International Journal Of History And Political Sciences
6
https://theusajournals.com/index.php/ijhps
VOLUME
Vol.05 Issue07 2025
PAGE NO.
6-10
10.37547/ijhps/Volume05Issue07-02
Methods of Developing Thinking Skills Based on
Independent Work in History Lessons
Elyor Alimov
Independent researcher of Karakalpak State University, Uzbekistan
Received:
11 May 2025;
Accepted:
07 June 2025;
Published:
09 July 2025
Abstract:
The article examines an important factor in teaching logical thinking through independent work in
history lessons in secondary schools, namely comparative education, linking social sciences together. It outlines
the issues of developing students' competencies in scientific awareness, which ultimately leads future history
students to independent, logical thinking, working with historical facts and using historical works of art on the
topic in this process.
Keywords:
Study assignments, independent work, integration, independent thinking, historical fact, artistic
texture, fictional information, comparison, juxtaposition, generalization, identification of the original, highlighting.
Introduction:
The
acceleration
of
societal
development, the expansion of information processes,
and the demand for adaptability define the
requirements for preparing students for life in a civil
society with a market economy. These dynamics place
high expectations on teachers. For the effective work
of both teachers and students, it is essential to adopt a
modern, competency-based approach to education.
Accordingly, the teacher grounds their practice in the
goals of this approach: teaching students to solve
problems arising in their learning activities, select
appropriate information sources, identify optimal and
innovative methods, achieve objectives, assess
outcomes, organise their own work, collaborate with
peers, and address cognitive, analytical, and axiological
challenges. In such a context, it is crucial to understand
the purpose of each task, determine its aims and
objectives, and seek ways to address them. It is well
established that students firmly assimilate only what
they have attained through their own efforts. The issue
of student independence in learning is not new;
scholars of every era have attached special importance
to it.
According to Panfilova, the competency-based
approach is tied to the idea of educating and training
students not only as specialists and professionals in
their field, but also as well-rounded individuals
—
as
members of teams and of society at large [1.37-46]. The
essence of this approach goes beyond transmitting the
knowledge, skills and practical experience needed for
professional duties: it seeks to broaden horizons, foster
interdisciplinary abilities, nurture the capacity for
individual creative solutions, promote self-directed
learning and cultivate humanistic values.
Situational tasks aim to cultivate the most universally
applicable information-handling skills, taking B.
Bloom’s taxonomy as their foundation [2]. Solving such
tasks proceeds through a sequence of stages: goal
setting, activation of prior knowledge, problem
identification, selection of tools, theoretical analysis,
practical implementation and generalisation. These
situational tasks represent a new-generation teaching
technique that integrates multiple instructional
functions.
Situational tasks are designed to develop the most
universally applicable strategies for processing
information. Many scholars identify the following core
set of cognitive operations: analysis, synthesis,
comparison, generalisation, classification, recognition,
selection,
design,
integration,
permutation,
transformation, unification, structuring, construction
and analogy. Hence, the pedagogical value of
situational tasks lies in their ability to reframe the
teacher
–
student relationship as one of equal,
International Journal Of History And Political Sciences
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https://theusajournals.com/index.php/ijhps
International Journal Of History And Political Sciences (ISSN
–
2771-2222)
reciprocal interaction. The teacher ceases to be a mere
source of correct answers and instead acts as a
facilitator who helps students master effective ways of
acquiring knowledge and taking action [3.59-62].
Clear conceptions of the role that learner autonomy
plays in mastering knowledge can be found in the
writings of K. D. Ushinskiy, M. N. Skatkin, I. Ya. Lerner,
and other scholars. The issue remains highly relevant
today, because autonomy is crucial not only for
completing secondary education but also for pursuing
further studies after school and for succeeding in one’s
subsequent professional activity. Accordingly, the
teacher’s principal task is not merely to transmit a set
amount of knowledge, but to cultivate student
s’
intrinsic interest in learning. Interest is the driving force
that prompts students to explore a topic in greater
depth and to develop their thinking skills. Such interest
grows when learners fully understand what the teacher
is explaining, when the tasks set before them are
engaging enough to stimulate creativity, and when
their independence in assimilating the material is
encouraged
—
by teaching them to draw their own
conclusions and to foresee how their knowledge might
be applied in future contexts. In an era marked by an
unprecedented expansion of information, every
individual is expected to attain a high level of
professional competence and to exhibit business-
oriented qualities such as efficient information
navigation and confident decision-making. None of
these demands can be met without the capacity for
creative work.
The aim of this study is to summarise my experience in
employing independent work in history lessons.
Fulfilling these objectives enables me to develop my
own system for organising such tasks in class and to
raise the quality of extracurricular instruction in
history, law and the sciences.
What can and should a student be able to do
independently?
First and foremost, they must be capable of acquiring
knowledge from diverse sources. Student autonomy is
manifested in the need and ability to think
independently, act in unfamiliar situations, recognise a
question or problem and devise an approach to solving
it. It is distinguished by a pronounced critical awareness
and the capacity to articu
late one’s own point of view.
Consequently, I regard the essence of independent
work as the student’s productive activity, during which
they transform information, acquire new knowledge
and skills, and resolve design- and creativity-oriented
problems.
Independent work is an integral element of the
educational
process
—
one
that
raises
lesson
effectiveness, energises students in class and fosters
the development of their cognitive activity. Taking into
account the specific nature of history as a school
subject, I emphasise the following core mental abilities
of students:
- Ability to locate historical facts and processes in time
and space: correlating an event’s date with a specific
time period; linking a date to its century or millennium;
determining the duration, sequence and synchrony of
the events and processes under study; constructing
chronological charts and synchronic tables.
- Ability to analyse historical material: break a narrative
into coherent segments; single out the main idea in a
passage; highlight the key characteristics and
interrelations of historical events, including their class
nature; examine a social phenomenon in its
development by identifying its primary causes and
consequences;
apply
generalised
knowledge
—
concepts arranged in a logical sequence
—
to analyse
and explain analogous facts; interpret new historical
evidence on the basis of the assimilated laws and
regularities of social development.
-Ability to synthesise and generalise historical material:
describe individual facts; characterise the phenomena
under study and prominent historical figures; draw
overarching conclusions from the facts examined; and
generalise the causal relationships of historical events.
- Ability to compare and contrast similar historical facts:
identify their shared and divergent features; trace the
changes that occur as a social phenomenon moves
from one stage of development to the next; and
construct comparative profiles of historical events,
processes and figures.
- Ability to derive and substantiate conclusions from a
class-based perspective, grounding them in evidence
and structuring arguments in a logically coherent
manner.
- Ability to present historical and contemporary
materials, and to produce outlines and summaries.
If factual data are mastered by students solely through
rote repetition, cognitive strategies can be internalised
only by means of independent practice
—
training in
specific operations and applying them in new contexts.
Such opportunities arise only through systematic
independent work. A systematic approach to
independent work includes the following elements:
-
Incorporating into students’ sphere of independent
cognitive activity the full range of knowledge available
on the topic
—
facts, laws, methods of inquiry, and so
forth;
- Engaging every student in the process of independent
International Journal Of History And Political Sciences
8
https://theusajournals.com/index.php/ijhps
International Journal Of History And Political Sciences (ISSN
–
2771-2222)
cognitive activity, taking into account their level of
preparedness and individual characteristics;
- Progressing step by step from simpler tasks to more
complex ones, while reinforcing their creative
dimension.
Independent work helps students consolidate
knowledge, form both academic and intellectual work
skills, develop their cognitive capacities, prepare for
self-directed effort and cultivate habits of self-
education. The fostering of autonomy unfolds gradually
over the entire period of schooling, with the share of
independent tasks rising from the lower to the upper
grades. The effectiveness of such work depends on how
it is organised and on the skilful combination of
independent activities with other instructional
methods.
From an organisational standpoint, independent work
includes:
Independent work, when used as a learning tool, must
in every specific situation correspond to a clearly
defined didactic goal and task. Research by various
scholars makes it possible to distinguish three
—
sometimes four
—
levels of autonomous activity.
In the pedagogical literature, independent work is
classified in several ways
—
by didactic purpose,
knowledge sources, and the level of students’
productive creative activity. Students’ cognitive activity
falls into two principal categories: reproductive and
creative.
The following types of independent work correspond to
these categories:
In my pedagogical practice, we apply four successive
levels of students’ productive independence during
lessons. Each level corresponds to one of the four types
of independent work.
For an individual to reach fulfilment through
education
—
and
especially
to
achieve
self-
understanding
—one must first know one’s own
history. Indeed, without historical memory there can
be no progress. From this standpoint, the country faces
a pressing need to reform its system of history
education. In recent years a range of modern methods
and techniques has been actively adopted in the
teaching of history. Scholars have synthesised
traditional approaches, classifying them into four
principal methods and identifying the specific
techniques associated with each [4.48-61].
the presence of a
clearly defined
objective for the
independent work;
the existnece of a
specific task to be
completed;
determining how the
results of the
independent work will
be assessed;
an obligation for every
student who receives
the task to complete it;
clearly specifying the
form in which the
outcome is to be
presented;
(oral, written, or
practical);
model-based
independent
work (repetition
tasks);
reconstrucrive
tasks;
creative tasks;
International Journal Of History And Political Sciences
9
https://theusajournals.com/index.php/ijhps
International Journal Of History And Political Sciences (ISSN
–
2771-2222)
At the first level, students replicate actions according to
a given model: describing a historical figure,
constructing a diagram, recognising events and
highlighting key ideas. Such tasks typically rely on
worked examples and model problems and are
practised in lower- and middle-secondary history
lessons. Because independence here is limited to
straightforward repetition of modelled actions, the
activity is not yet fully autonomous. To reinforce these
operations, I provide extensive scaffolding materials
—
varied prompts, cues and reference sheets (e.g., when
studying the Timurid period). Tasks at this level supply
the core knowledge students must acquire before
moving on to more demanding stages of independent
work.
The second level involves generalising previously
learned cognitive techniques and applying them to
more complex
—
yet still routine
—
problems. Tasks at
this stage nurture intellectual curiosity and create
conditions for advancing students’ patterns of thinking.
This level is realised through reproductive-variative
independent work. Here, students tackle modified-
context exercises that systematise and organise earlier
material, along with verification tasks that provide
immediate feedback. Such transformative repetition of
knowledge forms the foundation of reconstructive
independent work.
The third level presupposes the productive,
independent application of previously acquired
knowledge through higher-order mental operations
—
analysis, synthesis, comparison, identifying the
essential, generalisation, and inductive-deductive
reasoning. Tasks at this stage fall under the cognitive-
search (heuristic) type, and the learner’s creative
individuality begins to emerge precisely here. A
continual search for new solutions, together with the
systematisation and generalisation of accumulated
knowledge, makes students’ understanding more
flexible, deepens their interest in what they are
studying, and fosters a sustained desire for further self-
directed learning. Creative cognitive activity involves
seeking new knowledge by means that the learners
themselves select or devise; the most common format
is the solution of cognitive, problem-based tasks. In my
teaching practice I employ varied sets of such tasks
—
diagnostic and verification exercises, problem
situations, exploratory assignments, and creative
homework
—
at every instructional stage. They
encourage active intellectual engagement and
heighten interest in the study of the past. Because of
the variety of cognitive tasks, I use assessment tools
that specify criteria for each particular assignment: the
student’s ability to apply effective learning strategies
proposed in
—
or independently derived from
—
the
task; the capacity to identify what is most significant,
essential, and sufficient in historical material to justify
conclusions, formulate personal viewpoints, or
evaluate past events; the ability to operate with
relevant concepts; and the skill to construct an answer
in logical sequence and present it in an appropriate
form.
1. Logical tasks.
When responding to a question, students should:
1) decide why the most recent fact must be connected
with one of the earlier ones and formulate a precise
inductive or deductive conclusion.
2) support their answer with at least three pieces of
evidence, choosing from the following:
A) similarity of goals between the two uprisings;
B) similarity in the composition of their participants;
C) similarity of the causes that triggered them;
D) similarity in the course of events and their
outcomes;
E) similarity in the reasons for their defeat;
F) similarity in their consequences.
3) employ a task-specific comparative method and, if
appropriate, compile a comparative summary table.
4) classify the historical facts under an appropriate
category
—
e.g.,
civil war, peasant uprising, national‐
liberation movement, and so forth.
5) optionally, apply evidence-based argumentation by
presenting specific historical facts for each line of
comparison. The nature and volume of the data will
enable assessment of st
udents’ overall awareness and
the breadth of sources they have consulted.
2. Problem-based tasks.
3. Metaphorical tasks.
At this level, I assign independent “laboratory” tasks
that require students to work with a variety of sources.
The complexity of these tasks should increase in
proportion to the degree to which thinking skills are
being developed. The highest expression of students’
creative activity is reached when they can formulate a
problem themselves and devise ways to solve it.
The use of independent work facilitates the
implementation of a differentiated approach to
teaching. My professional experience leads me to the
following conclusions:
Regular use of independent work noticeably improves
the quality of students’ knowledge.
Independent tasks achieve the stated developmental
objectives.
Engaging in autonomous activity stimulates learners’
International Journal Of History And Political Sciences
10
https://theusajournals.com/index.php/ijhps
International Journal Of History And Political Sciences (ISSN
–
2771-2222)
cognitive engagement and helps them become self-
confident individuals.
In history lessons, students reach the fourth level of
thinking only by progressing through the preceding
three. Assigning a complex task while skipping a level
wastes class time, leaves the learner confused and
ultimately prevents mastery of the material. At the
fourth level, tasks require students to draw on the rich
network of concepts and relationships accumulated in
instruction and life experience and, through the power
of imagination and active reasoning, to create
something new, distinctive and
—
to a certain extent
—
individual. The more independent assignments are
incorporated into history teaching in general-education
schools, the more fully students’ logical
-thinking skills
develop.
REFERENCES
Panfilova,
T.
B.
(2016).
Samostoyatel’naya
vneauditornaya rabota kak mekhanizm formirovaniya
obshchikh kompetentsiy [Independent extracurricular
work as a mechanism for developing general
competences]. Molodoy uchyonyy, (17.1 [121.1]), 37-
46.
Bloom, B.S., (Ed.). 1956. Taxonomy of educational
objectives: The classification of educational goals:
Handbook I, cognitive domain. New York: Longman.
Kasatkina, N. S. (2017). Situatsionnaya zadacha kak
sredstvo otsenivaniya urovnya sformirovannosti
professional’nykh
kompetentsiy
budushchikh
pedagogov [The situational task as a means of assessing
prospective teachers’ professional compet
ences]. In
Education: Past, Present and Future (pp. 59-62).
Proceedings of the 3rd International Conference,
Krasnodar, Russian Federation.
Sagdiev, A., Fuzailova, G., & Khasanova, M. (2008). Tarix
o‘qitish metodikasi [Methods of Teaching History] (pp
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48-61). Tashkent State Pedagogical University Press.
