Four design principles for student learning of substantive historical concepts – a realistic review study

Substantive historical concepts are an essential part of the history curriculum. In contrast to the use of meta-historical concepts, this aspect of historical thinking has received relatively little attention from educational scholars in recent years. This article draws on theory from cognitive developmental psychology, and seeks to apply this in the field of history didactics. In order to foster authoritative judgement in its application in history education, research evidence is synthesised. A realistic review methodology was used to conduct this synthesis. Four context-mechanism-outcome configurations were identified: (1) when working memory is overloaded, effective learning is impossible; (2) to acquire knowledge sustainably, it must be stored as a schema in long-term memory; (3) knowledge is learned more effectively when it builds on previously acquired knowledge; and (4) knowledge will gradually become more easily accessible for working memory. These context-mechanism-outcome configurations stimulate insight into, and long-term memory of, substantive historical concepts. Didactic design principles for teaching substantive historical concepts are proposed, and implications for history education are illustrated and discussed.