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I was at school from the mid 80s until 1997. In primary school (age 5-11) I don't remember doing any history at all, although some of the reading comprehension lessons might have included "history texts" (and a lot of Egyptian, Norse and African /American* mythology, oddly enough. That might be what made me a gamer...). In secondary school, I only did history in 1st and 2nd year, then dropped it when picking my elective Standard Grades at age 13. All I remember of it was Scottish social history - crofting, perhaps a bit about the clearances and the rise of urban industrialisation in the 18th/19th century. I seem to remember geography covering much the same subject matter - which might explain why I dropped that, too.

Somewhere along the way, I've osmosed some knowledge of the American Revolution - not just from gaming sources, but I did have a couple of hefty children's encyclopedias when I was younger, so it might have been from them.

Personally, I was taught absolutely 0 American history, Which was a shame, because the first half of American history is also British history (and French, and German, and Spanish...)

History for me covered things like the Romans, Battle of Hastings, the Atlantic slave trade (Britain's part in it, but strangely...not including Britain/ the Royal Navy's role in ending it), the Blitz....all the typical, politically correct stuff.

I dropped the subject by Year 10 in favour of GCSE French...Which was a huge mistake, because my French teacher was a lazy sod who felt teaching a small class of 6 was beneath him; and the history teacher was a well loved, enthusiastic historian with a couple books to his name (hes since gone on to become a Town Counciler for my town).

 Palindrome wrote:


In my experience 'common knowledge' tends to be based o anecdotal evidence.Either way it still doesn't mean that state schools are staff by the far left, although given how far to the right the country, or at least England, as a whole seems to have gone in recent years maybe moderate left leaning views are now class as far left. It also doesn't mean that the curriculum has a leftist agenda.

Pardon? I gave you something that could quite easily have been translated into the 'physical evidence', had you been so inclined to try. I repeat, go and examine the number of Unions that currently exist for teachers. Then actually conduct some investigation into the sorts of things they kick off over. I'll give you a clue, it's rarely as simple as wages/overtime/holiday like the vast majority of unions.

Simple facts like 'the English have fish and chip shops and pubs' are fairly common knowledge without needing to be 'anecdotal'.

I was a class of 2000, started off learning about prehistoric, roman, middle ages, Tudors, Victorian, WW1, WW2 and then modern history that covered Nam, Cold War and JFK.

Working conditions for teachers in the UK are horrendous. The teachers unions are pretty damn reasonable for putting up with all that gak, not to mention the utter disdain most in England have for their profession. Irish teachers would be in open revolt if they had to put up with that crap (though I think there's a happy medium between the two).

Having or being part of a union doesn't make you "far left". Schools in the UK are afflicted by the legacy of the New Labour bs lefty era when PC and wishy washy pop psychology crap was confused with being socially concious, but I know and knew plenty of teachers who were centrist or right wing in their views, and plenty who were moderate left. I knew about 1 teacher out of 300 or so who ever expressed anything I'd consider "far left" in his views.

I mean, come on. Far Left? Agitating for communism, are they?

Lame, limp wristed and overly worried about being PC, absolutely. Filled with red tape and pointless admin job posts that just create more admin, yes. Wishy washy and overly concerned with feelings and self esteem, god yes. Far left? No. Absolutely not.

The UK generally has a pretty awful excuse for a "left wing" for the reasons you recently articulated quite well in the "british people are wrong about everything" thread Ketara. But most teachers I've met and worked with are far more interested in getting through the day through the constant barrage of stress and getting their students through the education system with some qualifications.

When I did gcse history from the age of 14 to 16 a few years ago, I spent an entire year focusing upon things such as Indians, the gold rush, the railways and other colonial events (sadly I can't remember loads) but unfortunately apart from that, not much about america was taught

 Da Boss wrote:
Working conditions for teachers in the UK are horrendous. The teachers unions are pretty damn reasonable for putting up with all that gak, not to mention the utter disdain most in England have for their profession. Irish teachers would be in open revolt if they had to put up with that crap (though I think there's a happy medium between the two).

Having or being part of a union doesn't make you "far left". Schools in the UK are afflicted by the legacy of the New Labour bs lefty era when PC and wishy washy pop psychology crap was confused with being socially concious, but I know and knew plenty of teachers who were centrist or right wing in their views, and plenty who were moderate left. I knew about 1 teacher out of 300 or so who ever expressed anything I'd consider "far left" in his views.

I mean, come on. Far Left? Agitating for communism, are they?

Lame, limp wristed and overly worried about being PC, absolutely. Filled with red tape and pointless admin job posts that just create more admin, yes. Wishy washy and overly concerned with feelings and self esteem, god yes. Far left? No. Absolutely not.

The UK generally has a pretty awful excuse for a "left wing" for the reasons you recently articulated quite well in the "british people are wrong about everything" thread Ketara. But most teachers I've met and worked with are far more interested in getting through the day through the constant barrage of stress and getting their students through the education system with some qualifications.

Okay, fair enough, perhaps 'far left' is a bit extreme a phrase.

But I would contest that there is a heavily political left wing inculcation in the way teachers are currently taught to teach, in the makeup of the teaching Unions (which are quite well known for kicking off over things just because a Conservative Government proposed it), in the curriculum, and in the administrative/policy making side of things.

Now you may be right, and the average rank and file teacher doesn't care overly for politics or has any particularly obvious leftist leanings. I have no problem with accepting that, and having had one or two conversations with you on that one in real life, I'll bow to your experience.

But I would argue that in the institution of education itself, the organisations that make them it into an 'institution' very much do have a heavy political left wing throughout.

I sat my GCSE History 2 years ago in June, there was an exam on Northern Ireland and The Weimar Republic then an exam on The Cold War. So there was no mention of America in mine.

 marv335 wrote:

My school is over 1000 years old, America barely counts as history yet...

Well, keep in mind, American history doesn't start with the United States, or even the colonies. We have plenty of history just as old as Europe. For example, the Serpent Mound.

 Hordini wrote:

 marv335 wrote:

My school is over 1000 years old, America barely counts as history yet...

Well, keep in mind, American history doesn't start with the United States, or even the colonies. We have plenty of history just as old as Europe. For example, the Serpent Mound.

Indeed. I live a few miles from what was one of the largest cities in the world, in the 1200's.

 Ketara wrote:

 Da Boss wrote:
Working conditions for teachers in the UK are horrendous. The teachers unions are pretty damn reasonable for putting up with all that gak, not to mention the utter disdain most in England have for their profession. Irish teachers would be in open revolt if they had to put up with that crap (though I think there's a happy medium between the two).

Having or being part of a union doesn't make you "far left". Schools in the UK are afflicted by the legacy of the New Labour bs lefty era when PC and wishy washy pop psychology crap was confused with being socially concious, but I know and knew plenty of teachers who were centrist or right wing in their views, and plenty who were moderate left. I knew about 1 teacher out of 300 or so who ever expressed anything I'd consider "far left" in his views.

I mean, come on. Far Left? Agitating for communism, are they?

Lame, limp wristed and overly worried about being PC, absolutely. Filled with red tape and pointless admin job posts that just create more admin, yes. Wishy washy and overly concerned with feelings and self esteem, god yes. Far left? No. Absolutely not.

The UK generally has a pretty awful excuse for a "left wing" for the reasons you recently articulated quite well in the "british people are wrong about everything" thread Ketara. But most teachers I've met and worked with are far more interested in getting through the day through the constant barrage of stress and getting their students through the education system with some qualifications.

Okay, fair enough, perhaps 'far left' is a bit extreme a phrase.

But I would contest that there is a heavily political left wing inculcation in the way teachers are currently taught to teach, in the makeup of the teaching Unions (which are quite well known for kicking off over things just because a Conservative Government proposed it), in the curriculum, and in the administrative/policy making side of things.

Now you may be right, and the average rank and file teacher doesn't care overly for politics or has any particularly obvious leftist leanings. I have no problem with accepting that, and having had one or two conversations with you on that one in real life, I'll bow to your experience.

But I would argue that in the institution of education itself, the organisations that make them it into an 'institution' very much do have a heavy political left wing throughout.

I think this says more about your political views than teachers. I wouldn't say the teachers I know are left wing. What I would say is that the government, and specifically Gove, have a habit of interfering in teaching far to much and using it as a political football. If your job was changed on the whims of the latest minister or govenment every few years and the ills of society Put on you with little support you would probably become quite political. And no, I'm not a teacher, or married to one, nor am I member of a union nor have I ever been. I have never worked in a job where the only employer is essentially the government (teaching, nursing, police etc.). When your job is controlled and used as a political football I can see why people get so upset. That's not the same as being left wing.

 djones520 wrote:

 Hordini wrote:

 marv335 wrote:

My school is over 1000 years old, America barely counts as history yet...

Well, keep in mind, American history doesn't start with the United States, or even the colonies. We have plenty of history just as old as Europe. For example, the Serpent Mound.

Indeed. I live a few miles from what was one of the largest cities in the world, in the 1200's.

Yup... Monks Mound in Cahokia, IL...

Here's what it looks like now:


Here's what it may have looked like in it's hayday:

Yes, never did American History at school aside from Cowboys and Indians projects.

Most of what I know, I learned from reading Flashman books. Shame George Macdonald Fraser never got round to retelling the American Civil War from Flashman's point of view. It's mentioned in the books quite a lot with Flashman recounting that he did of course fight on both sides.

 Orlanth wrote:
Pity, but hardly suprising then that you resort to namecalling to shut down opposed opinion; its all too often the strategem of the dogmatised fanatic.

Please don't tell me you don't see the hypocricy in that sentence.

 Steve steveson wrote:

I think this says more about your political views than teachers.

Hardly. I have some fairly neutral political views, and I'm far from a Toryboy, so to speak.

However, my father is a teacher, and I spent a fair bit of time and research looking at going into secondary teacher training for history myself before settling on chasing postgrad academia. I spent time in schools observing, and looked into the structure of the curriculum, the reasoning behind it, and so on.

Combined with the fact that as someone who actually publishes history, I like to think that my opinion is generally relatively detached on analysing societal shifts, cultural factors, and political ideology. No doubt I have some inherent bias, but to claim that I'm just projecting my political beliefs onto my analysis is somewhat farfetched.

we studied a little american history, mainly a how the west was won cowboys and Indians sort of thing. We actually done a fair bit on native american tribes, learn't about the folks that ate each other in the Rockys and how the buffalo where almost wiped out. All in all though I think it was just an excuse to watch a bunch of westerns.

Yeah my history education was poor, watching Young Guns and Blackadder is about all I remember from it.

All this talk of US and UK history leaves me mighty jealous. Up until year 10 our history mostly consists of Australian colonial history, which is mighty boring indeed. So you start with reasons why the UK wanted a colony (get there before the Dutch, and have a new place to dump convicts after the US went and had an uprising and they couldn't be sent there anymore), and then you get told about the First Fleet sailing in to Botany Bay... but you don't get told the only interesting bit, where Captain Cook continued exploring, and was eventually eaten by Hawaiians. Then you get stories about the harsh conditions for the settlers, and the gold rush, and the handful of really minor skirmishes between police and various groups of disgruntled people. And then you do state history, and for WA that consists of being told that on Foundation Day the governor's wife cut down a tree.

By the schools here get on to interesting history, ie the history of other countries, like modern Russian and Chinese history, you're in year 11 and history is an elective that no-one takes because it was so boring before then. In my year 12 there was about 300 or 400 kids, and there was one history class with about 20 of us.

Unrelated to subject at hand, but something that has bothered me for many days.

I adore Newcastle Brown Ale, it is my #1 of all beers usually drink it over most others. however the literature on the back has me bothered....do you guys over there actually refer to it as "The Dog"

Never heard it called the dog but that is probably a Northern thing. It's most colloquially called Broon.

 filbert wrote:
Never heard it called the dog but that is probably a Northern thing. It's most colloquially called Broon.

Hmm, I actually like that name more than "The Dog" not that it gets called much other than "newcastle" here.

Broon's more likely than "the Dog" I'd think, at least here in Scotland. I think its mostly advertised as "Newcastle Brown Ale" though, that bit on the back's just the same nostalgia piece that loads of other drinks have on them.

 filbert wrote:
Never heard it called the dog but that is probably a Northern thing. It's most colloquially called Broon.

It's called pishwater here....or junior beer or Nukeeey Brown if we are feeling generous. I seem to remember its only 3 an a bit percent.

In my history lessons we learnt roman, industrial revolution for what seemed like forever then a little bit on the early 20th century without ever touching on WW1 or the sequel. I dropped it as soon as I could for Geography - it had a well renowned field trip to Yorkshire that involve staying in pubs.

We did learn some local relevant things too; The Peasants Revolt (finally put down in the Forest near here?), a Zepplin crashing at Meadow Rise and most relevant of all allot of the Pilgrim farther a came from this neck of the woods. I went to Mayflower School, drank in the Pilgrim and Mayflower pubs and the Town is twinned with Billerica in Massachusetts. So a bit of US history but not much.

 notprop wrote:

 filbert wrote:
Never heard it called the dog but that is probably a Northern thing. It's most colloquially called Broon.

I seem to remember its only 3 an a bit percent..

It's a 4.5 thank you

 filbert wrote:
Never heard it called the dog but that is probably a Northern thing. It's most colloquially called Broon.

http://www.chroniclelive.co.uk/news/north-east-news/last-orders-1466093

The brewery’s most famous brand is Newcastle Brown Ale, or "Dog".

The nickname comes from when men would tell their families they would be going out to "see a man about a dog" meaning they were going to the pub.

See a man about a Dog is an expression used pretty much all over the uk --- ..hmm... maybe within certain age groups more than t'other mayhaps ..?

http://www.behance.net/gallery/Newcastle-Brown-Ale-Walk-The-Dog-Campaign/1469797

I think I generally hear it referred as " Nukey-" ( sic) pronunciation wise.

I'm not really sure what over overseas brethren would make of the Newcastle area accent.... it is quite distinctive.

 reds8n wrote:

 filbert wrote:
Never heard it called the dog but that is probably a Northern thing. It's most colloquially called Broon.

http://www.chroniclelive.co.uk/news/north-east-news/last-orders-1466093

The brewery’s most famous brand is Newcastle Brown Ale, or "Dog".

The nickname comes from when men would tell their families they would be going out to "see a man about a dog" meaning they were going to the pub.

See a man about a Dog is an expression used pretty much all over the uk --- ..hmm... maybe within certain age groups more than t'other mayhaps ..?

http://www.behance.net/gallery/Newcastle-Brown-Ale-Walk-The-Dog-Campaign/1469797

I think I generally hear it referred as " Nukey-" ( sic) pronunciation wise.

I'm not really sure what over overseas brethren would make of the Newcastle area accent.... it is quite distinctive.

I like to imagine I dont have an accent but being from Kentucky, I am not so sure about all that. I know I dont sound like a hick or a bumpkin, but I can only imagine how it sounds when I say it compared to when one of Ya'll order it or someone from Newyork etc....

For me it was a specialist area I studied when doing history at higher level for the IB. Even at uni there wasn't much on US history as much as I can remember.

So, does the above answer the questions for our American friends? As far as Britain is concerned, America didn't exist until 7th of December 1941!

If Americans want more of their history taught in British schools, I suggest the following re-writes:

1861 - Evil Nazi southerners, led by Otto Von Lee and Jefferson Von Davis, break away from the union.

1776 - The Nazis lay siege to Boston

1492 - German U-Boats land in the New World

I'm a bit late to the party apparently...

welshhoppo wrote:

 Snrub wrote:
So out of interest how does Australia fare in British history classes. I'd imagine it's just the same as the Yanks but since we are the youngest child maybe we get some love and attention?

Hahahaha. Our learning of Australia basically boiled down to. "We raped and killed their native population, then we filled the land with slaves and prisoners."

Thats about all we learned about Australia as well...

Steve steveson wrote:

 Do_I_Not_Like_That wrote:

Were the Nazis involved in the American Revolution? Then, British schools are not interested in it!

As far as Britain is concerned, it wasn't a war, anyway - just a minor skirmish!

The Americans won't understand that. They haven't invaded enough places to have enough history yet:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/history/9653497/British-have-invaded-nine-out-of-ten-countries-so-look-out-Luxembourg.html




Serious question, what do kids in the US learn about in history?

I wanted to point out that you burned down our capitol in 1814, but that seems a bit moot now...

kronk wrote:I learned that Prince Albert is sold in a can.

I was actually wrapping pallets of that tonight



I've been out of school for almost 10 years now, hopefully they changed it, but we really only learned about OUR history. Started with Columbus, and went on until the 1950's. My school had a class that taught us nothing but how our government works, since we ran out of historical things to discuss. Very rarely did we learn about "outside" events.

I did GSCE and A level history. As far as I can recall we didn't learn anything about American history.