G'Day Drake,
I am an English Teacher in an Australian Public High School but I have always loved History so I have part of the NSW Syllabus here.
Australian History is of course much studied, particularly in Primary Schools where they also follow themes like Vikings or pirates or knights.
In the Years (or as you'd say Grades) from 7 to 10 in High school teachers have groups of content they can choose from:
Group A:
Ancient Societies:
Egypt, Greece,Rome,Near East,Britain, Celtic Europe, an Asian country, the Pacific, the Americas.
Group B:
Vikings, Medieval Europe, the Islamic World,an Asian country,the Pacific, the Americas, Africa, Revolutionary Europe in the 18th to 19th centuries. From the above lists students have to study at least one society from group A or B and one of them has to be non-European.
In 9 and 10 the focus is more on Australia and the World where the great international events like World War One and Two are studied.
This is just compulsory History- there is an Elective History too which could include the 'History of Rock and Roll' for example among many others.
In Years 11 and 12, students choose from Modern or Ancient History. They focus on Personalities like Julius Caesar or Stalin or Ho Chi Minh or Gandhi etc and particular societies/eras like Nazi Germany or the Vietnam War etc.
There's a lot of flexibility for teachers to pursue their special interests only hampered by what resources are in the book room. I imagine not much would be done on Ancient societies in the Pacific, for example, as nobody has written any school texts on this topic as far as I know.
Hope this is of use. A current History teacher here could tell you more,
regards

In the United State they apparently don't teach history at least that is what the results of many polls indicate. Few in the United States even know what's in the US Constitution and of those few even fewer actually understand what it says.

Here in Flanders, Belgium, I can only speak for the general high school.
The curricullum is the same in state or chatholic schools.
I also want to say my highschool has a very good historyreputation from the 4th grade, because the principal writes historybooks and he follows this subject (and the teachers) very strict

In the:

1st year of HS:
General explication about History (different sources,...) and Mesopotamia

2nd year of HS:
Greek Culture, Roman Culture (first the whole empire than East-Roman and West-Roman Empire)

3rd year of HS (476 - 1453 (fall of Constantinopel): Middle Ages):
- The Islamic culture
- the effect of the desintegration of the Roman Empire on Western Europe: the Francs, Charlemagne, Wars between European Countries (some stuff is also discussed in Dutch, French or English Classes, f.e. William the Conquerer), and special focus on the Netherlands (general term: incl. Flanders as the center of the world with cities like Antwerp, Ghent, Brussels, Bruges,Mechelen...)
- The Crusades
- In the end the discovery of the New World

4th year of HS (1492 - 1789)
- the New World: Spain and Portugal and the effects on natives (also N-America)
- The Renaissance, Humanism, Reformation and Contrareformation and their effects on the Low Countries
- Absolutism in Europe vs. The United Provinces of the Netherlands and the changes in Engeland (less power for the King/Queen)
- Enlightment: Montesqieu, Voltaire and Rousseau (French Literature is discussed in the 5th and 6th grade, incl. Bosh, Moliére,...)
- Industrial Revolution (economical and social effects)
- American Revolution (13 original colonies, etc.)
- French Revolution and Napoleon and the effects on the world and especially on the Low Countries

I have to say in the 5th and 6th I had an enormously good history teacher
5th year of HS (1815 - 1918)
- Congres of Vienna and the Restauration
- Belgium in the United Kingdom of the Netherlands under Willem I
- Belgian Revolution
-> special focus on Belgium during the whole year: in 1830 the most liberal constitution in the world, cleavages between Catholics and Liberals, later on focus on the evolution of social laws and total equality, Language Laws,...)
- and later on the different waves of Revolutions (in France, different kingdoms in Germany,
- Nationstates explained (nationalism)
- Civil society: democracy, liberalism,
- Second Industrial Revolution (incl. theories of Adam Smith, Marx, new scientific discoveries, syndicalism, Einstein, Hegel,...)
- Italian and German Unification
- Colonialism in the World (France, Germany, UK, Russia
=> with special focus on Congo-Freestate and Leopold II, later Congo as a colony of Belgium
- Upstep to WOI: War between France and Germany (also special focus in French classes on f.e. poetry about 'La Guerre Franco-Allemande)
-> 1870-1914: the different alliances explained
- WOI: very detailed (also incl. Literature, Poetry, Art, social, economical and political consequences) with also a 3-day visit to the Western part of Belgium


6th year of HS: ((1919-2006)
- Treaty of Versailles
- Russia: - February and October Revolution
- Lenin's reforms
- After Lenin: the 'batlle' between Stalin and Trotsky
- Stalin's Sovjet-Union: reforms the USSR, Great Massacres,...

- the United States: Roaring Twenties and the Great Depression
=> focus on F.D.R. and his New Deal
- The Outbreak of extreme right parties in Europe during the Interbellum:
=> special focus on Italy and Germany
- Flemish Momvement in Belgium: Dutch-speaking part of Belgium (the majority) asks (and finally gets) more rights
- Step by step to WOII (incl. the expansion of Japan)
-WOII itself and the Genocide (with a visit to a concentrationcamp in Belgium)
- The United Nations (also discussed in the Moralclass or in the Religion-classes if you are religious)
- China: nationalists vs. communists
- European Unification: step by step, the different treaties and the challenges of today for the EU.
-Decolonisation waves (Asia and Africa): focus on Congo and later on Mobutu and Kabilla and South Afrian Apartheid
-Cold War: NATO, Warshawpact, Cuban Missile Crisis,...Reagan's Star Wars, Berlin Bloccade, Vietnamwar, China vs. USSR,...
- Consequences of the desintegation of the USSR on Europe and the World
- America at the end of the 20th Century and the beginning of the 21st: Golf Wars, Military presence around the world, the increasing cleavage between poor and wealthy
- Globalisation
- Belgium and her institutional reforms from '70s until now

__________________
"Nos pays sont devenus trop petits pour le monde actuel, à l'échelle des moyens techniques modernes, à la mesure de l'Amérique et de la Russie aujourd'hui, de la Chine et de l'Inde demain. L'unité des peuples européens réunis dans les Etats-Unis d'Europe est le moyen de relever leur niveau de vie et de maintenir la paix. Elle est le grand espoir et la chance de notre époque. Nous aussi, nous allons vers notre but, les Etats-Unis d'Europe, dans une course sans retour."

Jean Monnet

In Russia history lessons are very funny. Still there are teachers who have taught that Communism is the only right way, but now they have to tell students it's wrong. =)