Teachers Unofficially "Strike", and Conservatives Upset Over New AP History Course

[SeaBreeze]

It appeared on the news that teachers are upset that they can't teach American history as recommended in the new AP history course. I don't know much about it, but I think the teachers are saying that they want to teach the facts of history, whether or not it shows America in a good light. They don't just want to convey everything to the students that is positive about our history. I've understood that history taught in schools over the years has been very bias, and favorable to this country, negative events are ignored and not taught.

http://kwgn.com/2014/09/19/standley...els-classes-because-of-high-teacher-absenses/

http://www.newsweek.com/whats-driving-conservatives-mad-about-new-history-course-264592

 

[Warrigal]

I would suggest that the way history is taught these days, at least at secondary level, does not allow for concealment of any facts because the students are encouraged to research beyond the text book using different sources, including the internet. Intelligent and interested students can dig out the truth just as easily as investigative journalists. They are also encouraged to network with students from other countries and cultures.

If the teachers are complaining that they cannot use these open methods because of some political suppression, then they are within their rights and acting in the interest of their students.

 

[Warrigal]

I've now read the second article and IMO this Krieger fellow is a total dinosaur and he is the one pushing a political agenda.

We're having the same problem over here. We have a recently designed National Curriculum after 5 years of consultation with experts and stakeholders. I can't talk about history but from the documents I have read the syllabi from K to 12 are well drafted providing frameworks that allow for rigor and flexibility across age levels and geographic locations.

The different subjects are being phased in gradually to allow for evaluation and if necessary, revision. As soon as the new right wing government was elected last year they announced that they were having a review national curriculum which had not even been fully implemented yet. They object to ''The fact that the national curriculum stipulates that every subject must be interpreted through a prism involving indigenous, Asian and sustainability perspectives, "

The reasons for this interference are very similar to Krieger's

NSW schools want Aboriginal history to remain a ''crucial feature'' of a national curriculum, putting them at odds with the federal Education Minister Christopher Pyne's push for a greater focus on Western civilisations.
The state's school sectors including the Department of Education, the Association of Independent Schools and the Catholic Education Commission have lodged a highly critical submission to the national curriculum review.

In their joint submission, which also represents the position of the NSW Board of Studies, the school sectors argue that studying Aboriginal history and culture is ''essential for the education of all Australian students''.

''The NSW education community strongly supports Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander history and cultures as crucial features in anycurriculum that is defined as national or Australian,'' the submission says.
Mr Pyne launched a review of the national curriculum in January to ensure it was ''balanced in its content, free of partisan bias and deals with real-world issues'' amid concerns it was too left-leaning and was failing students.

He appointed two outspoken critics of the curriculum, including former teacher Kevin Donnelly, to review it. Mr Donnelly has warned that education has become too secular and has lurched to the ''cultural left'' and Australia's Judeo-Christian heritage should be better reflected in the curriculum.

''The fact that the national curriculum stipulates that every subject must be interpreted through a prism involving indigenous, Asian and sustainability perspectives needs to be revisited,'' Mr Donnelly said.
But the NSW schools submission warns that an understanding of Asia, as well as sustainability, was vital.

''An understanding of Asia and our relationship to the region as well as issues of sustainability are also strongly supported by stakeholders in NSW as important to subject-specific learning,'' the submission says.
The schools sector also criticises the national curriculum for having ''excessive content'' for some of the key subjects.

''It is possible to reasonably interpret that curriculum documents were designed for more teaching hours in total than was available within the school teaching year,'' the submission says.

Mr Donnelly and the other reviewer, Kenneth Wiltshire, a Queensland academic who has labelled the implementation of the Gonski funding model "a national disgrace", are expected to finish their report by midyear.


Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/federal-polit...-submission-20140327-35lqw.html#ixzz3Dpsory46

Apparently our history syllabus needs to be more focussed on British settlement, British law and British culture but without mentioning the first people of this continent. Let's not talk about the massacres and poisoned flour, or the children stolen from the mothers. That is nasty history, referred to over here as the black armband approach to Australian history.

Asia is clearly irrelevant to us and we need to concentrate on our (all male and mostly British) explorers. And heaven forbid there be any mention of the shearers' strikes and the rise of unionism and the Labor Party at the turn of the century before Federation.

It sounds like a return to the 1950s when I was in high school, before we ever tasted garlic.

 

[QuickSilver]

Facts? Those pesky things? Never let it be said those will get in the way of a political agenda.

 

[oakapple]

I think that most countries [some more than others, think Japan !] do sugar coat history a bit.History is written by the winners after all.It should be resisted though, and the teachers have every right to protest about it, perhaps the parents of the students should do the same?In quite a few schools in the US [and for all I know, a few other countries] there is a programme of denying evolution.Do people complain about that?