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Post by Allen Wiener on Jul 1, 2009 16:30:34 GMT -5
Tom has quite rightly run us off from the Mexican Casualties thread after we hijacked it with a discussion of the use and teaching of history. So I am resurrecting it here. I just came across the following article that expresses many of my concerns. Imagine new immigrants working harder than our students to learn the country's history because they want so much to be part of it. See if you don't agree with the recommendations in this report: goldwaterinstitute.org/Common/Img/Freedom%20From%20Responsibility.pdfThis quotation is a beaut: In the end more than they wanted freedom, they wanted security. When the Athenians finally wanted not to give to society but for society to give to them, when the freedom they wished was freedom from responsibility, then Athens ceased to be free. - Edward Gibbon AW
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Post by Kevin Young on Jul 1, 2009 20:24:13 GMT -5
We did get a little long winded and off track over there. So thanks for moving!
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Post by Jim Boylston on Jul 1, 2009 21:56:46 GMT -5
Please do continue, guys. I find it an interesting discussion, and Kevin, your little exercise in continuity with the Wright Bro.s and WW1 was a great example in how we could be teaching things to young people. Jim
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Post by bobdurham on Jul 2, 2009 4:46:53 GMT -5
Probably getting off-topic again but Kevin's exercise re the Wright Brothers & WW I brings something else into perspective besides learning history. Many people, not just young but all ages, have difficulties reasoning things out. If taught specifically that WW I happened after the Wright Brothers invented flight, most would probably remember that. But to reason it out on their own would be something else again.
In my previous job, I helped with training for the customer support people. If given step-by-step instructions on what to do to resolve a problem, most of our people had no trouble helping customers with a problem. However, if the problem was one not encountered before, many had no idea how to analyze the problem to find a solution. Same thing with teaching people how to program (computers, that is). Some very intelligent people, with high college GPA's, could not grasp where to even begin to write a program. We did a little exercise, having our people flowchart all the steps it would take to get ready for work in the morning -- usually a complete disaster!
Its one thing to teach someone facts but I don't know how to teach people to actually THINK.
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Post by Kevin Young on Jul 2, 2009 7:31:00 GMT -5
With out being able to think and reason, what good is just learning names and dates? Part of the problem with that people are taught history instead of studying history. Getting it into context is just as important as the dates. So, what we have done in the past is just fill minds with dates (which are important especially 1776, 1803, 1836, 1861, and such). But now, we aren't even doing that as a base anymore. If you think getting students to understand history is hard, try getting them to understand the constitution! Parents and students today have the student handbooks memorized. They know their "rights" but do not want to be bothered with understand what the document where all of their "rights" come from.
I have always tried to impart in context. When students are learning about the national road, I show them how it went through Illinois. Then I ask them if any of them knows where the oldest state road is in Illinois. There is a pause, and I mention that they cross it every day to go to lunch, which allows them to understand a connection of their home area into the "big picture." Sometimes it works, sometimes it does not.
A friend who teaches Southern History has fun by having his students recreate Southern debating societies and debate questions as part of a class. His final is also good as it makes the students think-after a semester of being educated on events in southern history leading up to 1860, the final requires in essay that you give five key events which contributed to the secession.
Of course, it is what they learn at home and other places. Question on a test was what is the nickname of Chicago: answer is the Windy City. One student wrote, "black town."
We tend also to become locked up in the trivia. We can tell you every aspect of something, like the workings of a M1842 Musket, but can tell you little about the period. I remember coming up to someone dressed out like a "typical" Alamo fronteirsman type. He was trying to do first person. I asked him where he was from and was informed he was one of Crockett Tennesseans. I did not even bother to question that (since we know that is part of the Alamo myth), so I asked him what part of Tennessee he was from. He thought for a second and said the west. I asked him who his Congressman was last year. He looked at me strange and begged off the question (of course, his former Congressman was standing a few feet away!).
Historical Illiteracy is not just in seen in terms of national and international history. It is starts at home. and we are in real danger of loosing our local history first.
Here is a good one for you. People know I love historical flags (flying the Grand Union right now). I was asked to provide a some Rev War flags for a float. Got a call to question the yellow one with the snake because it was not red-white-blue with stars. Sent over the Navel flag. Got a call about it because it had no stars and again, had a snake on it. Explained these were some of the first flags, and that Americans died fighting for our independence under them. I also explained that one of the flags has been flying off all US Warships since 9/11. I thought the problem was simply lack of knowing, but it turns out a local church had done a program for their members of what are truely signs of the devil. Anything with a snake counts, despite its use by our forefathers in fighting for freedom.
So, it seems that Historical Illiteracy has many levels!
Oh yes-I also did my 20th century events quiz withe changing over to the 19th century...you don't wnat to know!
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Post by Paul Sylvain on Jul 3, 2009 13:18:28 GMT -5
Well, I work for United States Citizenship & Immigration Services (USCIS), which is part of Homeland Security. When I started this gig, we were INS under the Dept. of Justice, but INS died about 15 months after 9/11. Until march this year, when I moved to Dallas to teach at our academic training center, I was an "adjudicator", or one of the guys who interviews aliens to determine whether they are granted permanent residence (think "Green Card") or U.S. citizenship through naturalization. The history/civics/English testing referred to in the article is given to applicants for naturalization. Since this past fall, we have been administering a newer and in my opinion more difficult version of the test. Even so, applicants are given or can download the test questions before-hand. It's a far cry from years back (before my time with the agency -- I started in July 2001) when applicants could purchase two book and were subject to anything in those books. Because of problems with the fairness of the practice, a more standardized test was developed. Applicants are subject to any of 100 questions. Ten random questions are pulled, and the applicants need only get six correct to pass. What most folks don't know is that many, many people seek shortcuts to learning anything about this country. There are medical waivers available, and you'd be amazed at how many applicants simply pay some doctor a ridiculous amount of money to sign off on a cookie-cutter medical waiver form stating this person is unable to learn any new skills, including demonstrating a knowledge of history, civics and government. Also, some folks simply wait until they have the right combination of age and years as a permanent resident (55/15 or 50/20 respectively) before applying. This automatically waives any English language requirement, meaning they are allowed to have a translator with them at the interview and for the history/government test. Even with that, I've seen applicants who meet the 55/15 or 50/20 requirement for an English waiver come in with a medical waiver so they don't have to muck with the history test, even though they have a translator. What I'm saying is that, yes, many immigrants do take the time to learn the language and something about our history and government. But I would argue that there are many immigrants who come here today for benefits such as SSI, Social Security, and so on, and seek to do it without investing any effort in learning our language and history. I have interviewed a number of Russian refugees who worked in the mother country and as soon as they landed here were suddenly incapable of working. Because of their so-called refugee status, they were granted immediate SSI benefits without ever working one minute here, or investing one cent in the system. When I've advised them that "adjustment disorder" was not a sufficient reason to accept the medical waiver, I've been told, "Well, (the applicant) is going to lose SSI." The immigrants who came here decades before Social Security and other programs, came here without expectations of any free handouts. They came and worked and took the time to learn about this country, our history and to learn the language. It's not the same today. That is why it is truly refreshing when I meet an applicant who has worked hard and struggled to learn the language and history while raising a family here. I have the highest respect for folks like that. When you tell them they've passed the test and will become a citizen, they cry and hug you -- and it's real. It's rare, but real, and it is humbling. However, that is almost the exception rather than the rule. Paul
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Post by Allen Wiener on Jul 3, 2009 14:44:00 GMT -5
I guess that proves that, if you give people a loophole, they'll use it; if you make them do the work, some or most will do that. I know one of the people you mentioned who really did do the work; it took years for that person to get a green card and then full citizenship and they really worked for it. Since we don't seem to require our own citizens to know much about our history anymore, why expect immigrants to do it?
AW
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Post by glforeman on Jul 3, 2009 16:01:15 GMT -5
Paul, Your well-written account pretty well sums up why the State of California is handing out IOUs. My mother was an immigrant from Germany right after WWII, a genuine war-bride who met my Dad in 1946 while he was serving with US occupation troops. I found the letter she sent my Dad accepting his proposal. Twice she mentioned having the legal papers in order so their dream could become real. Within a few years she knew US history better than most and she could hold the most credible discussion about world politics and government in all social and business circles. There were comments she made about events in the 60s that didn't make complete sense to me until I was older. She used her worldly experience to become a terrific flag-waving American--- and a great mother. GLF
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Post by Jim Boylston on Jul 3, 2009 16:18:16 GMT -5
On a recent business trip to Vegas I was picked up by an African cab driver who was studying for his citizenship test. He asked my home state (Florida) then asked me the capitol city (Tallahassee). He repeated it a few times and asked me if he was pronouncing it correctly. Then he asked if I'd like to try and answer some of the questions on the test. In addition to being a history buff, I'm also a fan of trivia, and the person with whom I was sharing the ride was as well. We answered questions throughout our ride, and had a lot of fun. When we reached our destination the driver said that most Americans he picked up were unable to answer very many questions...he was surprised we knew so many answers, but was more surprised that so many Americans seemed like they could care less about their own history. Personally, I thought that was tragic. This hard-working fellow spent his days shuttling American tourists around Vegas, most of whom knew next to nothing about their own country. This country clearly meant something to him, and he was so excited about becoming a citizen. Jim
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Post by TRK on Jul 3, 2009 16:35:56 GMT -5
This hard-working fellow spent his days shuttling American tourists around Vegas, most of whom knew next to nothing about their own country. This country clearly meant something to him, and he was so excited about becoming a citizen. God bless him. With his ambition, maybe one day some of those chumps will be chauffeuring him around Vegas.
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Post by Kevin Young on Jul 4, 2009 7:22:17 GMT -5
Sounds like an exceptional cab ride.
I do not want to think about how many Alamo visitors thought of it in context of San Juan Hill....in contrast, many of the out of country vistors had a better understanding of Alamo history than the average Americans...
Someone asked me what comments scared me the most (in regards to the level of historical studies of Alamo visitors). I said, "Coach showed us the John Wayne film."
The text books junior high students in Rossville, Illinois use have more on Juan Seguin than Davy Crockett...an example of trends in historical education.
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Post by stuart on Jul 6, 2009 14:40:44 GMT -5
If its any consolation, things are just as bad over here. At school level History is taught in segments/modules with no overall framework to hang it on. The 18th century for example is missed out entirely. Our kids do Tudors and Stuarts which basically means Henry VIII (Tudors) and the Great Fire of London (Stuarts). Somehow the Elizabethan expansion is airbrushed out and the Civil War consigned to oblivion, yet these are pivotal areas in British history.
In Scotland its pretty similar; back in the days when I did 17th century re-enactment we generally got two reactions. If armour was in evidence we were obviously doing Bannockburn, but if nobody happened to have any then we were equally obviously doing Culloden!
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Post by Herb on Jul 6, 2009 21:03:07 GMT -5
Some interesting comments. Now for some scatter shots! I read an interesting article today, referring to the emphasis in todays schools on political correctness, the article said to substitute the words "selective stupidity" for political correctness. I don't know I kind of like that! Being just a couple of years younger than most of you, I was a junior in High School when the curriculum was deliberately dumbed down, and what was the standards most of you went through were eliminated. For example we went from four years of English classes to one year and six semesters of "English " electives (two of the offered "English" classes were "studying" popular comic books). The previously required Math, History, Science, and Geography classes all also were reduced with electives offered instead. I had some pretty definite career goals, so I maintained the traditional education for the most part. But, a girl that I was interested in was taking a particular nonsense English elective, so of course I did, too. So much for the inmates running the asylum. That fortunately ended up being a pretty good class, but that was due to a darn good teacher and not the course outline! One of the problems with teaching history, is that a lot of teachers never understand that it's people we're talking about and not dates and minutia. For the sake of diversity, probably nearly every American knows Cripus Attucks' name, yet almost nobody can name any of the other victims of The Boston Massacre, and more importantly they don't understand why the Boston Massacre was significant. More tragically, most Americans had no idea who John Adams was until HBO made a miniseries. For every bit of minutia we teach in a broad general course of history the more important details are omitted. I'm surprised, that nobody's mentioned it yet, but I wonder what the impact of not having Walt Disney's version of Disney on TV on Sunday nights. I can think of a lot of things - not just Fess - that I went to the Bookmobile the next week to check something out after seeing it on Disney. Scatter shots!
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Post by Allen Wiener on Jul 7, 2009 7:53:13 GMT -5
It's discouraging that we continue to doctor up history to meet varying political agendas. When I was a kid, the curriculum was skewed in different directions, but was just as distorted regarding factual history. And it was as boring as watching paint dry. None of us enjoyed our history classes and learned very little from them (most of it wasn't worth learning anyway). For the better part of 13 public school years we got the same limited historical time frame, always beginning with Columbus, as if that's where American history began, and ending somewhere well before the Civil War. In one high shcool class, we got as far as Reconstruction, which was given the "Gone with the Wind" treatment. None of this mattered since all the events that were covered were viewed through a sanitized lens. We never heard about Columbus's treatment of natives or his mercenary objectives. The Conquestadors were either not mentioned or barely touched on, and none of their brutality was mentioned. In fact, you'd never know there were any Indians on this continent except for Squanto. Expanision and its objectives were left vague, and no details about the causes of the Mexican War -- not even much about that war.
In short, it was a sanitized, skewed version of "history" that was that era's version of "political correctness," no better than what I'm told is being fed to kids today, just different. I'm sure kids are just as turned off as ever.
Yes, we could use TV programs like those that Disney used to produce, built around actual historical events, and which make them interesting to kids so they'll actually go to the library or book store and seek more information about them. Disney did more to stimulate our interest in history than school ever did (or tried to do, for that matter).
I continue to recommend James Loewen's book "Lies My Teacher Told Me" as an anecdote to this form of teaching and as an example of how history might better be taught. The book also explaines how history curricula are pretty much dictated by textbook publishers, who cater to the states that buy the most textbooks (California and Texas particularly).
AW
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Post by stuart on Jul 7, 2009 10:21:15 GMT -5
Yes, we could use TV programs like those that Disney used to produce, built around actual historical events, and which make them interesting to kids so they'll actually go to the library or book store and seek more information about them. Disney did more to stimulate our interest in history than school ever did (or tried to do, for that matter). AW Agreed, but even this has its limitations. I recall reading an article a couple of years back about visitor patterns at Gettysburg. Numbers were raised fairly dramatically following the release of Killer Angels/Gettysburg, but most visitors now seem to be following the film and concentrating on Buford's fight at the seminary, Little Round Top and the site of Pickett's charge and missing out entirely on a lot of the other key stuff which didn't make it into the film
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