Texas Curriculum changes, towards the right

I didn't read the article, but going by the items you selected I don't have that many problems with the changes.

1. Back in the 80s (when I was in school) I thought they spent too much time teaching women suffrage and the civil rights movement. I always thought they spent too much effort on things that were normal to the students they were teaching. While both issues were significant and important I always thought having to spend the entire month of February (black history month) on slavery and the civil rights movement took away time that could be spent on other issues. I'm curious as to what they will be spending the "freed up" time on. I always thought it would be nice if they could get to more modern times in history class.

2. Thank God (intentional pun) they are going to stick with AD and BC. There isn't any reason to change and anyone whose feelings are hurt by AD and BC needs to stop being so sensitive. I'm Jewish and never gave it even a moments thought.

3. It is really tough for modern people to understand the issues that were prevalent during the formation of the U.S. I think trying to portray the founding fathers as atheists has been wrong for generations. Hopefully, this pendulam won't swing too far.

4. We are a constitutional republic so that makes sense to me. I'm not sure that public school children will have the experience to really understand foreign currency trading and the gold standard (I don't think most adults understand it), but good luck to them for trying.

5. Isn't Hussein his middle name? I certainly hope that Obama isn't the only President that they are choosing to not list his middle name. That would disturb me.

 

My kids already know that I'm an admirer of Thomas Jefferson, so they can rest easy on that front. They will get a large dose of him.

The Founders and religion is a great subject. They were all over the place in their approach to religion. I think they did this intentionally so that no one could pin them down on the subject. Clever fellows.

DMC - So far things have been good on the school front. I like their teachers OK, and the girls seem to like their school, atm. But my kids have yet to receive a single book, text book or otherwise, from this cheap state. They can keep it that way for all I care. I have a large personal liberary to which they have access. I can't wait to teach them how America is a Constitutional "democracy."

 

For the most part, I think the criticism over these revisions is manufactured, and not legitimate. It's a bit of a confusing issue, though, since history, even just the couple centuries of American history, is such a large topic! How do you cover it all in one school year? Easy, you don't. You pick and choose the parts you want to emphasize, generally ignoring the rest, or at best making brief mention of it. Mostly, this simply seems to be a shift of what parts are being taught and what parts aren't.

I think this:

Is a great idea, and one that should be done with every amendment and the various extrapolations it's undergone over the years. Especially in the current situation when FEMA videographers are demanding Red Cross volunteers turn their shirts inside out and teachers are criticizing students for drawing an American flag with "God Bless America" on it durring art class. The idea of 'seperation of Church and State', as the courts actually applied it, is very poorly understood, and it is even more poorly understood how we got from the amendment to it. It's a complex issue, and well worthy of some in-depth study.

The BC/BCE bit is, IMO, meaningless. Either way is fine, and they appear to both be in common use in the world today. If the student wants to become a professional historian or archeologist, they can learn the official reference in college.

The Thomas Jefferson change is, while quite significant, not at all wrong. He was a major influence on the founding of our country, but hardly the only one, and he's recieved basically all the attention for decades. We made brief mention of Ben Franklin, and that had more to do with electricity than politics. I think John Adams' name may have come up once. Sam Adams never did, and John Hancock only came up as a coloquialism. Chandos, I'm sure your kids will get the whole spectrum from you over many years, but most students unfortunately won't have that experience.

As for the Judeo-Christian influence on the Founding Fathers, I don't know what Texas had before, but that influence was definitely there and strong. It has been both over-emphasized and underemphasized in the past (the latter more recently it seems). Whether this just goes back to the former or finds some middle ground would be interesting to know.

The US is a 'constitutional republic', as welll as a 'democratic republic', and a 'representative democracy', and probably a couple of other terms as well, so I don't see a problem with switching from one to the other. Including all (and the differences between them, and why the US is all of them) would be nice, but it'd also be a lot of work.

Overall, I think this quote really sums it up well:

I remember the last time we had this topic, and it was highly political then, too. I doubt it has been anything else ever since the Texas standard was adopted by other states. Criticizing it for being so is about like criticizing the sea for being salty.

 

I have to say, I agree. When I was in school it was Washington who received all the attention. The Revolutionary Generation was largely taught within the context of the war and the political aspects were not looked into in any real depth. It was really a shame, looking back on it.

 

I mention Sam Adams around the house all the time....

 

...always a good decision.

 

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/may/16/texas-schools-rewrites-us-history

Some other parts of the rewriting:

It all seems very worrying to me, some of these changes look very hard to justify on objective grounds. While Americans are free to choose to let anyone carry around a gun if they want, other democracies get by just fine without an armed population. It's difficult to see how Islamic fundamentalism plays a bigger role than the forced dumping of a nation's people out of their lands with no provision for them. It's surely a cause rather than an effect.

 

This is about clueless hacks setting policy, thanks to a democratic mandate and the result is as to be expected: Half hilarious, half horrifying. And no NOG, it's not because they are conservatives, it's because they're really very dumb and know very little, but that with a vengeance. And because they're that dumb you don't need to defend them even when they are conservatives, never mind potentially perceived kinship.

It's conservative activism run amok. It's all about politics. The culture war is real, at least from a Texan conservative point of view it seems, and they are busy rolling back perceived liberal distortions and heresies, like correctly stating that America does have separation of church and state, Darwin's lies and the like. It is as much a deliberate provocation as it is an reflection of their peculiar world view.

Disturbing enough that the miscreants changing the curriculum apparently see the world in the way they want to see it described in schoolbooks. Then there is that frightening anti-intellectual resentment: In my personal experience it's not as if expertise is an obstacle to doing a job, and doing it well - to the contrary. Dilettantism certainly is. But for that moron dentist on the panel it is about 'standing up to the experts' (who, to his resentment, apparently kept on telling him things he didn't like to hear (i.e. must have been beyond a shadow of a doubt liberals).

As for 'standing up to experts, Texas style' Jon Stewart: "So doctor, you think brushing keeps your teeth healthy? Well I think rubbing chocolate on them does...I guess we'll just have to teach the controversy".

 

That's a good point. It is, at least in my opinion, what Sarah Palin has built her following upon.

 

Deise, some of what you posted is most definitely anti-revision spin.

For example, referring to the 'more innocuous' Atlantic triangular trade, that's what we studied in school. Because that's what happened. That wasn't the slave trade. The slave trade was one third of that trade, and the other two thirds were also important and worthy of study. Personally, if the previous books only taught about the slave trade, but not the entire Atlantic trade triangle, then this is an area in desperate need of revision. You can pick and choose which parts of history you value all you want, but always teach them in context.

And as to the 'justification for Sen. McCarthy', as I've heard it, that's also a matter of context. The changes seek to teach about the communist spies that led to Sen. McCarthy's inquisition. If you call that 'justification', then so be it. I don't, just context.

The re-write of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is definitely a mistake, and I'm curious as to how exactly they're teaching the First Amendment. It was certainly important when it was written, but today I don't know that it is so much. What with tanks and jets and all.

Here we're in absolute agreement. I'm not defending the hacks that did it, this time or last, but just the revisions I think were right.

Yes, but this is the way it's been for decades. Liberal and conservative activists going at war over the indoctrination of our children, and the rest of the nation caught in the middle of it. Thank California not being as concerned with the issue (why aren't they the standard, after all?).

 

NOG,
oh cut it. Triangle trade happens every day even today. The lesson pupils are supposed to take home about transatlantic slave trade is that in this 'triangle trade' the notable and truly nasty part was that human beings were treated like cattle or a commodity in that one leg of the triangle. The slave trade is the very aspect that distinguishes this particular triangle scheme from others. It is fully justified to call it 'slave trade', even though the ships, before they loaded up with slaves, had different cargo.

You don't need to change the name to provide the context you desire. We learned in school about the 'triangle trade', i.e. the context, while still calling it by its name - transatlantic slave trade.

Words do matter. If they didn't Frank Luntz would be out of a job. This is not just another economic scheme. To rename slave trade as 'triangle trade' is a (probably quite deliberate) euphemism and an act of relativism.

What are you Blacks so upset about this 'triangle trade'? What's bad about transporting from Europe copper, cloth, trinkets, guns and ammunition to Africa, purchasing other freight there and transport it with maximum economy to America to then haul sugar, rum, molasses, tobacco and hemp back to Europe? Just business as usual in ye olden days ... Get over it!

Perhaps African Americans can be forgiven some sensitivity on the issue in light of history?

 

In NH, we were taught about the entire trade triangle of the time, including the horrors of the slave trade, and how the slaves ended up propagating the system (against their will) by producing the very crops that brought in the money they were bought with. On the other hand, in Virginia, we were taught about the slave trade as if it happened in a vacuum, as if Europe had nothing to do with it.

Nor do you need the name to convey the horrors of what happened. Both are legitimate, which is my point.

And I suppose so is calling the US a Constitutional Republic instead of a Democratic Republic. Get over it, Ragusa. Both are legitimate terms that have been used by historians for decades to describe history.

Now, if you're bizzare nightmare proposition of the trade triangle is what is actually taught, as opposed to what I was taught in New Hampshire as a child, then I'll agree that it's inappropriate.