Abstract
The “doing history” lessons as an alternative to the knowledge-centered approach often mean the lessons modeled on the disciplinary approach of history. In this paper, we show the difference in the phase of “doing history” and consider the difficulties of unifying this approach into the disciplinary approach of history through discussion on the methodology in History by Minoru Hokari and analysis of history education theory by L. Levstik & K. Barton. Both Hokari and Levstik & Barton appreciate the diverse historical practices in society. They discuss them in relation to the realization of ideal societies such as pluralistic societies and participatory democracy. They imply the difficulties to the unification of the disciplinary approach as follows: (1) it excludes the voices of people who are not considered as academic, which may go against the realization of the ideal societies. (2)it also makes history lessons difficult to satisfy the reason to learn history for children.
