Knowledge, Skill, Motivation, and Community
University Teachers’ Views on Expertise in History and its Development in the Early Stages of University Studies
Abstract
This article will analyse how university teachers characterise expertise in history and how they support its development for first-year history students. Our data consists of ten semi-structured interviews with 15 responsible teachers of introductory courses to historical research at seven Finnish universities. Pedagogical and psychological scholarship on expertise suggests that key dimensions of expertise include theoretical and conceptual knowledge, practical knowledge, self-reflection skills, sociocultural knowledge, and motivation. A body of literature has specifically focused on historical thinking and expertise in history. The views of our informants align with previous scholarship on expertise in history. The informants also address all dimensions of expertise in their teaching, although to varying extents. Based on both previous research and the interviews, an epistemic understanding of ‘what history is’ is at the core of historical expertise. However, our data suggests that the development of theoretical and conceptual knowledge may not be the primary focus at the early stage of university studies. Instead, the practical, sociocultural, self-reflective, and motivational dimensions may be more crucial as they lay the foundation for the long process of developing a professional historian’s epistemic understanding and methodological skills.
Keywords: history; university teaching; introductory course; dimensions of expertise; expertise in history; historical thinking
