There was a time when anyone familiar with the formal educational process could ask a child what grade he or she was in and, from the response given, estimate a young person’s level of knowledge and identify the courses he or she was taking. “Reading, writing, and ‘rithmatic, taught to the tune of the hickory stick” described both the content and methodology of much of the formal educational process. Today’s explosion of knowledge has been accompanied by two phenomena of equal import: an expansion of ways in which we come to know and a two-way extension of the time-frame in which formal learning occurs.
Hence, college is no longer the private preserve of late adolescence. On the one hand, retirees earn college degrees and people in midlife begin the rigors of graduate studies. On the other, junior high school students, through several means, participate in college-level courses.
One program that offers youngsters advanced learning opportunities, both in a campus setting and through extension into the home, is the Duke University Talent Identification Program. “TIP,” as it is commonly called, offers not only a Summer Residential Program but also a unique year-long, By-Mail Program. It is this latter component, and more specifically the By-Mail AP American History Program, which is the focus of this article.
Using the work of The Johns Hopkins University as a prototype, Duke University’s TIP effort was initiated in May 1980, with a search throughout a sixteen-state area for talented seventh grade students. Since that time, more than 1,125 of these 12- to 16-year-old talented students have participated in one of the program’s three-week residential courses. They have enrolled in classes in American history, Arabic, biology, chemistry, computer science, French, German, Latin, literature, logic, mathematics, physics, psychology, statistics, and writing.
These students have attended classes six hours a day during the week and three hours on Saturday. The results of this Summer Residential Program have been quite remarkable. However, by fulfilling one need the program created another. Many students, after having participated in this fast-paced summer program, felt ready for classes modeled on the College Board’s Advanced Placement Program. They expressed the desire to continue study at both this pace and level.
Unfortunately, less than 15 percent of the schools in the TIP search area offer advanced placement programs. In response to this need, the TIP staff developed By-Mail Programs in biology, chemistry, grammar, Latin, literature, writing, physics, and most importantly for present purposes, American history.
To jump rapidly to the results of the AP By-Mail American History Program, two of the three students enrolled in this program during its first year received grades of five on the AP exam and the other received a four. The second year resulted in one score of five and one of three. (Three additional students chose to spread the course over a two-year period, an option built into the program. They anticipate taking the AP examination in May 1985.) This, of course, represents extremely successful performances on the part of these students.
Local history instructors with experience teaching the gifted and talented were designated to develop the By-Mail AP American History Program. It should be admitted that these instructors began their work with a mixture of enthusiasm for the project tempered by skepticism of its viability and practical outcome.
Because bright students need guidance in developing the tools necessary to put facts to work, an initial decision was made to offer this opportunity only to those students who had participated in one of the Summer Residential American history courses. Serious study of history at this level would be difficult unless the participant had been given an introduction to basic research and writing skills as well as critical reading and analytical thinking.
The official course description for the By-Mail Program in American history gives both an overall view and effective summary:
The course itself will deal with America from its English origins in 1607 until the present time. The basic approach will be chronological although special themes will be emphasized. Since the Advanced Placement examination contains both multiple choice questions and fairly lengthy essay questions, the study materials will seek to prepare the student accordingly.
For this program, each student is charged $475, an all-inclusive, one-time fee for the total package. The only additional cost is the registration fee for the AP exam itself.
The course is divided into eight monthly study sections, each covering a given chronological period and focused on a central theme. For example, the first study section is “America Discovered: The Colonial Experience, 1607- 1775”; the second covers “America Invented: Revolution to Constitution and Beyond, 1775-1820”; and so on through study section eight, “Pax Americana: From the Atomic Bomb to Camelot, 1945-1960” and “America Re-Examined: From Camelot to the Present, 1960-1983.”
The assignment for each month lists the resources to be used and the basic concepts to be covered. The resources include a taped lecture for each section, books and worksheets. Through all of these resources the goal is not only to convey content but also to strengthen skills. For example, students should be able to sharpen notetaking skills as they work with taped lectures. Likewise, they should correlate information contained in these lectures with their own readings and make their personal and individual summaries.
Students are alerted to the fact that history books reflect their authors’ biases and viewpoints, and they are asked to identify and evaluate these as they are discovered.
Three basic books with different emphases and varying viewpoints are used. Specific portions of Howard Zinn’s A People’s History of the United States, Allan Nevins’ and Henry S. Commager’s A Pocket History of the United States and John Garraty’s The American Nation are assigned monthly along with supplementary readings and accompanying activities. Here again, there is dual emphasis on both content and methodology. Students are expected not only to collect and organize factual data but also to evaluate it. In the Zinn assignments, for example, students are asked to state in a sentence the thesis of the chapter, list facts that Zinn uses to support the thesis, write their own opinion of the thesis, and state reasons for agreeing or disagreeing with Zinn’s often controversial positions. Students are alerted to the fact that history books reflect their authors’ biases and viewpoints, and they are asked to identify and evaluate these as they are discovered.
The Nevins and Commager assignments center around questions that require students to arrange factual data in meaningful sequences and to compare and contrast various causes and effects. In some instances a brief essay may be called for (e.g., “Why did the South move to the position that slavery was not only a necessary evil but also a positive good?”), in others a listing or cataloging of events may be required (e.g., “List in chronological order the major events that led to the split between the North and the South.”).
Though history has, fortunately, largely escaped from the onus of being merely a collection of facts, a knowledge of basic facts is necessary in order to understand and appreciate trends and movements. Short answer identification questions based on readings in Garraty are a part of each assignment. A conscious effort is made never to ask for a fact for its own sake. Identification questions are placed in a context and chosen on the basis of their significance for understanding American history. When dealing with these questions, students are asked to prepare the answer as though it were the lead paragraph in a news story—WHO? WHAT? WHEN? WHERE? HOW? and WHY?.
Since each Advanced Placement examination requires a document-based essay, students in the By-Mail course are sent a sample document-based question from a past AP exam and asked to answer it as per the stated directions.
In addition to the assignments listed above, students are asked to keep and periodically update a timeline, a war summary chart and a presidential chart. These three items serve the purpose of helping students organize material in such a way as to make it more readily understandable, and these items also give them ready access to necessary material for purposes of quick review. As a means of checking-up on students’ progress and to ensure that progress does occur, about every three weeks students are sent a test covering the material dealt with and reflecting the kind of questions they may expect on the AP exam itself. These tests, along with all of the assignments, are examined carefully by the instructors and returned to the students with appropriate comments.
. . . the weak aspect of such a program seems to lie in the fact that students enrolled in the course feel a certain sense of isolation.
The pay-off point in terms of preparation for the AP exam comes with the review, which begins in late March. A review tape was prepared highlighting essential elements of the course. Likewise, a review sheet is sent to the students, which divides American history into categories and is quite extensive. The categories used include parties, people, wars, rebellions, revolts, treaties, scandals, documents, presidents and elections, amendments, foreign policy, Acts of Congress, literature and the arts, Supreme Court cases, and, just to make sure that nothing is overlooked, an “anything goes” category. These review materials have proven to be invaluable aids to the students.
As indicated earlier, the instructors of this By-Mail course were extremely pleased and not a little surprised by the results the students achieved on the AP test; the grades of five and four were gratifying to say the least. In an effort to evaluate the program’s successes and weaknesses a survey form was mailed to the five students. Their responses showed some shared opinions as well as some interesting variations.
On balance, each of the students spent the equivalent of an hour a day on the course; as one wrote, this time was “usually condensed, I’m sorry to say, into a marathon weekend.” Garraty’s text was cited by the students as most helpful in preparing for the AP examination, but two students went on to say that Zinn’s book was their favorite. Again, the students made a distinction between assignments they found most valuable for the AP test and those they found to be most interesting. They all felt that identification assignments were especially valuable. As one student wrote, “Once I know the major people and events in a time period I have no trouble writing an essay with these facts.” This sort of statement lends credence to the efficacy of the techniques taught during the TIP Summer Program. Once a student has learned the appropriate method for writing an essay on a historical topic, then all the student needs are the germane facts, concepts and themes. Another said, “The identifications were essential. Having to write very clearly and concisely what you have just read is a terrific way to learn something clearly.” Students found thesis identification to be the most interesting assignment but did not feel that it was of great value for the AP exam.
The instructors of the course asked the students whether they found any of the assignments to be unnecessary. Al though none of the assignments were so judged, one student admitted that she sometimes found them tedious. The taped lectures, especially the review tape, were found to be extremely valuable in preparing for the AP exam, and all students reported taking notes on the lectures.
In reflecting upon the total experience, the weak aspect of such a program seems to lie in the fact that students enrolled in the course feel a certain sense of isolation. Though they were encouraged to communicate with the instructors concerning questions arising out of the substance of the course, and certainly they did this, none communicated in more than a most casual way with any students or teachers in their own community who were involved in AP history. As one student wrote, “I wish I had discussed things with the AP teacher or even sat in on a few classes—reading is interesting but not a substitute for discussion.”
In evaluating this problem it seems as though there are three possible solutions which, taken either individually or simultaneously, could help alleviate this sense of isolation. First, some effort could be made, where possible, to link the student with an existing AP American history class. The practical problem lies in the fact that most participants in this program are junior high students, and a senior high school where AP courses are taught may not always be accessible. Second, two or more students in the same school could be enrolled in the summer course and the follow-up By-Mail course. Undoubtedly, they would meet informally to discuss the course and could probably arrange to meet on a scheduled basis to share ideas and discuss questions arising from their study. Finally, perhaps some sort of round-robin letter could occasionally be circulated among the students; this might give them a sense of sharing and allow them to ask each other questions. The TIP staff and instructors are cur rently exploring these and other ideas.
In conclusion, the By-Mail AP American History program has passed beyond the experimental stage and has evolved to a life of its own. It will, of course, constantly be revised and reevaluated. Above all, it provides an example of, and an opportunity for, education in a nonconventional setting.
Virginia S. Wiison is Head of the Department of Humanities at the North Carolina School of Science and Mathematics and a history Instructor in the TIP Program at Duke University. James A. Litle is an Instructor of history/social sciences at the North Carolina School of Science and Mathematics and a history Instructor in the TIP Program. Gerald L. Wilson is Assistant Dean of Trinity College, Duke University, Adjunct Instructor at the North Carolina School of Science and Mathematics and a lecturer in the TIP program. Robert N. Sawyer is Associate Professor and Director of the Talent Identification Program, Duke University. The authors are indebted to The Mary Reynolds Babcock Foundation for providing the funds for the development and revision of the By-Mail American History course.
