Strategies to Teach About Africa in K-8 Social Studies 

[s]ensationalized coverage by the popular media likely informs students about HIV/AIDS in Africa. Rather than dismiss these articles or concerns as unacademic, it is important to ask the class to reflect on the indiscriminate use of shocking statistics and stereotypes about African sexual behavior.... Popular media coverage can promote a fear of contagion spread by foreigners and create an us-versus-them equation that keeps the disease at a safe distance from our daily lives. This fear reinforces stereotypes about Africa as a chronically diseased place and obscures the historical link between local and global economies and the high prevalence of infectious diseases in Africa. (p. 90) [paragraph 11]

The same sensationalist approach is evident in the way the Rwanda genocide of 1994 has been presented in mainstream America. Newbury (1998) notes that “[f]ocusing on the drama [of the genocide], reporting in the west often served to strengthen stereotypes of African tribalism and barbarism; it thus served to obscure rather than enhance understanding of these events” (p. 74). Teachers who wish to focus on HIV/AIDS or other forms of “crises” such as civil wars, genocide, famine, and illiteracy in African countries must do so with an awareness of the stereotypes that can result when students are over-exposed to problems and underexposed to historical specificity and dynamism of these problems, the human agency in confronting these problems, and the global interconnectedness in the persistence of the problems. [paragraph 12]

Teaching About Africa to Cultivate Interest and Curiosity About the Continent and Its Peoples

Elementary students love hearing stories about people’s experiences. Usually these stories are not contained in most teaching materials. One way that successful teachers make information come alive in their classrooms is to invite adults from the community who have lived in Africa to speak about specific topics in specific countries (i.e. politicians, journalists, activists, doctors, farmers, bankers, teachers, and writers). They are careful to choose guest speakers who complement the teaching of a particular concept, topic or country that is already being taught in the classroom. One way to cultivate interest and curiosity in students is to use the Know/ Want-to-know/ Have-Learned (KWL) approach.3 The teacher guides students in an exploration of what they know about the topic or country before the invited guest arrives. They also draw a list of things they want to know about the topic or country. After the presentation, students can discuss and record what they have learned and what else they are curious to know about the focus country or topic. The teacher could follow up with having students conduct library research on topics/issues of interest to them. In using this strategy one needs to be careful to move away from overemphasizing the “tourist” approach with its narrow focus on the “three F” mentality: food, festivals, and fairs.4  When the focus is on the strange and exotic, stereotypes and misconceptions that students may have are reinforced. [paragraph 13]

Another way to cultivate in students a healthy curiosity is to establish pen pals and other forms of communication with students in same or similar grades in African countries. Numerous websites such as <http://www.iearn.org/about/index.html> and <http://www.ptpi.org/programs/pen_pals.jsp> exist where electronic communications between students is possible. Teachers find that not only is receiving a letter from another country fun and exciting for children, but it also lessens the emotional and psychological distance between African nations and the United States. By communicating with African peers, American students can learn directly about other people’s daily lives in other places.  They will notice similarities and differences and hopefully this direct contact will dispel what inaccurate perceptions American students have about Africa, humanizing people who would otherwise remain remote and unknown. [paragraph 14]

In addition to facilitating contact between African and American students by mail, teachers can also create direct communication between African and American students who attend the same school in the United States.  Teachers at Valley elementary have implemented this strategy.  During their 10-day “Africa is Not a Country” program, teachers took pictures of all the African students in the school and hung them in a visible space. They helped students work on a narrative about themselves that accompanied the pictures. In doing so, these teachers drew the student body’s attention to their peers’ unique heritage, piquing other learners’ curiosity about their countries of origin in Africa. Highlighting African students’ cultures and experiences is likely to raise the student body’s interest in and knowledge of Africa. It also is a powerful way of validating African students in the school who might otherwise be marginalized. [paragraph 15]

Teaching About Africa to Develop Essential Knowledge in Students

The way the social studies curriculum is organized in many schools reflects fragmentation based on geographical regions or academic disciplines. Africa is often taught as a discrete unit totally unconnected to other knowledge that students are learning.  Beane (1995), a staunch supporter of curriculum integration, explains the rationale behind curriculum integration:

Curriculum integration is not simply an organizational device requiring cosmetic changes or realignments in lesson plans across various subject areas. Rather, it is a way of thinking about what schools are for, about the sources of curriculum, and about the uses of knowledge. Curriculum integration begins with the idea that the sources of curriculum ought to be problems, issues, and concerns posed by life itself...such concerns fall into two spheres: 1) self- or personal concerns and 2) issues and problems posed by the larger world. Taking this one step further, we might say that the central focus of curriculum integration is the search for self- and social meaning. (p. 116) [paragraph 16]

Building on the need for curriculum to be organized in a way that teaches essential knowledge to students, Wiggins & McTighe (1998) urge teachers to focus on “big ideas.” They posit that  “[w]ithout a focus on linchpin ideas that have lasting value, students may be left with easily forgotten fragments of knowledge” (p. 11). Presenting fragmented knowledge about Africa is more likely to reinforce stereotypes. It also fails to cultivate interest and curiosity in students. Instead of presenting fragmented information about Africa that is disconnected from everything else that students are learning in social studies, teachers using the integrated curriculum design model would focus on the cultivation of in-depth knowledge in a connected way that transforms students’ thinking about, and engagement with, Africa. [paragraph 17]

Newspapers are a powerful way to gather current information on issues facing various parts of Africa. A number of websites including <http://www.africaonline.com> provide access to online newspapers from African countries. One teacher at Valley elementary posts selected pages of newspapers from countries in Africa on a bulletin board outside her classroom. She constantly leads her students in the analysis of the content depending on the issue she is teaching in the classroom. Newspapers, when read critically, offer a way for students to understand concepts such as democracy, racism, immigration, human rights, hunger, war, environmental degradation, urbanization, and peace in a more integrated and globally-connected way. An analysis of newspaper clips covering elections in Kenya, for instance, could be used to teach the concept of democracy, its challenges, and promises for young nations. The conceptions and practice of democracy in Kenya could be compared to the American experience. For instance, teachers could explore the allegation of election fraud in both countries and how this might affect the process of democracy. Excerpts from South African newspapers about Mandela’s post-apartheid government could be used to discuss intricacies of forming new democracies against the backdrop of the racist apartheid system, and how the South African situation is similar or/and different as well as interconnected to America’s. Newspaper clips from Zimbabwe on the government stand on white settlers and land ownership could be related to a discussion about race and racism and the Native American experience in the United States. Newspaper reports on human rights violations, domestic abuse, and hunger in any African country could lead into an exploration of the nature of similar concerns in the United States and at the global level. [paragraph 18]

Oral history projects are useful vehicles for students to see into the lives of people in their neighborhood and how they are affected by some of these global issues. Students can interview individuals who they know or who live in their community about events that center on any number of global issues. Additionally, students can read biographies and autobiographies or watch film documentaries of individuals in African countries on how they have been affected by war, hunger, racism, colonialism, disease, and urbanization among other global concerns. Students can also adopt an issue in a particular country in Africa and develop a project designed to raise awareness about the issue and to foster a sense of connectedness to those affected by it. This more “empathetic” approach to understanding issues facing African countries offers an opportunity for students to engage in meaningful learning that is more likely to lead to mature understandings. Empathy is understood here in a Freirean way to mean a disciplined effort to understand other people’s experiences in a way that leads to knowledge of oneself and the world around them. [paragraph 19]

Some Concluding Remarks

It is important that students in U. S. social studies classrooms learn about Africa for many reasons, some of which are addressed in this article. It is equally important that teachers reflect on why, what, and how they teach about Africa to their students. While existing social studies standards may act as pointers with regard to when to include information about Africa in the curriculum, it is the teacher who ultimately determines what and how knowledge about Africa is taught each day in the classroom. The teaching and learning about African peoples, countries, and issues in America’s social studies classrooms would be enhanced if at least two basic beliefs are widely shared by teachers. The first belief is that the major goal of teaching about Africa in the first place is to instill in students some knowledge about Africa that transforms their thinking about the continent and its peoples. Teachers who believe in efficacy of teaching about Africa in ways that offer a balanced and nuanced knowledge about the continent are more likely to use strategies that challenge the hegemonic grip that continues to characterize the intellectual production of the non-American Other. Denigrating the Other, a strategy that has historically been used successfully in the colonial master-subject relationship to sustain power hierarchies, works only if stereotypes about the Other are allowed to thrive. Breaking these power structures requires teachers to spend more time focusing on confronting myths and stereotypes and teaching their students to avoid faulty and unproductive generalizations about Africa. Such teachers understand that using simplistic information that perpetuates stereotypes is a great disservice to their students. [paragraph 20]

A second belief that needs to be shared among teachers who teach about Africa is that the knowledge students acquire in the process of learning about Africa endures beyond the classroom. In other words, it is transformative knowledge that has what Wiggins & McTighe (1998) call “lasting value.” Teachers who approach the teaching of Africa with this understanding seize and build on the curiosity and intellectual capacity of their students to engage them in an in-depth analysis of issues in Africa using a variety of engaging strategies. The primary concern for such teachers is to develop a wider knowledge base that their students will need to effectively understand and function in their local and global contexts. I believe that a reflective approach to the teaching about Africa in U. S. social studies classrooms can impact students’ knowledge about Africa in significant ways. [paragraph 21]