THE HISTORY PASSION PROJECT: PLEASURE, PURPOSE AND VALUE IN UNIVERSITY TEACHING	Fantastic responses to the survey on teaching History in Higher Education: over 10% of historians in UK history departments completed the survey ... read more!! The project findings so far were presented at our Annual Conference, April 2011 ... take a look at the presentation details and video.

 

This project is being led by Alan Booth, from the School of History, University of Nottingham and Jeanne Booth, education and business consultant and former head of a university careers service.

What makes a university historian into a passionate teacher? What difference does passion make to our students anyway? What contribution does it make to preparing graduates to make a good living in the 21^st century? And what can we do to create curricula and class activities that infuse students with a passion for their studies? The project investigates the role of passion in teaching, what inspires and sustains it, how it is demonstrated in interactions with students, and what impact it makes.

Background/Rationale

In today’s educational environment the language of efficiency and measurable outcomes dominates policy-making. In such circumstances it is all too easy to lose sight of the insight, excitement, energy and imagination that in our view is a key component of effective teaching and learning in history. The passion project will engage with this submerged dimension of history pedagogy and build an archive of pedagogic life-stories and other materials to reflect the passion found in university history teaching; enable richer conversations about its value; and find new ways to articulate to policy-makers the value of history education and its contribution to society, now and in the future.

Methodology

The history passion project adopts a range of methods, incorporating surveys, reviews and oral testimonies. These include:

• Email survey of UK historians.
• Filmed interviews with historians, their students and graduates.
• Sampling of student evaluation and satisfaction surveys.
• Review of literature and other contextual material.

Resources

The project will deliver practical resources for the whole history community of teachers and students including:

 

• Digital narratives from interviews with historians and with their students and graduates.
• Opportunities to discuss teaching including a webinar on core values and future-thinking.
• Bibliographic resources including literature review and other contextual material.

 

More details and opportunities to get involved will be made available on this website as the project develops,or email alan.booth@nottingham.ac.uk