FOR INSTRUCTORS

Doing Oral Histories
Introduction

  • Have you ever met a person you could listen to all day?
  • Have you ever heard about something and wished you could learn more?
  • Do you wish you had recorded the stories told by your grandparents?

The material that follows has been developed for classroom teachers, club sponsors, or individuals interested in helping others learn to collect oral histories.

   Handouts     
Note: to view "PDF" Portable Document Format files you will need Adobe Acrobat Reader.

       

What Is Oral History?

  • Oral history is a method of gathering and preserving historical information that is authentic, useful, and reliable. It is done by recording interviews with participants about people, places, or events in their lives.

  • Oral histories are the recollections, reminiscences, and memories of living people about their past as requested and recorded by an interviewer.

    • Most oral histories are primary sources recorded in the person's own words with no interpretation or analysis by another person.

    • The purpose of oral histories is to preserve primary source information about the past to be used by others. They are useful for individual research, for community and institutional projects, and for publications and media productions.

    • A good oral history contributes new information to the historical record.

     

  • Whether in oral histories or other documents, we sometimes assume that first-person testimony or primary source information is accurate, but that assumption may not be correct. Oral history is an individual's interpretation or narrative story of his or her experience of particular persons, places, or events. For example, grandpa remembers his wedding differently than does grandma. Which recollection is correct? Both are! Memory is influenced by the individual's point of view. They have different interpretations of the event. They remember different things.

    • Oral history is not the same as history. History is a search for the truth about the past. History asks, "What really happened?" The work of the historian is to study and analyze information, to judge the reliability of information, and to interpret its meaning as well as its significance from the facts available.

  • Oral folk history is an adaptation of oral history by virtue of the topic or content of the interview. Oral folk history focuses on aspects of daily life, beliefs, customs, stories, music, material culture, etc.

Frequently Asked Questions


Finding Time

1. Many of the skills involved in doing local oral histories are related to national and state standards (TEKS: Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills) and are useful for all students, so the skills teaching could be done during regular instructional time.

2. The actual interviews are most easily done after school, on weekends, or in the evening, but arrangements could be made for interviewees to come to the school with interviews done during the lunch period, study hall, or activity period.

3. Oral histories can be done as a regular class project, as an extra credit project, as part of History Day projects, or as a project of a Junior Historian chapter.


The Equipment

Check to see what tape recorders with microphones are available in the school. If inadequate, consider the following:

1. Check to see if individual students have access to tape recording equipment.

2. Check with your school's parent/teacher organization or another local organization to see if they can purchase or lend recording equipment.

3. Check with the Junior Historian chapter sponsor or treasurer to find out if sufficient funds are available to purchase recording equipment.

4. Check with local retail stores to see if they will donate equipment for use by the school.

5. Hold a small fundraising event to obtain money to purchase.

What Oral History Offers Students

  • A chance to be actively involved in the preservation of history

  • Meaningful interaction with an adult in the community and other students

  • An opportunity to develop new or refined skills in asking questions, doing research, using recording equipment

  • A better appreciation for history and its relevance today

  • A finished product that will be remembered by the student in the years ahead

  • Possible recognition at the local and state level

  • Increased knowledge about their hometown, family, or culture

  • A sense of accomplishment in actively doing a project

Connections with the TEKS (Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills)

Through oral history projects, students learn and utilize TEKS to:

  • Differentiate between, locate, and use primary and secondary sources such as interviews.

  • Analyze information by sequencing, categorizing, comparing, and summarizing.

  • Organize and interpret information.

  • Use standard grammar, spelling, sentence structure, and punctuation.

  • Transfer information from one medium to another, using computer software as appropriate.

  • Create written and oral presentations of social studies information.

  • Use a decision-making process to identify a situation that requires a decision, gather information, identify options, predict consequences, and take action to implement a decision.

  • Gain knowledge. Content will be specific to the student, but examples of learning might be:

    -explain how people earn a living

    -identify reasons people have formed communities

    -explain ethnic or cultural celebrations.

Responsibilities of the Instructor

  • Ensure necessary equipment is available.

  • Review or develop instructional materials.

  • Provide instruction as needed.

  • Facilitate the learning of the students.

  • Assist in accessing computers for transcriptions.

  • Monitor timeline to ensure deadline is met.

  • Conduct local judging to select best or most important student projects that could be submitted to a local historical archive.

  • Review student checklists to be sure all tasks and information have been completed.