We’ve been working with several school districts that have recently decided to use the 4QM curriculum, and it’s been truly gratifying to hear administrative decision-makers describe why they’ve made that choice. Several different people have told us that 4QM is the first thing they’ve seen (in years or decades of looking!) that actually provides a comprehensive disciplinary framework for teaching history and social studies. The 4QM curriculum isn’t just a collection of materials and activities, and it’s not re-purposed ELA. It’s a complete intellectual schema designed and built for our field from the ground up. 

Our Field is Fragmented

There’s lots of social studies curriculum and professional development available, and we think that none of it reflects a truly comprehensive understanding of our field. This state of affairs reflects an argument about what social studies education should be that dates back over one hundred years.

Before the 20th century American school children learned “history,” not “social studies.” In the early 20th century progressive reformers called for the integration of other social sciences (political science, sociology, anthropology, and so on) into a new subject area called “social studies.” We’ve been fighting over what kids should learn about the past and human societies ever since. Should we prioritize teaching core narratives about the past, as a way of transmitting a common culture? Or should we prioritize teaching social sciences, as a way of practicing inquiry into human societies? (Check out Ronald Evans’ The Social Studies Wars for a deep dive on this history.)

The battle scars are visible in the fragmentation of social studies materials on offer today. State standards identify different “strands” (civics, geography, economics) in their social studies frameworks, and then labor to include all of them each year. Competing curricula represent different visions. Often you can tell which one by their titles: “Core Knowledge History and Geography” takes one approach. “Inquiry Journeys” takes another. Nobody seems to have a way to integrate both approaches. Until now.

4QM Unifies the Field

The Four Question Method is a comprehensive peace settlement in the social studies wars. It starts with history, and introduces kids to the basic premises of social science. And it does so with a framework that is both recognizable to scholars and experts in our fields, and accessible to teachers and students. Gary likes to describe the Four Question Method by referencing Oliver Wendell Holmes, calling it “the simplicity on the other side of complexity.”

Here’s how it works. Students start by asking and answering Question One, “What Happened?” The answers to Question One are historical narratives. You can’t think deeply about a subject you don’t know much about. That’s why our main slogan is “Story First!” We believe that all social studies is downstream from history. 

Question Two interrogates some of the interesting people who drove those historical stories forward, asking “What Were They Thinking?” Here we slow down and try to understand the way people in different times and places understood themselves and their worlds. We answer this question by interpreting primary sources and artifacts so we can get into the heads of the people we’re studying. We go well beyond memorizing the story, and dig in on the purposes and assumptions of the people in the stories.

Question Three introduces students to the tools of social science. It asks, “Why Then and There?” Here students study underlying contexts and conditions to explain why things happen in one time, not earlier or later, or in some places not others. This is the work of political scientists, sociologists, and other social scientists. We believe in “social studies,” but not as a series of discrete disciplines added onto and disrupting a coherent curriculum. Question Three integrates social science into the study of history in a compelling and coherent way. 

Question Four asks, “What Do We Think About That?” Here students make judgments about the stories and people they’ve learned about. Who is admirable? Who is shameful? Why do we think so? We don’t phrase the question with a “We” because we expect everyone to agree. Far from it! But we want students to practice talking through important issues with fellow citizens, with a goal towards understanding each other, even (or especially) when they disagree. Without labelling it as a separate curriculum strand, Question Four teaches civics for democratic citizens.

Accessible and Rigorous

Our Four Questions are easily accessible; young children can understand them. And at the same time they’re academically rigorous; answering them responsibly is deeply challenging on any grade level. 4QM students learn historical content, and they learn how scholars think about the questions that content raises. They get repeated practice with the four questions that define our fields. Should students learn core narratives about the past? Yes. Should they learn and practice the tools of social science inquiry into human societies? Yes. The Four Question Method is a powerful tool for doing both.

We think this is one reason why the administrators we’ve been talking with are so happy with our curriculum. The Four Question Method starts with a simple yet profound understanding of what we want kids to know and be able to do in social studies, and provides simple yet powerful ways of getting them there, one question at a time. 

J.B.