Opening Up the Textbook (OUT) for Online Learning

Why OUTs? 

Many students believe that “if it’s in the textbook, it must be right.” Our Opening Up the Textbook (OUT) lessons offer teachers and students more opportunities to break away from textbook-driven history classes and provide students with additional source material to contest, complicate, expand, or vivify the textbook narrative. For more information about OUTs, watch this video or read this article.  

One example of an OUT is our Inca Empire lesson. Here’s an idea for how to structure and teach it to distance learners:

1. Our teacher materials include lecture notes, and our PowerPoint includes corresponding images. Teachers can pre-record a video of the mini-lecture to provide students background information on the subject. 
    
2. After students watch the prerecorded mini-lecture, have them read Document A, an excerpt from a 2018 history textbook. 
   • Poll the class: Based only on the textbook account, how did the Inca expand their empire? 
     • A) Use of force, B) Ways other than force.
        
3. Check for student understanding. The textbook mentions Inca force and coercion repeatedly and makes no mention of Inca strategies to attract or co-opt subjects (strategies of soft power).
    
4. Explain to students that we shouldn’t just take the textbook’s word for it and that we need to investigate the historical record. Does it corroborate the textbook account or tell another story?
    
5. Have students read Document B and complete the corresponding guiding questions. They should identify the document attributes Inca expansion to use of force but must also contend with the source and context of the document. Pedro Sarmiento de Gamboa, a Spanish captain, argued that Spain was the rightful ruler of the Andes. Might that have influenced his account?
    
6. What did others say about Inca expansion? Document C, Felipe Guaman Poma de Ayala’s book, has illustrations of festivals the Inca held for laborers. The Inca writer describes the popularity and competence of Inca leaders in addition to mentioning Inca conquest. What might account for this different portrayal of Inca expansion? Again, students must consider source and context with scaffolded questions. Ayala’s perspective and motives were very different from Gamboa. Ayala wanted to convince Spain to make reforms in Peru for the benefit of Native Peruvians. 
    
7. Students read one more document and answer guiding questions. Garcilaso de la Vega, the son of an Inca noble and Spanish conquistador, says Inca technological innovation was key to the expansion of their empire. His stated motivation? Correcting Spaniards’ misconceptions of Peru and love for his homeland.
    
8. The textbook account and the three historical documents each provide a very different view of Inca expansion. After reading all, ask students to corroborate the accounts and write a new history textbook passage on the topic, using evidence from at least two of the historical docs. 
    
9. Have students read a few of their classmates’ textbook accounts and provide feedback. Send another poll: Based on the historical documents, how did the Inca expand their empire?
    
10. Conclude lesson with a written assignment reflecting on the textbook or with a virtual discussion.

Download the Inca Empire lesson for free and review a list of all our Opening Up the Textbook lessons.