So I live in the US and I'm just wondering what history classes are like for the people living everywhere else. I know that we take world history and American history and a few other things I can't seem to think if but I guess what I'm trying to figure out is if you learn the same thing as us. One main thing is the Civil War. Do they teach you about that in countries other than the US?
I never learned about the American Civil War in school (I went to school in Ireland). We got a very rough overview of the American Revolution (enough to know about the Boston Tea Party, when the US got its independence, and who George Washington was and what he did, but not much else). We also spent a month or two on the Cold War. Other than that we had no education about American history. We also did a bit about the French Revolution and the Jacobin Reign of Terror, and quite a lot about the Nazis and World War Two. Most of our history education was focused on Ireland.
Gosh I can remember very little of what I learnt in History lessons, even though it was my favourite subject. I don't think we studied the American civil war, but I think we did the English civil war. Erm, the industrial revolution, French revolution, quite a bit about WW1/WW2 probably (I remember there was something called the Treaty of Verseilles), the suffragette movement. I think I remember learning about the Roaring 20s/Wall Street Crash/Great Depression. There was a lot about Tudor political history if I remember correctly.
In AS level history it was split into English and European history. I was out of my mind back then and have absolutely no idea what I did the whole year though.
Primary school history topics were best. We learnt about Romans and Vikings in year 3 (though I can take or leave that far back in history) and in year 4 we did the Victorian era which was the best thing ever, and seemed to be mixed with a lot of arty projects. It was so much fun. We went to Beamish open air museum, Cragside Hall in Northumberland, we had a Victorian dressing up day, and we learnt about Impressionism and paper quilling. We also got to read one of my very favourite stories (The Secret Garden). Gosh, primary school could be amazing. I wish I could go back for a week.
Even in the US apparently we teach differing things on the Civil War, which I find fascinating! I worked with a girl last summer who was from the deep South (I'm from the midwest), and she said they learned about the "War of Northern Aggression," which the Confederacy apparently won made evident by the fact that the North is no longer occupying them! Not what you were asking I know, but interesting to think that even in our own country we're not all teaching the same thing.
Even in the US it's different by region. Here in California, we focused on US history as a whole and then also what affect it had on us here. Agriculture was brought up quite a bit more because of this being a major agricultural hub. Because of the shame of it all, Japanese internment during WWII was left out while my cousin learned about it back in North Carolina. Our history lessons about the world wars were minimal, actually.
Wow I never thought that even in the US we would be learning different things.
We have a girl in my school who moved from California who tells us they learned a lot about the gold rush but we never really did that in Ohio so I guess I should've know it would be different.
I'm sitting on the edge with my two best friends ones a bottle of pills and ones a bottle of gin-Hollywood Undead
Yeah, what Shannon said is a good point too - I think in every state, at least in my experience, there's at least one year of specific state history. And I think this sort of thing holds true all over the world as far as learning history! My German friend Lana (who may pop into this thread to tell you more about it herself!) and I have talked a bit about how differently we learned about WWII in school. I think it's always going to be colored by where you live and how whatever event it is affected your area. So the Civil War, which you initially asked about, might not have made a big appearance in most non-American world history classes just because while it did have a minor impact on some other countries there's so much to learn in world history and not enough time to do it! Whereas to Americans, it's a big part of the formation of our country.
Even in the US apparently we teach differing things on the Civil War, which I find fascinating! I worked with a girl last summer who was from the deep South (I'm from the midwest), and she said they learned about the "War of Northern Aggression," which the Confederacy apparently won made evident by the fact that the North is no longer occupying them! Not what you were asking I know, but interesting to think that even in our own country we're not all teaching the same thing.
Wow, I've never even heard of anyone calling the Civil War the "War of Northern Aggression." That's amazing.
We learnt: Egyptians, Ancient Greece, Ancient Rome, about Knights and Kings and Castles, the Stone Age and it's different stages and how people lived in a community etc., a lot of Empires [most of which were German I guess, even if one of them is the Holy Roman Empire], French Revolution, Napoleon, World War I & II.
We do learn about English and American History in English class, maybe the upside of having it as an extra subject. I remember learning about the British Empire, Apartheid, Australia and even Irish History. I definitely talked about the American Civil War, but that was in Social Studies class in my 12th year. Social Studies here being a mix of history, politics and economics. Also, a lot of English and American History is still known about here when you don't learn about it in school because of its representation in popular media etc. We also learn about the New World and the settlers etc.
On World War II and how History is different depending on where you live: we don't dare to leave out the more shameful parts of our History. Instead, they beat you over the head with it at least three or four times during your school career and make you feel guilty and personally responsible for the Holocaust. Quite frankly, I don't think it is ALL the legit to do it like that. Hopefully they will find better ways to teach about it and teach personal responsibility for the individual over what is going on in their country.
We also learn a lot about post WWII Germany and how it was split into the BRD and the DDR and what life in the DDR [it has a different name in English but ceeb to look it up, it was the part of Germany that the Soviets got] was like etc.
Last edited by Unbreakable. : 29-11-2013 at 11:31 AM.
It's all about perception I guess, because some of them wholeheartedly believe it! I was shocked too.
That's an interesting point too about learning some of it in English class, I hadn't even thought about that! We definitely do some history/culture in our foreign language classes that we might never get around to in history classes as well, at least we did at my high school.
Glad I managed to summon you as you have much more to contribute to this topic than me! And always good to know my summoning powers are still intact. :P
One main thing is the Civil War. Do they teach you about that in countries other than the US?
I got taught about the civil war in my history class. The english civil war with Cromwell, miserable *****ing bastard he was, took all the fun out of everything when he gained power (he won the civil war) and when he died they asked King Charles I son to rule the country, though Parliament would have most of the power. So Charles II came along and he decided he wanted to move the capitol from London to Winchester and started building a palace there. He died before it was completed and the next guy went 'er, **** that, London is the capitol. ' So they used the palace as barracks.
When you say civil war though you should call it the American Civil War, because there have been quite a lot of civil wars throughout the world.
What else I learnt, I think every school child in England (can't say about Scotland or Wales because curriculum is different) learnt about the Battle of Hasting in 1066. Then we learnt about Kings and Queens and the Romans and the Vikings. Basically everyone who invaded Britain, or tried. We learnt about Victorian time and the introduction of mass production and a bit about the British Empire, though funnily enough nothing about the cruelty inflicted by the British Empire.
I could probably write a small essay on what I was taught in history because I did it at A level too,but I'm bored now so I wont.
Never forget what you are for the rest of the world will not.
Wear it like armor and it can never be used to hurt you
You'd think the nonexistence of the Confederate States of America would tip them off. Then again, since so many of them paint the Confederate flag on their pickup trucks, maybe they're unaware of that.
I went to school in England and did a lot about the Tudor's (which I now have an obsession with) also a lot about Roman's, ancient Greece, Victorian's, Industrial Revolution, Stuarts (mainly the gunpowder plot and the English Civil War)Battle of Hasting's, WWI and WWII, then GCSE history was pretty much 20th century onwards, we did Votes for women, the wall street crash and great depression (there we looked at America a lot and Roosevelt and his reforms) then a lot on the Cold War, bits on the two world wars, the iron curtain, Berlin Wall.
But I know a lot more history because I have a real interest for it (although it is pretty much all British or English history) My American history is poor. But as I said I'm completely obsessed with the Tudor period and know many facts about it and read a lot of books about it.
"Never be a spectator of unfairness or studpidity. The grave will supply plenty of time for silence." Christopher Hitchens
'When words fail, music speaks'
I am transsexual and homoromantic and proud to be.
We learnt: Egyptians, Ancient Greece, Ancient Rome, about Knights and Kings and Castles, the Stone Age and it's different stages and how people lived in a community etc., a lot of Empires [most of which were German I guess, even if one of them is the Holy Roman Empire], French Revolution, Napoleon, World War I & II.
I also went to school in Ireland and learned this basically. You know I still regret not doing history for leaving cert, the only reason I didn't was cos I heard it was all essays, but I was actually very good at essays so I should have. I did geography instead, it was so boring cos my teacher sucked (I had her for maths and as my tutor too, she sucked at everything). I think history would have been more interesting and useful than geography.
I think it's really interesting that you guys have geography as a subject that you study in depth! Probably explains a lot about American's generally poor geography skills that we don't. We did map studies when I was 8-9 years old, and had to learn to label the 50 states in 5th grade, but that was about it! The closest we had at my school was AP Human Geography, which I took in 9th grade, but that isn't really the same at all and hardly anyone took it. What kind of things do you do in a geography class? Like, is it all learning to label a map, or is it more than that?
Geography for me was hardly anything about where in the world places are, we did a lot about different types of rivers, different types of land stuff like volcanoes, earthquakes, tetonic plates etc. I hated geography, found it so boring and gave it up as soon as I could. My geography in terms of where places are is quite poor, even where places are in the UK is poor, before I moved north I literally knew the county I lived in and London and a few places further south, anywhere north of London was a mystery, even now that I live in Manchester I still hardly know where anywhere is. My American geography is extremely poor, I think I know where roughly 3/4 states are, otherwise I know nothing about it. But I've never been that interested in geography and as I say hated it at school.
"Never be a spectator of unfairness or studpidity. The grave will supply plenty of time for silence." Christopher Hitchens
'When words fail, music speaks'
I am transsexual and homoromantic and proud to be.
We also had to label the 50 states but not until 8th grade and we had an advanced placement history class in 9th grade (I wasn't in it lol) but they had to label all the European countries like we did with the states. I attempted to do that about 3 days ago an only knew where about 5 countries were when I started after that I knew quite a few more but gosh that's complicated stuff. If we had geography classes available I would definitely take them.
I'm sitting on the edge with my two best friends ones a bottle of pills and ones a bottle of gin-Hollywood Undead
Oh, Oliver, that's interesting, not what I was imagining at all! We did a little bit of that in Social Studies but again, only when I was pretty young.
I did have to do some Europe map labeling in AP European History but I failed pretty miserably haha.
I can't see your link Colley but I've seen similar ones - the ones of Americans trying to label Europe are equally abysmal.
