[lit-ideas] Re: WWII? WTF?
- From: "Edward Gleason" <egleason@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: "Lit-Ideas" <lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Tue, 02 Oct 2007 17:09:40 -0400
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Crystal:
This was posted to the
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You will find it FASCINATING!
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>>> "Andreas Ramos" <andreas@xxxxxxxxxxx> 10/2/2007 4:39 PM >>>
For class of S.F. high school juniors, WWII details are elusive
Nanette Asimov, Chronicle Staff Writer
Tuesday, October 2, 2007 (SF Chronicle)
If high school juniors' answers to a World War II questionnaire
were
strung together, here's how history would look:
World War II took place in 19-something, when Theodore Roosevelt
was
president and the Germans claimed to be the best race.
Hoping to aid Third World countries, the United States joined the
war to
stop racism and end the dispute over Jews.
The head of the Nazis was a killer named Hitler whose evil partner,
Mussolini, was president of the USSR. Ultimately, the war ended with
the
bombing of Iwo Jima and Hitler's suicide. Then a treaty was signed.
Not every 11th-grader who answered a Chronicle questionnaire at San
Francisco's Burton High School responded with such a fractured version
of
history. Eight of the 34 students said correctly that "Roosevelt" or
"FDR"
was president during most of the war, apparently remembering the
subject
they had studied as sophomores last spring. Most knew about the
attempted
genocide of the Jews, all but three recognized Hitler, and eight
placed
the war in the 1940s.
But others, perhaps suffering a temporary memory lapse, variously
named
George Washington, Teddy Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, Richard Nixon and
Winston Churchill as the war's main president. Eighteen students
wisely
left the answer blank.
"It's a bit disappointing," sighed their teacher, Theresa Quindlen,
head
of Burton High's history department, who agreed to let The Chronicle
quiz
her students and print the results. "But maybe something will spark
their
interest, and they'll become future readers of history."
Once omnipresent, World War II transformed how members of an
earlier
generation understood their world.
But for the generation coming of age in the new millennium, the war
that
defined the second half of the 20th century has receded into the dust
of
history - and the pages of social studies textbooks.
The state Board of Education is explicit about what students should
be
taught about World War II. But kids' knowledge of their grandparents'
war
- and increasingly their great-grandparents' war - often depends on
what
they learn on their own.
Students spend about 10 days learning about World War II in the
spring
semester of their sophomore and junior years. Some teachers, including
Quindlen, go deeply into the war, even inviting Holocaust speakers to
class.
Other teachers spend less time, knowing students will get the
subject
again as juniors. But in 11th grade, some teachers say they gloss over
the
war in favor of other subjects because students studied it as
sophomores.
Lack of time is a widely held frustration - especially for history
teachers, whose subject only grows each year.
Many hope World War II is enticing enough for students to study on
their
own. One of Quindlen's 10th-graders, 14-year-old Jacky Cheng, did just
that. He missed only one question - on Rosie the Riveter - though he
had
never studied the war in school.
In hopes that more kids will be similarly inspired, Quindlen, like
some
other Bay Area teachers, is giving students extra credit for watching
the
Ken Burns series "The War," being aired on PBS.
One student watching with interest is 15-year-old Yvane Mirabuena,
a
sophomore who learned about the war from her father, who related
stories
he had heard from his father, Gerardo Mirabuena.
Yvane's grandfather, then 19, joined the U.S. Army in the
Philippines.
In early 1942, he was among tens of thousands of U.S.-led troops who
were
sick and starving during a hopeless defense on the Bataan Peninsula.
They
surrendered to the Japanese - and conditions grew even worse.
The Japanese force-marched them 90 miles through treacherous
conditions
to
a prison camp.
"He was a lot of times beaten by the Japanese with guns," Yvane
said. "He
starved. He never had enough sleep. He got malaria, and he was
dehydrated."
Just 3 out of 4 soldiers survived the Bataan Death March. One was
Yvane's
grandfather.
Because of Mirabuena's service, he and his family were able to
immigrate
to the United States.
"He came here for a better life," Yvane said.
Although she and her classmates have not yet studied the war, Yvane
and
most of the 34 sophomores answering the questionnaire recognized
Hitler
and knew Pearl Harbor had something to do with the start of the war.
Twenty seniors, having studied the war twice, did somewhat better.
Yet
few
could identify Churchill or Mussolini, and not everyone was certain
who
was president during most of the war.
"There is an absolute need to know about World War II," said Jill
Rice,
the state Department of Education's expert on history curriculum. "It
shaped modern society. It defined a lot of current social norms. In
America, it sent women to the workplace."
And after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, the lessons of
World
War II took on new relevance, said Rice.
The camps where Japanese American civilians from the West Coast
were
interned "were always a really hard concept for my students to get
until
Sept. 11," she said.
That's when people of Middle Eastern descent became targets of
rising
hostility. "And for the first time, students could understand that,"
Rice
said.
Other events of the war may be just as tricky: The Rape of Nanking
and
the
Final Solution, for example.
Each spring, the state expects sophomores to learn about those as
they
analyze the causes and consequences of the war, while juniors focus on
U.S. participation, digging into everything from Tuskegee airmen to
the
use of atomic bombs.
Like many experienced teachers, Quindlen looks for ways to humanize
the
war, telling students the story of her great-aunt, who never married
after
her fiance was killed in the war, or showing "Saving Private Ryan."
She
also invites them to choose their own World War II essay topic, from
the
Manhattan Project to the graffito character Kilroy.
At Palo Alto High, a lightbulb lit for 11th-grade history teacher
David
Rapaport a few years ago when a student's father handed him a World War
II
scrapbook he'd found in a dumpster.
"It was amazing," Rapaport said. "It was in perfect condition."
A soldier's wife named Barbara Costello had saved not only letters,
telegrams and military orders, but every napkin and receipt remotely
related to the service of her husband, William Costello.
Last year, Rapaport asked his students to trace the soldier's life.
The kids spent the year learning about the man, and ended up writing
a "A
Soldier's Scrapbook," a colorful, 40-page book they published
themselves.
It's part World War II history, part love story. A photo of the
couple's
graves is on the back cover.
"Instead of listening to and reading history, we have uncovered it
ourselves," writes Ali Arams, one of the book's 150 authors. "Our
class
has discovered history like no one else has before." World War II quiz
Test your World War II knowledge - or your children's. This
Chronicle
questionnaire was administered in San Francisco to 36 sophomores, 34
juniors and 20 seniors - but without benefit of multiple-choice
options.
Below is a multiple-choice version of the quiz, with each choice -
incorrect, correct and nearly correct - taken from the students'
original
answers.
1. When was World War II?
a. 1700
b. 1939 to 1945
c. Europe: 1930 to 1945; U.S.: 1941-1945
d. 1967
2. Who was president during most of World War II?
a. Woodrow Wilson
b. Theodore Roosevelt
c. Franklin Delano Roosevelt
d. Harry Truman
3. Who was Winston Churchill?
a. Prime Minister of the U.K.
b. General of the U.S.
c. A dictator
d. Some important dude
4. Who was Adolf Hitler?
a. Super evil guy
b. Nazi leader
c. Killer of Jews
d. All of the above
5. Who was Benito Mussolini?
a. Soviet leader
b. An explorer
c. Dictator of Italy
d. A columnist
6. Who was Rosie the Riveter?
a. Icon of U.S. female participation in the war
b. A protester
c. Gay gang member
d. Congressman
7. What caused the U.S. to join World War II?
a. Fighting over Hawaii
b. Revenge
c. Zimmerman's note
d. The bombing of Pearl Harbor
8. How did World War II end?
a. Two atomic bombs were dropped in China
b. Hitler's suicide
c. Germany lost as Allies pushed into Berlin, Japan was bombed by
two
atom
bombs, and Emperor Hirohito surrendered.
d. Americans and Russians freed the Jews
9. What was the war about?
a. Racism
b. Communism
c. Boston tea
d. Liberation of Europe and the Pacific
10. What was the Holocaust?
a. Genocide of over 6 million Jews and others
b. Slavery
c. Killing of those that weren't white
d. People looking down on Jews
ANSWERS:
1. b; 2. c; 3. a; 4. d; 5. c; 6. a; 7. d; 8. c; 9. d; 10. a
Students' WWII memoir
"A Soldier's Scrapbook" is a book by 150 students from Palo Alto
High
School that tells the story of their year-long investigation into a
World
War II scrapbook rescued from a Santa Clara dumpster by a parent.
During the year, the students learned plenty about the soldier who
was
the
subject of the scrapbook, and his wife, who created it. Coincidently,
the
couple, Barbara and William Costello, had lived in Palo Alto, and
their
children attended Palo Alto High. The students produced 500 colorful,
40-page paperbacks with the help of a $3,000 grant from their school's
site council. The students are selling the books for $10 and will put
the
proceeds back into the site council fund.
To buy one, send an e-mail to their history teacher, David Rapaport,
at
drapa port@xxxxxxxxxx Or place a phone order at the school by calling
(650) 329-3836. - Nanette Asimov
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