History Education in Pre-School History/Social Studies Curricula: Example of U.S.

Abstract

the main principles of history teaching in pre-school education curricula in U.S. and thus to inspire similar studies in Turkey. For this purpose, states of California, Massachusetts, and North Carolina's history-social studies curricula have been selected through the convenience sampling. One of the qualitative research methods, document analysis was used in this study. Descriptive analysis technique is used for data analyzing. Data analysis shows that history teaching approach in preschool period is constructed mainly based on civics. It is also find out that with reference to the national and religious holidays, through child’s plays, poems, stories in national and global history literature, biographies, tales, flags and icons that symbols of the country, it is aimed to acquiring of the concepts and facts that time, past and change. The aim that improving historical thinking skills and historical consciousness in preschool education is another finding revealed in this study.