Teaching Historical Contextualization: The Construction of a Reliable Observation Instrument

Since the 1970s, many observation instruments have been constructed to map teachers’ general pedagogic competencies. However, few of these instruments focus on teachers’ subject-specific competencies. This study presents the development of the Framework for Analyzing the Teaching of Historical Contextualization (FAT-HC). This high-inference observation instrument focuses on history teachers’ competency in promoting historical contextualization in classrooms. The results of the study demonstrate the instrument’s content validity. Generalizability studies were conducted to further assess the instrument’s dimensionality and reliability by decomposing the instrument’s variance. A large proportion of the variance was explained by differences between observed teachers, and a small proportion of the variance was explained by lessons and observers, demonstrating the instrument’s reliability. Furthermore, a decision study was conducted to determine the optimal number of observers and lessons needed for a reliable scoring design. The developed instrument could be used to gain greater insight into history teachers’ subject-specific competencies and to focus teacher professionalization on teachers’ specific needs