[lit-ideas] Re: WWII? WTF?
- From: eternitytime1@xxxxxxx
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Tue, 02 Oct 2007 23:29:18 -0400
This sort of item is interesting for me because we usually think an entire
generation will understand and remember a defining event (WWII, the Vietnam
War, Paris Hilton's DUI). The article points out that WWII defined the second
half of the 20th century. WWII was easily the most significant event of the
20th century. It ended only 60 years ago. Yet today's kids are unaware of it.
HI, again,
It is interesting to me, too.
What is the point of knowing 'history'? And, what does one define as
'history'? The events and the dates? Why are they important?
Anyway--here is a fun article which I found, actually, posted on Stanford's
Education website--though it was actually publish barely across the border from
me in Kansas City, Kansas, in The Kansan.
Kind of intriguing--what Andreas said about people not remembering--yet...what
do any of us remember about things? (Isn't that part of the point of the
scrapbook that was found/used as a model in regards to the WWII project? Is
that why we take photos and (for those of use who scrapbook or do oral
histories) create our own histories? Why do we do this if not for those coming
after us--but do we (sometimes) create/take them for ourselves-to remember? Why
is that important?
Curious. Am still also thinking about John M's post about being religious and
being happy...
Best,
Marlena
Source
The Kansas City Kansan
Date
09-22-07
Sam Wineburg draws surprising conclusions about history education
Moments in History: The state of history education in our classrooms
September 22, 2007
The Kansas City Kansan
By Bryan LeBeau
“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” - George
Santayana (1905)
“History is more or less bunk.” - Henry Ford (1916)
Headline: “Ignorance of U.S. History shown by College Freshmen. Survey of 7,000
Students in 36 Institutions Discloses Vast Fund of Misinformation on Many Basic
Facts,” New York Times
Pontificating on the value of history has long been a cottage industry. Of the
hundreds of such observations, the philosopher George Santayana’s is probably
the most often cited, with captain of industry Henry Ford’s a close second. Be
that as it may, the fact that pundits and historians have spent so much time
addressing the value of history suggests that we have a deep, abiding
interesting in the past. As historian Peter Stearns has put it: “The human
impulse to ponder the past runs very deep.”
Why then the apparent ignorance of history attested to by test after test of
the nation’s youth. Hardly a school year goes by without yet another study
making the point. Limited space allows me time to reference only the two most
recent such studies. The first, published last year by the National Center for
Education Statistics for the United States Department Education, reported good
news! For the first time in several years, 12th graders showed gains in their
knowledge of history. Upon closer examination, however, we see that those gains
were minimal and well over half of those tested - 57% to be exact - continued
to fall below a “basic” level of knowledge of US history, which means that they
could not identify key people and events in the nation’s history.
Even more shocking was the release last year of the results of a survey done by
the Intercollegiate Studies Institute that showed college students - indeed
students at the most prestigious colleges and universities -- did little
better, or even worse in some cases. In the limited time and space I have
today, I would like to respond (if not adequately answer) just three questions:
First, is there anything new here? Second, how should we interpret such test
scores? And, finally, what might we do about it?
The first question can be answered briefly. Systematic student testing is a
relatively recent phenomenon, for better or worse. But occasional surveys of
older vintage suggest that concern about our knowledge of American history is
nothing new. Historian Sam Wineburg looked into the matter and found, by way of
example, the results of a study done in 1917, the year the United States
entered World War I. In that study 51 % of 1500 Texas elementary and high
school students failed to make the grade in measuring “what every student
should know” - not far off the most recent study.
Lest you explain that away by saying, but “that was in Texas,” Stearns found a
test done in 1943 - of the Greatest Generation -- this time of college freshmen
nationwide. The results were quite similar, once again. The New York Times
headline included above is not of recent vintage, as you might have thought,
but rather in reference to that study, dated April 4, 1943. So perhaps we
should not be so hard on our current school age children. Their parents and
grandparents, it would appear, did not do much better.
To answer the second question, let me begin by pointing to a study Wineburg
conducted recently. He used a fact based questionnaire to test the historical
knowledge of several historians, as well as high school students. Surprise! The
high schools students did better in identifying people, places, and events.
However, when he asked the two groups to make sense of a grouping of people,
places, and events and explaining historical documents related to them, not
only did historians score much higher, but students failed miserably. Students
had not developed the higher order thinking skills necessary to “connect the
dots.”
So what does this say about our tests of student knowledge? Perhaps we are
testing for the wrong things. If we are interested in providing our students
with “the facilities of historical thinking and reasoning, including the
mastery of core content” that leads to “more effective citizenship,” perhaps we
need to rethink what and how we teach. But is that reasonable to expect when
the tests whereby students and teachers are measured don’t test such things,
and when success or failure on those tests increasingly impacts funding,
careers, and even life choices.
Mind you I am not opposed to testing, even standardized testing. Indeed, that
is part of my job at KCKCC. We live in an age of accountability, and tests are
a part of that new age. So rather than calling for no, or even less, testing, I
and many others in education are calling for better testing - testing that
measures what really matters, not what is easily measured.
Having said that, our goal of a better testing of historical knowledge is not
so easily accomplished. Once again, for the sake of time and space, let me just
focus on one issue we need to overcome, and that is answering the obvious
questions of why we study history and what history is best studied. This was
the focus of a collection of essays in the March 2004 issue of The Journal of
American History - a collection worth pursuing if you have any interest in the
subject. In summary, those articles suggest that most Americans agree that we
do not study history as an end in itself. Most believe it essential to
promoting good citizenship. But then our consensus is lost.
Should our teaching, and knowledge, of history be broad or deep? Put another
way, should we know a little about many parts of history or more about fewer
things? Which is the best way to attain that level of understanding referred to
earlier as the lessons of history, not just the accumulation of facts and
figures?
On a deeper and more troubling level, however, there is widespread disagreement
over what history should be taught. Anyone who has given the subject any amount
of study has come to realize that our past consists of massive amounts of data
and information which is meaningless without some level of interpretation. As
we all also know, however, those interpretations vary, sometimes dramatically
(see for example my August 4 -6 article in the Kansan on points of view
concerning the dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki).
That leaves us with the far more perplexing and divisive question of which
interpretation or interpretations should we teach. Some readers will recall
Congress’s attempt in 1994 to establish national standards for what is taught
in the nation’s public schools and the uproar that followed publication of the
National History Standards. Pleas for a return to “traditional” history
followed, which some could not define but others criticized as too patriotic or
blind to the less flattering aspects of our past. From that point we fled into
armed camps with our own view of history, asking: “Whose history is it anyway?”
Today, we find ourselves mired in armed camps of “identity history,” whereby
each of us, either individually or in groups, have our own views of the past.
It is a situation made worse by those that argue that the absence of any hard
evidence to support their historical perspective matters less than how they see
it, perhaps agreeing with Henry Ford that, in the end, history is bunk, so why
not make the most of it. The result: a retreat into the laundry list of facts,
figures, and people - carefully balanced so as to be inclusive, of course --
with which we began, and with which it is less difficult, thought not
impossible, to quarrel.
As policy analyst Richard Rothstein has concluded, our failure to address the
questions of why history is important and what “kind” of history we ought to
teach and learn “renders standardized assessment impossible.” But stay tuned,
hardly a September comes and goes that is not soon followed by yet another
headline announcing the demise of the nation’s knowledge of the past. That,
certainly, is a well-established lesson from history.
Bryan Le Beau, historian and Dean of Institutional Services at the Kansas City
Community College, is a frequent contributor to the Kansas City Kansan.
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