Using Digital Public History for future teacher training. Opportunities, challenges, implications for practices

Abstract

The experiences of Public History can be developed profitably at all school levels through different methods and types of involvement of students and population. When dealing with teaching training, we have to do with pre-service teacher training referring to the university context as well as with in-service teacher training which relates to a longer period. Providing some tools for a critical understanding of the school, Public History can guide teachers’ choices and be useful for modifying and improving professional activities. This approach, which often moves from a piece of video (but also from historical photographs or other documents), revolves around historical bifurcation points which deserve to be analysed through What if... ? questions. It is the question we reflect on to deepen the historical dynamics, but also the contemporary ones resulting precisely from those crucial transitions.