I am interested in what sorts of required history education exists in different countries. If I was a kid in your country going to a state school, and was of average intelligence, what would my experience be and what would I learn about? What places? What periods of time? Does your country separate kids into different schools (like the "Gymnasium") for professional routes vs other schools for kids who aren't as smart? What is emphasized more in your history experiences--skills or content knowledge?

I'm not interested in any sort of debate or flag waving on who does what better or whose kids are stupider--I'm just trying to understand how other systems work and what historical topics are taught. I teach world history and I am particularly interested in the extent to which European countries study other parts of the world as part of a required curriculum (especially amidst EU growth and the desire to maintain national identity).

In the US it is difficult to say because every state does it differently and schools in general have quite a bit of freedom in how they approach it and what classes they offer. From state to state, school to school, and teacher to teacher some are horrible and some are very good. Generally though, in the US history courses are part of a larger social sciences department. Almost universally there is a required separate US history, a required World History or Western Civilization course (depending on the school or state), and Government or Civics class is also typically required. Typically the last history class one takes is when they are 16-17 (Junior) when they they are a Senior (17-18) they typically take a Government course.

I teach World History and I will follow this post with a summary of the history of the concept of world history for anyone interested.

At around the start of the 20th century, the concept of "Western Civilization" as a means of understanding and teaching history was being developed. In part this was because of three main reasons.

• Growing international trade in an era of 19th century economic liberalism.
• Growing need to justify imperialism in which "Westerners" were seen as superior.
• European alliances and conflict--especially WWI--in which Europeans (and Americans) started to see themselves as having ancient historical bonds.

Thus, "Western Civ" came into existence and began being taught in universities and secondary schools. Prior to this, history education had been a mixed bag of classical and--for lack of a better word--ethnic/national studies. Sometimes western civ was called "world history" even though it was really just European history.

Then following WWII some people in America (at Colombia University) began to teach survey courses in regional global history in which students would study historical events on each continent. Some say this is because some Americans wanted students to know more about the world they were increasingly involved in. So regional global studies courses began to spread--although the narrative of "Western Civ" was still considered academically preeminent and more significant (and still is at the university level).

In the 1980s the current concept of "World History" came into existence in which continents are not studied separately but are examined together from a comparative perspective chronologically. So major themes and events during a period of time and what was happening in a variety of places during that time: what things make each place unique and what commonalities do they share? This model is the current consensus amongst those in the US like myself who specialize in World History (rather than those who just get "stuck" teaching it). Although many schools in the US—especially elitist schools--are still teaching Western Civilization courses and offer global education courses only as electives.

been to school in 7 different US states, only history requirement I ever encountered was 2 years of it in high school, 1 world history class and one US history class, both only skimmed the surface

and the required classes do vary quite a bit from state to state I found out along the way, California set me back one year cause their curriculum sucked, both Napa and Vallejo were 1-2 years behind what I was offered on the east coast

Drake you focus on European history, but would you be intereted in how we do it here in SA?We are an interesting study in history education, as the huge change in SA meant that were the focuss was on one groups history, it changed to the otehr side, and our history teachers have to find ways to teach things like Apartheid in such a way as not vicitmise or spread hate.

But if you are inerested, I will write something on it later.

AH

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Yes I am definitely interested in how people in every country teach history--including the troubling moments of their own past. My original though mainly was about how much Western cultures teach about non-western cultures. For this reason I put it in the Europe forum. But obviously that isn't the only thing to talk about. So please...tell more about history curriculum in South Africa!

you are lucky.we must have history from gr.3 to gr.13. now i study British and European history with Canadien history. nest year i will study History o f Québec and French civilisation. gr.11 to gr.13 there are world history with citizen education. this are very difficult when study much the religion and language.
.

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"Globalisation has made us more vulnerable."-Anna Lindh

"I don't have respect for the people that made the decisions
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history clases here are mainly about western europe. the middle ages and the rennaisance, the dynasties in europe and their empires, the french revolution, WW1 and 2, the post-war reconstruction, cold war and the colonisation of indonesia.
more eurocentric than most of us liked, we hardly learned anything about the independence of US for example.
and content mattered more than skill.

When I went to school, I think there were 5 years of history in elementary school (the school took 8 years), and 3 years in Gymnasium (which took 4 years to complete).
But history stopped in 1945 in both schools, as newer impartial textbooks were not yet available - only communist ones, which were not used.

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interesting thread drake. do you which regions tend to favor which method ?

When i was at school, we had a compulsory semester of Australian history. In year 12 we compared 2 revolutions (we did all three Russian one e.g. 1905, jan 1917 and oct 1917, comparing it too 1911 China and 1949 China). We then studied the Rise and Regime of a dictator (Stalin is who we did), the Great Depression (English, American and German focus) and then we studied WWII (we did that from a Chinese perspective).

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