US History

[videogamerz2000]

Even though I don't like history I'll talk....
Todays events revovle around stuff that happened years ago, should have already been solved and take trucks full of paper work to do. Now, I haven't learned everything about everything and I don't know anything about the Cuban Missile Crisis, but I do know this. 9-11 was a cry to signify, let's put an end to the crap and move on to bigger and more important things. But what did Bush do? And more crap to the already-big-enough pile. I may be just Canadain but I do know that, sorry Bush, time for the adults to talk now.

[Viper Daimao]

im not sure i understand what you're talking about. 9-11 was a cry to put an end to the crap? sounds idealic but lacks reality.

from what i've heard from a lot of people, it seems schools are hit and miss. I was in a very good school and took AP US history that used a college text book. I had an excellent teacher that all the students loved. I did a report on the cuban missile crisis, watched documentaries on LBJ, read about the gulf war(though I do actually remember it happening when I was a kid) history is a great thing, but we cant cover everything in the small amount of time, you have to go out and learn on yourself. and to call US history pathetic, is a gross mistatment.

[videogamerz2000]

Yeah, I kinda ramble on in some ways, and that's why I almost fail my essays, time and time again. But for sure, in Canada, my teachers are always on the right foot and know when and how this stuff actually affects the world. Course, half the time i'm not paying attention.....

[Illuminatus]

Originally Posted by DarthZeth

Yeah, school fucking sucks.

Zeth= My Hero.

[Dystopian Rhetoric]

I love history my self. It isn't really much the same as it is over there... since its mainly British history we're studying... except this past two years when I've been taking my GCSEs. My school has decided to focus on 4 modules, Nazi Germany, 1920s America, America 20th Century Study and British Politics at the beginning of the 20th Century. I don't particularly find much of this American history, of which our studies focus on, very interesting at all.

[Osterbaum]

You should study about other nations history than only the US and Britain.

[DarthZeth]

man, 1920s America? that is pretty boring.

[Dynamite Kid]

As I hold a History degree and am on for my Master's at the moment, I strongly support a better History programme. The first and most vital mistake that public school 'educators'
make is using exams as a marker of student success in the subject. The professional historian, just like the professional mathematician or doctor, is allowed to look at the fact books. The historian is supposed to use the facts available to make analyses and advance opinions. If it were simplly writing down stuff that happened, it would be a worthless exercise.

The American History cirriculum is one of blatant misstatements, just like any other 'national' history. Most people don't know how unpopular the American War of Independence was at the time it was fought, or think that English is the official language of the United States. People don't even know that the rivalry between Soviet Russia and the West began in 1917, not Post-WWII. Eh, it's really the book writers' and parents' faults, not the students who are forced to take in this pap. They didn't decide that some foggy notion of 'citizenship' and 'you don't mess around with God's America' was more important than fact.

[Ravenhurst]

Originally Posted by DarthZeth

EDIT: did i mention that schools are used as mild propaganda mills by teachers? and that their are set up in such a way to teach you how to be employees rather then leaders?

The purpose of extending compulsory education to twelve grades was to prepare kids for factory work. You can still see remnants of this in the educational system, i.e. severe punishments for being late or absent but little to no punishment for not learning or poor grades.

[Atma]

It's threads like these that reminds me of how stupid I am.

I have a decent knowlege of History; I know where the Aztecs were and where they lived, I know when WWI took place and why, I know where Neopleon was born and how he came into power, I know how the United States of America was created, and I know how the Cuban missile crisses went down. A lot of this was learned last year by my TERRIFIC history teacher, and others from just watching TV, surfing the 'net or reading books.

Truthfully, I don't learn much from school, but that's probably just as much as my fault as it is there's. I'm half asleep most of the time due to my habit of nodding of around midnight. Consequently, I usually wing the tests and essay's and squeak by with a C. Hey, at least it's passing.

Right now, in my world cultures class, we just finished the History of China. Booooooooring. We basicaly spent the past 3 months learning that China kept to themselvs for hundreds of years, with next to no technological advances, no wars, no nothing. They shunned out foriegners and ideas and concluded that they were "barbaric". Then they had the Opium war, which forced them to give up Hong Kong to Britan, and open up trade routes. Hell, even nowadays, China is slowly coming out of being a 3rd world country. Did you know that the SNES is in full swing right now over there? Yeah.