Empathy is a key component of historical thinking and understanding. The author states that having perspective is important when teaching elementary students about historical empathy. The author studied twelve volumes of Social Studies & The Young Learner published between 1988 and 2000 and coded the data into five major categories: personal perspective, cultural perspective, civic-community perspective, chronological perspective, and histori-biographical perspective. The author continues the article by outlining each of the five categories. The study offers a sense of teacher practice concerning historical empathy over a period of time, and draws attention to the increased and robust use of perspective taking in elementary classrooms. The author suggests that curriculum for elementary level education should include and promote perspective taking and offer teachers literature, artifacts and thematic studies. Perspective taking is seen as aiding in the development of children’s social responsibility.