Browsing by Author "Linna, Laura"

Objectives. During the last decades and curriculums the teaching of history in elementary school has changed. Student´s ability to use historical knowledge has become more and more important. This has also influenced on the schoolbooks. The purpose of this study is to analyze the information schoolbooks from different decades give from Crusades, events that are far away from student’s everyday life. The main focus is to analyze the historical reasons and means of historical empathy given in these schoolbooks. Methods. The schoolbooks chosen to this study were Muinaisuudesta nykyaikaan (1970), Historia 6 (1993) and Aikamatka maailman historiaan (2004). The schoolbooks were chosen from different decades, because the interest was also on the change of their content. The chapters about the Crusades were analyzed on what and how they told about historical reasons behind the Crusades and how they enabled historical empathy. This study was theory bound qualitative study. Gained information was analyzed using content analysis and discourse analysis. It was also attached to the wider theory of historical consciousness. Results and conclusions. The reasons given to the Crusades varied on the schoolbooks. The oldest schoolbook gave the least amount of reasons and the reasons given were general. The discourses found on the schoolbooks were the discourse of church, the discourse of appearance and the discourse of identification and emotions. These results reflect the change in the teaching of history and its curriculum.