Time and history in Spanish Elementary Education: Analysis of the Current Education Legislation

Since the 90s of the last century, History education research underlines the need of transcending the Piagetian theory principles and emphasises the importance of introducing historical contents in early childhood education by the development of specific thinking skills. This research analyses, for the first time, the History curriculum in Spanish Elementary Education with the aim of evaluating the presence and influence of the current History instruction paradigms in its design. To get that aim, the contents introduced in the national (Real Decreto 126/2014) and autonomous communities' core curricula (N=17) were categorized according to the different historical instruction trends. It is also analysed the evolution of the teaching process regarding the historical contents required in this stage. The results show the great weight of the Piagetian theories on the current curricular design. The presence of the historical thinking skills is still scarce and its introduction is limited to the first Elementary Education levels and to the children's family history. However, minor innovative changes has been detected: for example, in the Comunidad Valenciana curriculum the historical thinking skills have a remarkable role. The Valencian case, pioneer in introducing this innovative approach, leaves the way open for other innovative examples.