This panel is a workshop led by the H/21 Project (History for the Twenty-First Century), a collaborative project of the World History Association. The presenters will discuss the project goals and open-access resources available to world history instructors, and then lead an interactive workshop to demonstrate practical examples of course materials that college and university instructors have successfully implemented in introductory world history courses. Audience members will have the opportunity to practice using H/21 learning materials and consider various ways in which they might implement these lessons in their classes. This panel will also showcase evidence of successful outcomes of these lessons, based on surveys and studies conducted by the H/21 team.

The H/21 Project (History for the Twenty-First Century) is a collaborative project of the World History Association, which seeks to rethink world history curricula by designing inquiry-based and student-centered lessons on critical topics in world history. The goal of this project is to support college and university faculty by offering open-access instructional materials, which include curated lessons with primary sources, instructor guides, and classroom activities. On this panel, three H/21 authors will discuss their new modules, based on their original research. Eric Nelson’s presentation explores the relationship between “Big History” and local history, challenging students to draw connections between their lives and large-scale developments in cosmic and human history. Wendy Urban-Mead will present a lesson about Africans and the African diaspora in World War I, centering the experiences of African colonial subjects in French West Senegal and German and British East Africa. Brenna Miller’s presentation will address teaching the history of the construction of large-scale dams in the twentieth century, through case studies of post-World War II damming projects in Egypt, Ghana, and India. All of these papers offer a discussion of interactive, student-centered pedagogical strategies, highlighting the use primary sources in the classroom, critical thinking, and historical empathy.