Cristopher Colombia in primary school curriculum

[Donotfitin]

So the school just sent the curriculum
for my DS year (Y1). They called him a “significant explorer”. I immediately queried it, because as a Latin American he’s seen as a very divisive figure who brought rape, disease, and genocide. In my country (Mexico) we’ve completely removed that date from
our calendar, and the statues, etc… have now been removed.

I‘m not against it, but I just want a nuanced approach. So AIBU?

It has also attracted the closet racists of MN. ‘How dare she question the education her child is receiving, when she is from a different country’.

Are people being wilfully obtuse on this thread?? The poster wants the history to be taught as accurately as possible and is querying this. She is not saying that it should not be taught at all.

This is year 1. It will be looking at a map and drawing pictures of ships.

OP

Things have to be taught in an age appropriate way. When primary children learn about WWII they are taught about evacuation, they are not taught about some of the horrific atrocities. They might learn bout Anne Frank but not the details that are either in the diary or events that occurred around them.

I believe some are!

Exactly this. I learned about WWII at primary and for some reason missed it during secondary. For years I thought WWII was evacuation, rationing and a bit of jolly singing in air raid shelters. I didn’t know about the destruction of cities, the deaths in bombing raids, the ptsd, the civilian massacres in Europe, the rape in Berlin. I didn’t even know much about the Holocaust.

The horrors are not appropriate for primary so you have to teach a sanitised version or avoid completely.

This. I don't think we should start censoring history.
As you say, he *is a significant historical figure.
I do think though that not enough is taught in school about the colonizing aspect of history though - it's glossed over and glamorized.
Say what really happened! (age appropriately of course)

But if the Columbus story is not age-appropriate for Year 1 then maybe it just shouldn't be taught until a later age, rather than being sanitised.

It would be like saying Stalin was a "significant leader in the 20th century" without mentioning the gulags and the awful human rights abuses that he perpetrated.

Why is everyone just commenting without looking up what’s actually on the ks1 curriculum? It’s not a secret, there is loads available online to see what should be covered. If you’re not sure, look up bbc bitesize - it’s a really good resource. What you learnt at school 30 years ago isn’t the best guide to how things are taught now.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/subjects/zkqmhyc

indigenous people are people who are native to the land.

But again these are historical things that have become more modern. Canada 'celebrates' Queen Victoria's birthday as a bank holiday. But to most Canucks it's May two four weekend. I couldn't give a toss about celebrating her birthday but enjoy the bank holiday.

In that vein, we celebrate Canada Day which loosely is the day we became a country. Should we not celebrate it as it marks our divorce from the original colonisers (British, French....) but celebrates the creation of a country from the Indigenous people? Then to further complicate, which colonisation is horrific, many of the indigenous people fought with the colonisers - war of 1812 - French/Hurons vs English/Iroquois.

Most colonisers weren't great people - including some of the founding fathers who owned slaves including George Washington and Thomas Jefferson but are important historical people in terms of the creation of the US and writing of the constitution.

We can identify these things, but rewriting history through a modern lens certainly isn't simple and can be naive.

My original point, tho, was not to re-write history but to give it a factual recitation. I don't think his name ought to be attached to a lovely extra day of holiday and whilst he might be 'significant', because let's face it, who's heard of Prince Henry of Portugal, he should not be celebrated.

Do you mean Henry the Navigator? I've heard of him.