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naraburns  nihil supernum  1yr ago (text post)   31611 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of January 16, 2023

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It would be better for students spending an entire year reading (1) Paine, (2) Declaration, (3) Articles of Confederation, (4) federalist papers, (5) anti-federalist papers, (5) constitution, (6) Jefferson and Adam’s correspondences, and (7) key early cases (eg Marbury, Gibbons). That provides a much more detailed American history background compared to…AA history.

I think this a narrow and parochial view of American history that almost no contemporary scholars would subscribe to. High politics is, of course, very important, but so is economic history and social history. A student who has a detailed knowledge of the federalist papers and related debates in the early republic, or in later periods congressional debates etc. still has a fundamentally incomplete understanding of American history if that's all they know about.

It's an elective. They will be taking this course in addition to a US History survey course, not instead.

Scarcity is a thing. Doing this means doing less of other things including an in depth review of more important American history.

My guess is a lot of the things I list are covered only in a cursory manner. Do high school students read all the federalist papers? Do they know there are anti federalist papers? Do they understand the importance of the constitution in relation to foreign bond holders?

Scarcity is indeed a thing, but no student will ever get a complete and in depth understanding of every period of American history, that's just not realistic. So there are going to have to be some somewhat arbitrary decisions on what to cover and what not to cover, elective classes just means students are choosing what they cover in depth, which is fine.

Well my point is it makes sense in scarcity to prioritize the important items.

What I'm saying is that there isn't really such thing as 'objective' importance in history. Is the high politics of the early republic more or less important than, say, the experience of small farmers or urban workers or slaves in the same period? Who is 'objectively' worth more class time, Roosevelt or Wilson? Washington or Lincoln? There are no correct answers to these questions, it's just preference really.

US constitution is indeed far more important and in the States interest to make sure citizens learn it. It’s literally why we have public schools.

And yea there are correct answers to these questions.

I don't deny that there are some things definitely important enough that all children should learn about them, in America the constitution and its creation obviously being one of them. However, there isn't a strict heirarchy of importance, even if there are some things clearly worth teaching, and in circumstances with a finite time available for learning what you cover can come down to preference more than anything else.

And yea there are correct answers to these questions.

What are they then, and how do you arrive at them. How does one decide which Presidents, for instance, deserve 'objectively' more coverage than others?

Hard disagree. But I think we will need to agree to disagree on this one

You seem to be arguing that the mandatory US History survey course should be two years, which is fine. But that leaves less room in student schedules for all AP classes, not just this one. Do you oppose offering AP Stats or AP Bio for the same reason?

I would probably reduce ELA specific classes (writing can be learned in say history) and keep AP stats and Bio.

But yes, I think we need to be more critical of curriculum in general and these more non central classes in specific. Especially given that some of what is covered in these non central classes would be covered in say American history (you will be investigating some slavery in general American history). But I think the current scheme is woefully under serving students.

My sister in law went to an allegedly good high school and a fine university. She didn’t know what the 3/5 compromise was. What we have right now isn’t working.

I would probably reduce ELA specific classes (writing can be learned in say history)

YES, YES, YES. See my comments in this thread, where someone was arguing against HS history altogether.

It would be fascinating to arrange the Federalist and Antifederalist Papers as a Reddit-style discussion tree. I’d definitely read them that way.

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