Disentangling pre-service history teachers’ pedagogical content knowledge

History education would benefit from insight into teachers' pedagogical content knowledge [PCK]. A thinking-out loud protocol was used to get insight into 12 pre-service history teachers’ PCK in Belgium and the Netherlands. A reconstructed lesson planning process was used to disentangle the individual constituent components of PCK. Not all PCK components developed simultaneously, participants demonstrated more knowledge of teaching strategies than of their students or the curriculum. Some participants were only partly capable of establishing relationships between certain PCK components, a situation that can be interpreted as the result of cognitive overload. The implications for teacher education are discussed.