Posted on 11/03/2005 6:15:19 AM PST by Fiji Hill
OK if we torture them a little first?
My mom went to Mannheim High, I was born in Heidelburg - Patrick Henry Village :)
bump once more
actually, it's not unbelievable... i come from a family of teachers... people wanting to make a difference--thinking they could make a difference... after years of hitting their heads against those walls of bureacracy, they go on to other endeavors such as becoming corporate educators (my own background) or college educators... i have a sister-in-law who is getting her teaching credentials this year...
i am now a "homeschool" mom... we do world history and began with the Ancients when my oldest son was in first grade... after three years, we are finally onto American History (we spent two years on the Middle Ages through the Renaissance instead of one)... in about 18 months, we'll be back in the Ancients... which works out well, as my second son will be in first grade at that time...
Sounds like you are doing an excellent job. My niece is an elementary school teacher and is already burned out after 4 or 5 years.
my high school American History teacher was excellent... he taught us all those stories behind the history too... when we got into the 1900's, he would decorate his classroom decade by decade... he had old posters of movies, advertisements, newspaper headlines, etc... he also had an abundant collection of Life Magazines that we would browse through when we were studying those time periods...
when i went onto college and took American History, my professor once asked me in front of the class, "where did you go to high school? who was your history teacher?" he was surprised that i knew all these stories...
In fifty years our kids will be taught a version of history that only includes women, and minorities. The contributions of white males will be banned. The founding will be ignored. The civil war will be ignored. World War II will be ignored. All that will be taught is the womens suffrage movement, and the civil rights movement.
Your history teacher sounds like my Modern American History teacher (it was an elective). The first week we were assigned a chapter in the text to read. Next Monday he asked how it was, then said, "A bit dry?" Had us hand them in and did things differently. We had a mock debate when we got to the JFK Assasination and lots of other fun projects.
Any high school around here includes a big unit on the colonial period, as they did when I was in junior high and high school. My brother spent a whole quarter on the Constitution alone last year as a junior (and no, it wasn't lefty-oriented).
Okay, a disclaimer: no one here is any more down on public schools - especially in regards to their treatment of history - than I am.
BUT
This is misdirected or at least ill-informed outrage. I agree with the academic freedom angle - that this teacher needs to be allowed to do what is working for him. I agree that more of my fellow history teachers ought to do so. However, the idea that there is some scheme demonstrated here to ignore the founding period isn't really correct.
Now to be sure, I've no doubt a lot of educrats and union leaders are perfectly willing to do so...but you can prove it from this article.
In point of fact, public schools have been teaching Early U.S. History (Discovery through Civil War Era...usually about the end of Reconstruction) in the 8th Grade and Late U.S. history in the 10th grade. Probably a good many of us were taught history on that pattern.
I have long advanced the idea that state boards should shuffle the order of Social Studies classes so that both halves of U.S. History were required High School credits. But it's been done wrong like this for a long time, it is not some new and devious scheme that just appeared.
Ideally, one ought get Modern World History (from the Reformation) in 9th, Early U.S. in the 10th, Modern U.S. in the 11th, and Government/Economics in the 12th.
Precept upon precept.
I'm not saying don't speak up for this guy...but make your protest an informed one...some things are dictated by the state board and the local principle has limited authority to get "outside the box"
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