On History Education in British Schools

An excellent article reprinted from the Times of London
Original Source: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/education/article2107201.ece

Children must be taught landmark dates in chronological order from primary school, to give them a common sense of British history and identity, Ofsted tells the Government today. Far from knowing the order of key events, such as the Battle of Hastings or the signing of Magna Carta, pupils have no overview of history and cannot answer the “big questions” it poses, the schools’ inspectorate has found. Not only are key events in British and world history overlooked, but without a sense of the order in which they occurred, students cannot make any connections with the periods that they have studied.

The damning assessment of pupils’ understanding and the way history is taught in England’s schools, particularly primaries, comes after academics and historians have called repeatedly for a review of the way the subject is taught up to the age of 14. “History is taught in all primary schools, but we are recommending that the syllabus is looked at to promote a coherence in what’s being taught – a core, with some local discretion,” said Miriam Rosen, Ofsted’s director of education.


Dr Rosen acknowledged that history had been squeezed in some primaries, because of their need to raise standards in the three Rs. “We quite understand why schools have focused on literacy and numeracy, but we think they are beginning to see they can link history teaching to make sure it’s not lost and that there’s still a focus on the core subjects,” she added. Her comments appear to be at odds with the latest proposals by the Government to allow schools to teach themes such as creativity and cultural understanding, rather than individual academic subjects, such as history and science, at secondary level. In History in the Balance: History in English Schools 2003-7, the inspectors targeted their criticism mainly at the education of 7 to 11-year-olds, “which continues to disappoint”.


While the teachers themselves often had not studied the subject beyond 14, they were also poorly trained in history and tended to jump from one topic to the next, the inspectors found. They cited one primary, where eight-year-olds studied the Romans one term, learnt how children coped in the Second World War the next and finished with Ancient Egypt. Although the National Curriculum calls for pupils to develop a “chronological framework” and to make “connections between events and changes in the different periods”, the inspectors said this rarely happened in practice. “Consequently they often have little sense of chronology and the possibility of establishing an overarching story and addressing broader themes and issues is limited,” they wrote. The inspectors praised history teaching post14, but noted that only 32 per cent of pupils study it at GCSE level and even fewer post16. Although 66 per cent achieve A grades at GCSE, a third of A* grades are from independently educated pupils. The report echoed concerns aired by academics and historians, including Kate Pretty, principal of Homerton College and Pro-Vice-Chancellor of the University of Cambridge, who said that Britain was losing a sense of shared identity, because children were not being taught basic general knowledge in primary school. “It’s not secondary school that instills the deficit, but primaries.

It’s the primary view of the great stories in the past, like Alfred burning the cakes, Magna Carta, Columbus sailing the ocean blue – all that sort of stuff,” she said. “The little tiny stories that make up the common thread which you can pull on, we’re expecting students to somehow implicitly know. It’s not about A-level knowledge of a particular subject, but a general web of understanding that binds us to a past. That seems to me is being lost somewhere in all of this.” The report comes as the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority proposes allowing schools from next year to teach themes such as creativity and cultural understanding rather than individual academic subjects from the ages of 11 to 14.

The curriculum watchdog is already piloting a new GCSE syllabus in 70 schools where periods of history are replaced by themes including “conflict and its lasting impact” and “people’s diverse ideas”. Jim Knight, the Schools Minister, said he agreed with many of the points raised by Ofsted, which had been addressed in the revised secondary curriculum introduced last week. “The new curriculum has strengthened the requirement that all pupils need to have a good chronological understanding of history. This is compulsory at primary Key Stages too,” he said, adding that they would improve the training of primary teachers.

However, Michael Gove, the Shadow Children’s Secretary, said the report underlined the dangers of the new curriculum. “The changes Ed Balls [the Education Secretary] announced last week would mean more of the flabby, woolly, ‘theme-based’ teaching this report warns us about,” he said. “Ofsted underlines the importance of rigour and giving pupils a proper connected sense of what went on in the past. Ed Balls’s plans for five-minute lessons and writing Churchill out of the past are the complete opposite of that, and won’t give the next generation the understanding it deserves of our national story.”

An Anti-Terror Campaign

By Steven Plaut From Front Page Magazine.

After their military defeat by regular forces, the occupied population produced terrorists who engaged in bombings, sniping, poisonings, and other attacks on occupation forces and on the civilian population. They operated as irregulars in small terror units, armed with automatic weapons and bazookas.
Women and minors as young as eight participated in the terror attacks. They attempted to build weapons of mass destruction, using chemical poisons. They assassinated officials of the occupation regime. They had a special obsession with torturing and murdering "collaborators." They murdered hundreds of civilians, while thousands of the terrorists themselves were killed by the occupation armed forces. The occupiers responded to terror with brutality and force, sometimes using collective punishment.
The above does not refer to or describe the anti-American and anti-British terror in Iraq and Afghanistan. Nor does it describe Palestinian terrorism against Israel launched from the West Bank and Gaza.
What it does refer to is the campaign of terrorism directed against Allied forces in Europe in the aftermath of the defeat of Nazi Germany. The terrorists were members of a number of underground "resistance" organizations attempting to punish the Allied "occupiers" and drive them out. The most important of the terror groups was known as Werwolf (German for werewolf).

For the rest of the article go to:
http://www.frontpagemagazine.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=28945

Old Testament Link on 2600 year old Tablet

Source: The Australian. Go there for the full article.
http://www.news.com.au/story/0,23599,22060312-2,00.html

THE British Museum yesterday hailed a discovery within a clay tablet in its collection as a breakthrough for biblical archeology - proof of the accuracy of the Old Testament.
The cuneiform inscription in a tablet dating from 595BC has been deciphered for the first time - revealing a reference to an official at the court of Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, that proves the historical existence of a figure mentioned in the Book of Jeremiah.
It is rare evidence in a non-biblical source of a real person, other than kings, featured in the Bible.
Vatican calls itself the 'one true faith' » 4000-year-old snake sparks road rage »
The tablet names a Babylonian officer called Nebo-Sarsekim who, according to Jeremiah 39 was present in 587BC when Nebuchadnezzar "marched against Jerusalem with his whole army and laid siege to it".
The cuneiform inscription records how Nebo-Sarsekim lavished a gift of gold on the Temple of Esangila in the fabled city of Babylon, where, at least in folk tradition, Nebuchadnezzar is credited with building the Hanging Gardens, one of the Seven Wonders of the World.
British Museum staff are excited by the discovery. Irving Finkel, assistant keeper in the Department of the Middle East, said: "A mundane commercial transaction takes its place as a primary witness to one of the turning points in Old Testament history. "This is a tablet that deserves to be famous."
The discovery was made by Michael Jursa, associate professor at the University of Vienna, on a research trip to the museum. "It's very exciting and very surprising," he said.
"Finding something like this tablet, where we see a person mentioned in the Bible making an everyday payment to the temple in Babylon and quoting the exact date, is quite extraordinary."
Since 1991, Dr Jursa has been visiting the museum to study a collection of more than 100,000 inscribed tablets - the world's largest holdings.
Cuneiform is the oldest known form of writing. During its 3000-year history, it was used to write about 15 languages, including Babylonian, Assyrian, Hittite and Urartian.
There are only a small number of scholars worldwide who can read cuneiform script.

....Continued at source.

Ancient Egypt Quiz #2

Ancient Egypt II

1. Which Egyptian Goddess is depicted by a cow?
2. Which pharoah introduced monotheism to Egypt?
3. Who was his Queen?
4. Who was the son God?
5. Between which centuries did the Middle Kingdom exist?
6. Name the three most prominent cities during the period of the Middle Kingdom?
7. Under which pharoah was polytheism introduced into Egypt?
8. Which pharoah was likened by later historians to an Egyptian Napoleon?
9. Who was the mother of this pharoah?
10. Who was the Egyptian bull god?
11. Who according to mythology was creator of all the pharoahs?
12. Which people were Ramases II’s greatest enemy?
13. At which battle did Ramases II record his greatest victory over this enemy?
14. Which Englishman discovered Tut’s tomb?
15. What area of Egypt did the Hebrews reside in before the exodus?

Answers to Ancient Egypt II

1. Hathor
2. Akhaenton
3. Nephretiti
4. Ra
5. 18th to the 20th Century BC.
6. Thebes, Memphis and Luxor.
7. Tutankhamen
8. Ramases II.
9. Hatshepsut
10. Serapis
11. Ptah
12. Hittites
13. Battle of Kadesh.
14. Howard Carter.
15. Goshen