As the nation has evolved and industrialized, the need for a social studies education remains critical. The original design of promoting civic competence is still foundational; however, this multidisciplinary field interweaves history, political science, economics, and geography to create a unique platform for integrated study.

The discipline takes a more holistic view today than ever before as social studies today concerns itself with academic rigor, data collection, analysis of facts, the collaboration of thought, and strong decision-making and problem-solving skills in addition to its historical goals. However, to keep students engaged in social studies as a discipline, maintaining traditional pedagogical survey approaches may not be the best option.

The emergence of the inquiry method has been significant in the ever-evolving understanding of ‘social studies’ because human inquiries, general arguments, holistic assumptions, and individual points of view are at the heart of what makes social studies a profound and rewarding scholarship.

Simply regurgitating facts is not studying social studies; it is memorizing facts which will soon be forgotten. This type of study is akin to the “attic” philosophy, which postulates that memorization is like storing information in one’s brain in the same way one may store furniture in an attic. Indeed, this may not be the best approach when seeking to create a historical thinking framework.

However, when students learn through the lens of various inquiries, such as visual inquiry, critical inquiry, and moral inquiry, historical thinking becomes more relevant, more applicable, and converts to process rather than function. 

Inquiry leads students through discussion. Teachers don’t act as an authority on the topic but allow the relevant questions to become opportunities for students and teachers to do history themselves, to encounter the past in all its messy, uncertain, and elusive wonder.

Although it is realistic to assume that all students won’t become historians and that all students will not necessarily reach the level of trained historical thinking with which professional historians work their craft, students need to find ways to execute the basic steps of inquiry which develop a historical mindedness.

Specifically, by learning cognitive habits, such as questioning, connecting, sourcing, making inferences, considering alternate perspectives, and recognizing limits to personal knowledge, students create habits students to carry with them not only to other classes but into the workplace.