Soil mechanics is a course with sound theoretical basis. The content of this course, from both its scope and depth, is very suitable for students to practice their exploratory thinking ability. Taking the teaching of stress history as an example, this paper explored the teaching methods facing scientific research in teaching of soil mechanics. Teachers can guide students to think actively by proposing a series of questions regarding the teaching content, and then students can understand the teaching content by solving these questions. Based on this, teachers can extend the teaching content and introduce students to think in a more open sight. This makes students know related frontier problems and new developments regarding the teaching content. By guiding students in active thinking,this teaching method can achieve a good effect by helping students both in understanding the content more profoundly, and in enlightening their scientific research abilities.