The Education Oversight Committee might make changes to the state’s end-of-course history exam today.

Students who took a preview test of the exam last year did not do well. As a result, the committee will vote whether to:

• Continue the test — as is — in 2006-07 and look for improvements

• Survey U.S. history teachers in the state to make sure they understand how to teach the social studies standards

High school students who are finishing their U.S. history classes this semester were required to take the test for the first time last week.

The test will not factor into students’ grades this year. But, starting next year, the multiple-choice test will count for 20 percent of a student’s final history grade.

Teachers will use the results to make sure students are mastering course work on U.S. history and the Constitution. The results will let districts know whether they are on par with state standards.

The larger goal is to create better-informed students who grow up to become better-informed voters and citizens.

“It’s an understanding of the past (that makes for) a good present and future,” said Leslie Skinner, a social studies specialist with the state Education Department. “Without historical context, students struggle to understand current events.”

Educators say the untimed, 55-question test gauges students’ mastery of U.S. history by asking questions that require them to do more than recall facts.

The test does not focus on dates. Instead, it requires students to use higher-order thinking skills, or analysis and reasoning, to answer correctly.

“History is taught chronologically,” Skinner said. “Our test is therefore chronological. That’s our kindness to students.”

To prepare, Richland 1 Middle College teacher JacQuie Parmlee-Bates greets her students every day with questions. While they might seem random to the students at first, she hopes they will retain and understand better by relating history to their personal experiences.

After all, she said, history is about storytelling. And she teaches it in the language students speak.

For example, Parmlee-Bates tells her students that, more than 100 years ago, Queen Liliuokalani of Hawaii was on “lockdown” because she refused to cede Hawaii to the United States.

In textbooks, that 1893 event might be called a revolt after which the queen was imprisoned — rather than put on “lockdown.” But Parmlee-Bates said she is trying to make the subject current.

She also likes to ask students to pretend they preside over a country to challenge them to think like political leaders.

She will ask: “If you were separated by water, how would you fight a war with another country?”

After getting students’ responses, she will, for instance, teach them about how Germany fought Britain using airstrikes.

“We need to make it so we teach students where they are in relation to the next state, the next country,” she said.

History classes are the last subject to get end-of-course tests in S.C. schools. Tests for algebra 1, English 1, physical science and biology have been phased in since 2002.

The S.C. Education Accountability Act of 1998 requires the tests.

Reach Copeland at (803) 771-8485.