Place-Based Social Studies Instruction and Cultural Heritage Education Among Public Secondary School Teachers
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.19737582Keywords:
cultural heritage education; learners’ lived experiences; local resources; place-based instruction; public secondary school teachers; social studiesAbstract
This study examined the role of place-based social studies instruction in shaping cultural heritage education among public secondary school teachers. Using a cross-sectional predictive-explanatory design, data were gathered through a validated researcher-developed questionnaire administered to Social Science teachers and analyzed through descriptive statistics and Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modeling. The findings showed that place-based social studies instruction was generally high, with localized content integration emerging as the strongest instructional dimension, while community-linked learning activities obtained the lowest rating. Cultural heritage education was likewise rated high overall, although instructional support for cultural continuity and identity formation appeared less developed than heritage awareness and the integration of cultural knowledge in teaching. Measurement model results confirmed satisfactory indicator loadings, composite reliability, convergent validity, and discriminant validity. Structural model analysis further revealed that instructional grounding in learners’ lived experiences, localized content integration, and contextual use of local resources significantly predicted cultural heritage education, while community-linked learning activities showed the weakest but still significant effect. The model explained a substantial proportion of the variance in cultural heritage education, indicating that place-based instructional practices meaningfully contributed to heritage-oriented teaching outcomes. The study concluded that while teachers already demonstrated a strong foundation in contextualized social studies teaching, deeper community engagement and stronger identity-forming heritage instruction remained underdeveloped. These findings highlight the need for sustained pedagogical support, locally responsive planning, and strengthened school-community collaboration to enrich cultural heritage education in secondary social studies classrooms.
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