courses for secondary social studies is largely the result of
recommendations of the 1916 Committee. The pattern of course offerings in social studies,
which has been consistent for most of the past century, reflects a time in which many students
completed only elementary or junior high school, thus United State history has typically been
offered in grades five, eight, and eleven. Despite the changing demographics of school
Grade 1 Families
Grade 2 Neighborhoods
Grade 3 Communities
mandated standardized tests that insure the alignment of classroom practices with state
frameworks. (Regents Examinations in New York State are one of the oldest examples of this
12
approach.) These curriculum frameworks were usually intended to influence textbook publishers
and establish standards by which students, teachers, and schools will be assessed. In many cases,
state curriculum frameworks represented a major step toward state control of what knowledge is
of most worth. Although states deny that these frameworks amount to “curriculum,” their
practical effects are the equivalent. This is particularly true when frameworks, standardized tests,
In most subject matter areas, there was a univocal call for and representation of curriculum
standards, in social studies there are no fewer than six sponsors of curriculum standards and 10
standards documents competing to influence the content and pedagogy of social education.
Studies[https://www.socialstudies.org/standards/execsummary]*
Historical Thinking Standards, (b) History Standards for Grades K–4, (c) United States
Government[http://new.civiced.org/resources/publications/resource-materials/national-
standards-for-civics-and-government]*
• National Council for Geographic Education: Geography for Life: *National Geography
Economics[http://www.councilforeconed.org/resource/voluntary-national-content-
standards-in-economics/]*
• American Psychological Association: *National Standards for High School Psychology
Curriculum[http://www.apa.org/education/k12/national-standards.aspx]*
The most generic curriculum standards are those created by the National Council for the
Social Studies (original released in 1994 and revised in 2010). The NCSS standards seek to
create a broad framework of themes within which local decisions can be made about specific
• Culture
• Global connections
By contrast, the history standards prepared by the National Center for History in Schools,
are much more specific, especially for grades 5–12, and provide both a sense of how children
should think (historically) and about what. Both the NCSS and the national history standards are
vividly contrasted by those published by the American Psychological Association (APA) for the
teaching of high school psychology. APA standards mimic the study of psychology at the
collegiate level, including a focus on research methods and the sub-disciplines of psychology.
14
None of these standards documents accounts for the others—each is a closed system that
maintains the particular discipline intact. In addition, these multiple sets of standards, when
combined with state and provincial curriculum documents, identify too many educational
outcomes to be taught and learned in the time allocated, one of the fatal mistakes of standards-
The Common Core State Standards (CCSS) in the United States are the most recent
incarnation of curriculum documents that define what will be taught and how it will be taught in
schools. CCSS reflects the same language and concerns as other standards-based reform efforts,
with an emphasis on so-called world class standards, 21st Century Skills, and a logic that sees
schools as serving the needs of corporate capitalism at the expense of educating individuals to
There are many persistent dilemmas and controversies in social studies that will likely never be
resolved, for example, breadth versus depth of curricular scope, chronology versus issues-based
teaching, a focus on the dominant culture versus multiculturalism, and advocacy versus
neutrality of teachers. Although one has to be careful not to frame these issues in purely dualistic
terms, each of these cases described in this section illustrate clashes between social studies for
indoctrination (also called “citizenship transmission”) and social studies aimed at fostering
classrooms. As preeminent American historian Arthur Schlesinger Sr. put it in the early part of
the 20th century, “Whether we like it or not, the textbook not the teacher teaches the course.”
And although Schlesinger’s point of view vastly underestimates the role of the teacher, textbooks
are one of the most dominant forces in determining what gets taught and how.
the first commercial volume in a series of social science textbooks entitled Man and His
Changing Society. Between 1937 and 1942, Rugg experienced what has been called the greatest
censorship campaign ever to be waged against a textbook author. Rugg was affiliated with the
social reconstructionist movement, which questioned the prevailing notions of social Darwinism
and laissez-faire capitalism. Social reconstructionists did not call for the overthrow of the
government or the economic system; rather, they argued that the social and economic systems
required careful planning and execution to ensure that social justice would prevail. Rugg and the
social reconstructionists believed that schools were a key factor in the pursuit of social change
and that the individualistic self-interest promoted by the traditional curriculum and its emphasis
on society.
Rugg said, “To keep issues out of the school program is to keep thought out of it,” and
insisted that schools should prepare students for active participation in democratic decision-
making. The aim of his textbooks was to teach students to be aware and critical of injustices in
American society and to become active participants in bringing about needed social change.
16
Rugg insisted that “pupils must learn to think critically about modern problems.” In a review
of the textbooks, historian Carl Wittke wrote that Rugg “emphasizes the need for tolerance,
Macmahon, Wittke & Lynd, 1942, p. 25). Rugg’s Teacher’s Guide advised teachers to make
constant use of phrases such as “Why do you think so?,” “Are you open-minded about the
matter?,” “What is your authority?,” and “Have you considered all sides of the case?” as part of
The Rugg textbooks intended to foster critical thinking rather than conveying received
knowledge. For example, end of the chapter questions in A History of American Government and
Culture, including the following: “In considering each period of history we shall ask: How
democratic was the government? Who had the privilege and responsibility of voting? Who were
Problems of American Culture, Rugg encouraged students to explore their local communities
with the hope that they would identify and take action to ameliorate social ills to
organize a survey of life in your village, town, or city. Study the history of your
town, gathering together copies of old records. Try to understand the people who
neighborhoods, the family life, social organizations, the real government. Study the
needs and try to learn how to improve the community in which you live. (Rugg,
1931, p. 14)
Some of the themes addressed in the Rugg textbooks included the fragile nature of the economy,
a critique of laissez-faire capitalism, the unfair distribution of wealth and income, the causes and
consequences of high unemployment levels, class conflict, immigration, rapid cultural change,
and imperialism. In his junior high school textbook Citizenship and Civic Affairs, he indicated
that in 1929, 36 American families had more than $5 million to spend, while more than 5 million
families had less than $1,000 on which to live. He illustrated the contrasted life styles and
opportunities of a prototype “Mr. Very Poor Man,” “Mr. Average White-Collar Man,” and “Mr.
Prosperous Business Man,” the latter are “able to afford beauty as well as comfort” in his home.
Man and His Changing Society was a highly successful textbook series. According to Rugg,
5.5 million copies of the textbooks, student and teaching guides were sold to nearly 5,000
schools. Peak annual sales approached 300,000 copies. The success of the textbooks has been
credited to their innovative form, style, and extensive content—the same characteristics that
created the controversy and ultimately led to the demise of the books in the 1940s.
The Hearst newspaper corporation, the advertising and manufacturing industries, the
American Legion, and other powerful interests and patriotic societies such as the Daughters of
the American Revolution attacked the Rugg textbooks for, according to Time magazine,
“picturing the U.S. as a land of unequal opportunity, and giving a class-conscious account of the
In 1937, B. C. Forbes attempted to have the books removed from the Englewood Cliffs,
New Jersey schools, calling the books “un-American, socialistic, and subversive” (Bagenstos,
1977, p. 33). Although Forbes was initially unsuccessful, he used his column in the Hearst
newspapers and his position as founder of Forbes magazine to spark a grassroots, public
campaign against the Rugg textbooks (Boesenberg & Poland, 2001). Forbes and the Hearst
papers felt threatened by, among other things, the textbooks’ portrayal the newspaper industry as
18
The largest newspaper chain is that controlled by William Randolph Hearst . . . So
great is the combined circulation of these newspapers that it is estimated that they
enter daily one home out of four in the United States . . . Newspaper publishing is
a business, and newspapers are printed for profit. What they contain is essentially
what the publishers think the American people want. (Rugg, 1931, p. 333).
Forbes called the books “viciously un-American” and claimed that Rugg “distorts facts to
convince the oncoming generation that America’s private-enterprise system is wholly inferior
The National Manufacturers Association produced the so-called Robey Report (written by
Ralph W. Robey, an assistant professor of banking at Columbia University), which reviewed 600
social studies textbooks and labeled a substantial portion of them as “suspicious” because they
were critical of the “free enterprise” system and the current form of American government.
Robey said
the whole emphasis (of Rugg’s materials) is placed on the one-third of the
population who are underfed rather than the two-thirds who are well-fed . . . Yet in
most instances you don’t get a leftist point of view; if you had an out-and-out leftist
slant it would be much simpler to handle. What you get is a critical attitude that is
In 1939, the Advertising Federation of America and its affiliates—offended that the Rugg
textbooks contained lessons about why consumers should look out for false advertising claims—
launched an anti-Rugg propaganda campaign with a pamphlet entitled “Facts You Should Know
About Anti-Advertising Propaganda in School Textbooks” (Spring, 1991). One of the final
blows for Rugg’s textbooks came in 1940, when the American Legion demanded that his
textbooks should be banished from the schools in an American Legion Magazine article titled
“Treason in the Textbooks,” which was accompanied by a cartoon depicting Rugg as a slant-
eyed devil and innocent schoolchildren wearing pink-shaded glasses (Spring, 1991).
These national organizations fomented grassroots protests, which resulted in the removal of
the textbooks from schools across the country (and book burnings in Ohio). In defense of their
profitable series, Rugg’s publisher, Ginn and Company, financed his travel to communities
where the textbooks were under attack. Rugg was met by many protesters who admitted to never
reading the books, but caught up in anti-communist hysteria of the times nevertheless made false
and ludicrous claims about the books and their author. Ironically, Rugg was considered a
moderate among the social reconstructionist thinkers and was antipathetic to the class-conflict
Despite the continued acclaim for the textbooks by many educators and the supportive
efforts by organizations such as the School Book Publishers, The National Council for the Social
Studies, and the American Civil Liberties Union by the early 1940s school boards across the
country were ordering the removal of the Rugg series. Sales declined to 21,000 in 1945. A small
number of the texts, however, remained in use and, in 1951, an article in Reader’s Digest
branded Rugg and fellow social reconstructionist George S. Counts as “evil geniuses” (Flynn,
1951). Rugg’s books were condemned for “tricky statistics,” for being “heavily charged with
socialist propaganda” (Marsden, 1991. In the late 1950s, when the Rugg textbooks were no
longer in use, the American Legion was complaining that the seeds they had planted remained
“like hardy germs” of the new “golden staphylococcus—they’re highly resistant to all known
20
Although other social studies textbooks suffered similar attacks as Rugg’s, most notably the
Building America series, which was published by the Association for Supervision and
Curriculum Development in the 1940s, the Rugg episode remains the most notable because of its
lasting impact on the textbook industry, which has since adopted a highly conservative stance
In 1963, a major federally funded, multi-pronged curriculum effort known as Project Social
Studies was born. The New Social Studies (as the project is commonly known) aimed to
transform social studies curriculum and teaching by (a) stressing concepts and generalizations
from all social sciences; and (b) encouraging active learning through discovery, inquiry, and
The National Science Foundation (NSF) funded Man: A Course of Study (MACOS), which
is perhaps the most well known and controversial of the two-dozen New Social Studies Projects.
First made available to schools in 1969, MACOS was a cultural anthropology course designed for
fifth- and sixth-grade students and included films, booklets, records, maps, games, and other
materials, such as field notes, journals, poems, songs and stories, construction exercises, and
observation projects that allowed children to learn in varied ways. Within five years, MACOS
was in use in 1,700 schools in 47 states. MACOS examined the nature of humans as a species and
the forces that molded and continued to shape humanity. MACOS exposed students to the way
others lived, introduced them to the concept of culture, and attempted to enable students to think
about human behavior in a more general way and to appreciate cultural diversity by
comprehending the common humanity of all people. Recurrent themes included the concepts of
life cycle, learning, parental care, adaptation and selection, aggression, affection and love, social
organization, language, technology, and values and beliefs. These themes are repeatedly
Three questions recurred throughout the curriculum: What is human about human beings?
How did they get that way? How can they be made more so? Students explored these questions
first by examining life cycles of salmon, herring gulls, and baboons. The second part of the
course focused on the Netsilik Eskimos (Netsilik Inuit, or Netsilingmiut) in the Pelly Bay region
of Canada. The Netsilik material emphasized the uniqueness of human beings and the basic
MACOS came under widespread criticism, which began with attacks by right-wing groups
such as the John Birch Society and creationists who opposed the teaching of evolution. School
districts and teachers using the MACOS were harassed, and a media campaign against MACOS
was mounted. Critics claimed that because MACOS was a secular curriculum—that is, it claimed
that human values and behavior are determined by specific environmental forces—it was
disrespectfully anti-religious; that the curriculum dehumanized people and humanized animals;
that, by introducing students to the values of another culture, the course undermined the moral
foundations of American society; and that teachers were instructed to concentrate on examples of
cannibalism, infanticide, and senilicide until these acts were understandable and acceptable to
American children.
In the mid-1970s, NSF requested funds from Congress for preparation of teachers to use the
curriculum. During what was to be a routine hearing before a subcommittee of the House
Science and Technology Committee, Congressmen John B. Conlan (R-AZ) and Robert E.
Bauman (R-MD) complained that some parents were protesting that the MACOS program
22
conveyed what they saw as disturbing and un-American values. Conlan said that the program
“brainwashes children with a dishonest view of man,” and Congress subsequently canceled
MACOS funding.
Jerome Bruner, the cognitive psychologist who was the primary developer of MACOS
attributed the demise of the program to a “storm of anti-intellectualism, primitive patriotism, and
[the] ‘back-to-basics’ [movement].” He concluded that the study of the nature of humans cannot
be address in schools without reconsidering how schools reflect society. Bruner stated
If I had it all to do over again, and if I knew how, I would put my energies into
reexamining how schools express the agenda of the society and how that agenda is
Over a half-century after the height of the Rugg textbook controversy, a similar ideological clash
occurred over the federally funded national history standards project. In the 1990s, standards-
based educational reform began sweeping the nation, with the backing of political liberals and
conservatives as well the national leadership of corporate America and the teachers’ unions. The
National History Standards developed by Gary B. Nash, a renowned social historian, and his
team at the National Center for History in the Schools at University of California, Los Angeles,
became a lightning rod for criticism from cultural conservatives as well as progressive leftists.
The initial draft of the Standards for teaching United States and world history were viciously
attacked by right-wing ideologues (including Rush Limbaugh, Pat Buchanan, George Will,
Lynne Cheney, G. Gordon Liddy, and Newt Gingrich), rejected by the U.S. Senate 99–1, and
denounced by the Clinton administration, because they judged the standards were too
Before a gathering of the American Legion, U.S. Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole said that
“The purpose of the National History Standards seems not to be to teach our children certain
essential facts about our history, but to denigrate America’s story while sanitizing and glorifying
other cultures.” Dole declared that the work of the Standards’ authors “threatens us as surely as
any foreign power ever has” (Nash, Crabtree & Dunn, 1997, p. 245-246) Clinton’s Secretary of
Education, Richard Riley, said “The President does not believe and I do not believe that these
Standards should form the basis for a history curriculum in our schools” (Vinovskis, 1999, p. 44)
The attacks on the National History Standards were, essentially, opposition to teaching and
research of social history, a history that challenged the traditional grand narrative of “great white
men.” The National History Standards (and social history in general) were subject to attack
because they were considered as not celebratory enough. Nash described critics of the Standards
as wanting “a stainless steel version of history, a consensual past” (Nash, 1995, p. 46). By
contrast, the social history that informed the Standards covered episodes of the American
experience that could not be absorbed into “happy-face history.” Key critics, like Lynne Cheney
(who was head of the National Endowment for the Humanities when it funded the National
History Standards project), described them as a “grim and gloomy” monument to political
correctness (Sullivan, 2016, para. 22). She pronounced the Standards project a disaster for giving
insufficient attention to Robert E. Lee and the Wright brothers and far too much to obscure
figures (such as Harriet Tubman) or patriotically embarrassing episodes (such as the Ku Klux
Klan and McCarthyism) and described the Standards as “the most egregious example to date of
24
encouraging students to take a benign view of—or totally overlook—the failings of other
cultures while being hypercritical of the one in which they live” (Sullivan, 2016, para. 22).
Although cultural conservatives led the charge, they were not the only critics of the
Standards project. Representing the views of many progressive social studies educators, historian
Michael Whelan (1992) argued that the U.S. Senate rejection of the National History Standards
was right, but for the wrong reasons. Whelan argued that the most pressing problem for history
education is that the subject matter is essentially limitless, but instructional time is not. Whelan
posed key curricular questions, such as: What topics will be included in or excluded from study?
On what basis should such decisions be made? Who is in the best position to make these
decisions?
Whelan (1992) argued that while the broad-based national consensus building process used
by Nash and colleagues gave the impression of thoroughness and fairness, but consensus
building is not the best way to determine the historical understandings most worth knowing and
teaching. Instead, decentralized curricular decision-making is much more consistent with the
fundamentally interpretative nature of historical study. History is not a matter of facts, but a
matter of deciding what the facts mean (Whelan, 2006). In addition, the notion of national
standards is based on the misleading assumption that the study of history is simply about the past
rather than properly understood as about the relationship between the past and the present. Leftist
critics of the National History Standards (and the myriad of standards projects that emerged in
the 1990s) also highlighted how, when coupled with the mandated high-stakes tests, the
curriculum standards quickly morphed into “official knowledge,” which narrowed the range of
content taught in schools and deskilled teachers by making it nearly impossible for individual
The Thomas B. Fordham Foundation, whose publications include Where Did Social Studies Go
Wrong? (WDSSGW) and Terrorists, Despots, and Democracy: What Our Children Need to
Know, has sponsored one of the most visible recent efforts at social studies reform. These
publications have sparked an aggressive and vigorous debate regarding the nature of social
studies education. The authors of WDSSGW believe, among other things, that the current social
studies curriculum “eschews substantive content and subordinates a focus on effective practice to
educational and political correctness” (Leming, Ellington & Porter-Magee, 2003, p. ii).
In his foreword to WDSSGW, Chester E. Finn Jr., president of the Fordham Foundation and
former assistant secretary of education in the Reagan administration, states that an essential tenet
of any decent social studies curriculum for young Americans is that “democracy’s survival
depends on transmitting to each new generation the political vision of liberty and equality before
the law that unites us as Americans . . .” (Finn, 2003, p. VI). It is on this crucial point of
transmission, and its primary role in education for democracy, that WDSSGW contrasts with the
Even before the concept of social studies was invented, schools had been indoctrinating its
youth; no other single factor has so characterized textbooks, curriculum materials, or classroom
instruction. Teaching as “transmission of content” is alive and well in the contemporary social
artificially separate subjects, rote memorization of facts, and uncritical transmission of cultural
values are not, in fact, essential tenets of teaching for democracy, but rather just the opposite.
The current debate about social studies curriculum, and its incumbent tensions, indicates the
need for social studies educators to begin a serious conversation that can help the field chart a
26
deliberative, divergent, and flexible course for its curriculum. If the field social studies is to
continue to evolve and its members ought to focus on communicating areas of agreement as well
rejects the pluralism of the field of social studies and deliberation as the means to democracy. An
examination of the table of contents of WDSSGW is illustrative of the desire of its authors to
close off and limit the discussion: chapters with titles such as “The Training of Idiots,” Garbage
In, Garbage Out,” and “Ignorant Activists” reflect a perspective that implies an inherent
correctness and allows little room for scholarly discussion or reasoned disagreement (Ross &
Marker 2005).
As people debate the reform of social studies, they should not move rashly to adopt a
singular curricular perspective that is driven by ideology and special interests. Rather, they need
to take the time to consider conscientiously a pluralism of viewpoints on social studies reform
that could help to reinvent the social studies curriculum and make it relevant and flexible to meet
the unknown demands of the future. A way to assure that a pluralism of views on the nature and
purposes of social studies education remains beneficial, and not factionalizing or destructive, is
to embrace deliberation as the core idea of creating, maintaining, and teaching for democracy.
As these curriculum controversies and history of the field illustrate social studies is full of
contradictions. It harbors possibilities for inquiry and social criticism, liberation, and
emancipation. Social studies could be a site that enables young people to analyze and understand
social issues in a holistic way—finding and tracing relations and interconnections both present
and past in an effort to build meaningful understandings of a problem, its context, and history; to
envision a future where specific social problems are resolved; and take action to bring that vision
into existence. Social studies has the potential to be a place within the curriculum where students
learn to speak for themselves and strive toward an equal degree of participation and better future.
In practice, however, social studies has been and continues to be profoundly conversing in
Acknowledgments
Many thanks to the anonymous reviewers for their comments and suggestions.
Further Reading
Case, R., Clark, P., & Critical Thinking Consortium. (2016). The anthology of social studies:
Issues and strategies for elementary teachers. Vancouver, BC: Pacific Educational Press.
Case, R., Clark, P., & Critical Thinking Consortium. (2016). The anthology of social studies:
Issues and strategies for secondary teachers. Vancouver, BC: Pacific Educational Press.
Chandler, P. T., & Hawley, T. S. (Eds.). (2017). Race lessons: Using inquiry to teach about
Crocco, M. S., & Davis, O. L., Jr. (Eds.). (1999). “Bending the future to their will”: Civic
women, social education, and democracy. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield.
DeLeon, A. P., & Ross, E. W. (Eds.). (2010). Critical theories, radical pedagogies, and social
education: New perspectives for social studies education. Leiden, Netherlands: Sense.
Evans, R. W. (2007). This happened in America: Harold Rugg and the censure of social
Evans, R. W. (2015). Schooling corporate citizens: How accountability reform has damaged
28
Krutka, D. G., Whitlock, A. M. M., & Helmsing, M. (Eds.). (2018). Keywords in the social
Nash, G. B. (1995). The history standards controversy and social history. Journal of Social
Nash, G. B., Crabtree, C. A., & Dunn, R. E. (2000). History on trial: Culture wars and the
Ross, E. W. (Ed.). (2014). The social studies curriculum: Purposes, problems, and possibilities
Russell, W. B., III (Ed.). (2012). Contemporary social studies: An essential reader. Charlotte,
Schmidt, S. J. (2010). *Queering social studies: The role of social studies in normalizing
Shear, S. B., Tschida, C. M., Bellows, E., Buchanan, L. B., & Saylor, E. E. (2018).
Information Age.
Westheimer, J. (2015). What kind of citizen? Educating our children for the common good.
Woyshner, C. (2015). Histories of social studies and race: 1865–2000. London, UK: Palgrave
Macmillan.
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E. Wayne Ross