ABSTRACT
Historians find out about the past through asking questions and making inferences about sources which remain: buildings, sites, pictures, artefacts and written sources. How was it made? Why? How was it used? What did it mean to the people who made and used it? Sources are often incomplete, and their status may be unknown. (For example, was the bone pendant in a bronze age grave an ornament or symbolic object?) Therefore it may be possible to make a number of different and equally valid inferences about a source. Inferences are valid if they conform with what else is known of the period and if they assume that people in the past acted rationally. It is necessary to support inferences with arguments and also to listen to the arguments of others. To what extent, then, are young children able to make valid inferences about historical sources, to support their inferences with arguments, and to listen to each other’s suggestions?
