Farnworth begins by stating that we are an information based society and that students must learn to process information if they are to succeed in today’s society. Computers play an important role in this processing, such that finding a job without having computer skills is difficult. Farnworth believes there is a natural link between history and computers because they are both information based so history teachers should exploit this link. Word processing, spreadsheets, charting and data processing can all play a role in doing history with computers. Statistical information can be placed in bar charts, such as the voting of elections. Bar charts can be transferred to word processing programs and the statistics analyzed there. Database programs can be used to organize events either chronologically or thematically (Both Robert H. Brady and Neil Postman discuss the philosophical assumptions behind doing history in this manner.). Word processing programs can be used to prepare research essays. These include such things as spell checkers and grammar checkers. All this can be put together in a desktop publishing program. Farnworth discusses a program offered by AT&T called Learning Network Around the World which connects students and teachers around the world. Each classroom assembles a completed project at the end of the sessions and exchanges it with the other classrooms. These are assembled into a final publication before the session ends.

I have a couple of comments to make on this article. First of all, it is somewhat dated, since it was published in 1992 and technology has improved greatly in the intervening years so more is possible now than was at the time the article was published. Secondly, Farnworth sees a need to teach certain computer skills in the classroom that many students nowadays learn outside the classroom, although not all do. I think that a History/Social Studies course could become somewhat sidetracked if it got too involved in teaching how to use computers. Schools need to be set up in such a way that the basic skills can be taught separately so that the use of computers for learning history is for precisely that. My final comment is that my own field of History is not as open to all the programs mentioned as some types of History are. My main interest is intellectual History. Bar charts and statistics do not easily lend themselves to this sort of History. Bar charts and statistics are much more amenable to economic or social History or even military History. However, I do like the idea of connecting students around the world. It adds a new dimension to learning that is particularly of interest to the student of Social Studies.