This paper has three objectives. First, it provides some reasons for the historical illiteracy of our students at a national level and some indices of their lack of historical knowledge. Second, it describes how the 1993 Massachusetts Education Reform Act sought to improve the study of history and how the 1997 and 2002 curriculum frameworks in history and social science implemented that legislative charge. Third, it offers several recommendations to improve the teaching of history and the social sciences in the context of the Common Core standards adopted by the state in July 2010.