Abstract Visual Notations as an Aid for Historical Problem Solving

Abstract

Historical problem-solving normally involves textual answers with students using various pnmary and secondary sources to solve historical problems. This study used abstract visual notations on the lines of unified modeling language (UML) to aid the visualisation of historical events and concepts and thus recreate the "explanation space" diagrammatically. These diagrams are then translated into text to create richer explanations. The feedback from participants guided the development of a software called the History-Maker, which addressed the difficulties faced by the pencil-paper approach.