to think it is outrageous that our children are not taught the truth about Britain's history?

[OneStroke]

Why aren't our children taught about, for example, the Biafran War, the effects of colonization, the legacies that these actions leave today?

It should be part of the national curriculum and if it was many people would not be as ignorant and complacent about their lives as they are.

Just a thought.

Whatever is taught someone will always find something that they think should have been included.There is only a finite time in the curriculum for each subject and it would be impossible to fit everything in.Why the Biafran War specifically?I dont think I know much about it and I am 65!!In what way would its inclusion benefit schoolchildren more than say the Falklands war??

I loved history at school, we studied the Vietnam war for GCSE, and it gripped me so much that we actually went there on our honeymoon .
Have to say I know very little about British history. We were watching the Tudors last week, and we were both confused as Cromwell was in it. DH said he was sure Oliver Cromwell was born after Henry viii died, so we looked it up and of course it was Thomas Cromwell.
Thinking about doing history as some kind of further education now.

Schools history PRoject

Ellie - don't you know that teachers are not allowed to get drunk any more

OP, why don't you teach your kids about it yourself?

Although I do agree that the national curriculum needs an overhaul its not just up to the school to educate our DC, surely part of being a good parent means bringing up children who aren't "ignorant and complacent about their lives"

Memoo I do teach my children about these things.

It is not fair to expect all parents to do this though as many do not have any idea themselves!

Racism is much more widespread in deprived areas where education is not valued at home.

It is children from these homes who would benefit from schools teaching them a more widespread view of the world.

I totally appreciate that history is a vast subject and obviously can't all be covered.

Its not really fair to say that education is not valued by people in deprived area.

I live in a so called deprived area, in a council house in the middle of a big estate.

I couldn't value the education of my children more! As do many of the families who live around me.

For many of us living in poorer areas, ensuring our DC get a good education is vital, as that is the only way they will have a better standard of living themselves when they are adults.

I also see it a my role to ensure that my DC don't grow up to be racist. In fact I would be gutted if they grew up to be racist or homophobic etc

TBH I think your assumption that education is not valued in homes in deprived areas and that racism is more widespread is a slightly prejudice viewpoint in its self.

I think our teaching of history was really very good. At A level history teacher deliberately gave me the topic of the Holocaust to prepare, as one of only 3 non Jewish students in the class, & god, did I prep that one carefully and thoroughly, given that some students had lost family.

The only poor teaching I had was in yr 9 when a new 'right-on' Head of History patronised the black students in our class, which they ruthlessly exploited. For about 4 weeks in a row, D would claim A had called him a racially offensive name and then the teacher would take 25 minutes to explain why that was wrong. D&A were best friends Having realised he might have been taken for a mug, he then did slavery but was a bit out of his depth when a boy with Ghanaian ancestry told the rest of the black students his family has sold them into slavery [that was a week of diversionary lessons too ].

Seeing what is taught as "World" history I am so glad that I went to an International School.

History is written by the victors in most cases. The "truth" is always more complex than that.

I've only learnt the Romans coming to England, The Industrial Revolution and the Romanovs. We did all of them about 8 times each. I'm a bit about the waste.

In Scotland I did History and Economic History - two separate subjects, 2 individual 'H' qualifications.

I thought that was much better than one subject.

My DS (10) is starting to be quite interested in history, thanks to CBBC's "Horrible Histories" - and, I've managed to get him reading the books that the program is based on . It's all the minutae of history - what people ate, what grooming they carried out/were subjected to etc. All the stuff that makes the past personal rather than the big stuff of who won what battle (and wrote the history books). So maybe these details are 'true' because they were too small for the victors to care about. Anyway, the point I'm trying to make is, he's not interested in the big broad sweep but the up-close-and-personal, that's what has brought history alive to him.

Oh for gods sake, when are the Normans going to apologize for 1066, the Vikings raping and pillaging before them, the Germans for their little hiccups, the Argentinians for the Falklands, Scotland for Gordon brown.
I mean grow up and see the country now with a massive mix of cultures.
Final point show me an African country that has developed since the end of colonialism. There is still slavery in much of West Africa, India & Asia and we did NOT invent slavery we did however apply modern business practices to it that all.
So no we do not need to make our children sorry for actions that happened far before they were born.
We should be proud of our great heritage and our seemingly never ending ability to absorb millions of people in to one of the most amazing countries on earth.

In response to the OP's title, because there is no 'truth', just subjective opinions about cause and effect, regardless of which period or event in history being taught.

Choices have to be made about which are the most 'important' bits. Again this is a subjective opinion.

We were forbidden from being taught Scottish history in school. (1960's Scotland) or sex ed come to think about it.

I agree with your sentiments OP. Tbh I am more interested in teaching children how to think critically. The 'who did what & when' of history are the framework upon which the real meaty stuff is attached.

There is no right view of history. How could there be. You can choose to vary the view point but you are never going to have a subjective neutral 100% accurate story. There is only so much history you can teach in a school career - and teaching pupils about the Biafran war for example is simply pursuing an agenda in the same way as teaching about WWII.

I'm a history teacher in an independent prep school and our curriculum is Britain-centric for sure, but we do also teach how to rigorously question the available evidence, how to construct and support a logical discussion and why 'history' is an ever-evolving body of knowledge. It's a popular subject - often cited as a child's 'favourite'. We do teach about the negative effects of imperialism, rampant industrialization, etc and by no means tub thump about Britain's 'greatness' - but neither do we run its achievements down.

dancingnakedintherain - I did the same GCSE course as you - only we did the Arab-Israeli conflict instead of China (and I think some people did Northern Ireland). The fourth element was a personal research project on a local building. I loved the history of medecine and know a lot more about Mormons and barbed wire, due to the "history of the Wild West."

In France they start with pre-history and work through to the present day. We dotted about all over the place - Greeks, Romans and Vikings then Tudors and Stuarts, then WW1 and WW2 in the first three years. Very hazy on lots of bits of history and most overseas history.

In the US, my high school DCs did Western Civilization, which started in prehistory and covered pretty much every continent (still puzzled about 'Western' in title). They covered history topically; economics, empires/ political, technology, including warfare through the ages, social (this meant women, children, religion). It was a very broad course, and the teachers focused on teaching them how to construct an argument using the available sources. Writing and rhetorical skills are taught in depth in the US, I found, and history is the main way to use lessons learned in English class. My DCs were expected to weave different authors' viewpoints and different philosophical interpretations (economic, conservative, liberal, etc.) into their essays, and also produce research papers. Their elementary school exposure to history wasn't really useful, but their English classes were. I think you get out of history class what the teacher is prepared to put into it; I was delighted and grateful to see the huge effort my DCs' teachers seemed to be putting in.

Need to add this was only their first year high school course, (age 14). They then moved on to American history, then an elective (oldest DD did Middle Eastern history).