Writing Resources

Lesson Plan: Turning Historical Descriptions into Causal Claims

Politics 

Objective

To help students make understand the relationship between narrative description of specific episodes and general claims about recurrent political processes, in both their thinking and their writing 

Total estimated time

60 min.

Work Completed Before Class

Students will have read various works which explain political or social change in one setting, usually involving one particular historical event.  

In Class

In class, the instructor distributes several single paragraphs, each a narrative description of the similar events, drawn verbatim from different works of social science or history.  

1. For each of the narratives, ask students to precisely state the author’s argument in one clear sentence.  In doing so, distinguish between what can be relatively similar explanations.  Avoid using terms and concepts that belie your knowledge of the eventual historical outcome - or results - of the instance or case at hand.  (see attachment) (15 min)
2. Then restate this explanation as a proposition which relates two conceptual variables through a systematic and probabilistic relationship that could be used in studying a larger number of cases to understand why and how social movements begin.  Use general concepts rather than place names or proper names.  (15 min)
3. Have a conversation about the importance of using historical evidence to make a causal claim in the Social Sciences.  (15 min)
4. Ask students to discuss the potential political implications of their description of the event and its causes. (15 min)
5. If there is any extra time have a discussion about determining causation in historical writing.  Discuss techniques for effective and succinct causal claims.

 

Developed at Brandeis University through a grant from the Davis Educational Foundation