Developing historical thinking skills in learning history through teaching and learning methods

This article attempts to discuss historical thinking skills of high school students. To investigate the matter, the present study focuses on the impact of conventional learning methods commonly used by history teachers; more specifically, it is concerned with the effects of lecturing method, discussion method, assignment method, and question and answer method on historical thinking skills. Senior high school students across Bandung were chosen randomly as the participants of this study. The method used was an analytical survey with a quantitative approach through linear regression techniques for analyzing the influence of the independent variables on the dependent variable. The findings show that lecturing, discussion, assignment, and question and answer methods had influence on historical thinking skills with a total score of 38.5%, while the rest was influenced by other factors not discussed in this study. Teachers might use appropriate learning methods to improve students' historical thinking skills and explore the knowledge in interpreting history.