Counter Class
James Loewen in his excellent book, "Teaching What Really Happened: How to avoid has this to say about school history as it is taught. From page 9:
"Indeed, in my experience, the more history a student has taken in high school, the less able s/he is to think sociologically. Some college history professors agree. A friend who taught the U.S. history survey at Vermont nicknamed its two semesters "Iconoclasm I and II," because he had to break the icons -- the false images of the past that students carried with them from their high school history courses -- to make room for more accurate information. He actually preferred students form other countries, who knew no American history at all or, as in often the case, knew it more accurately and more analytically than do American high school graduates.
In no other discipline do college professors prefer students with less preparation! "
The Counter Class pages are devoted to providing critical reviews of American history textbooks and study materials to counter the rubbish which is taught in American history textbooks and to put an end to the problem which James Loewen describes.
There will be pages with Counter Class study materials and pages with reviews of specific American history textbooks. Additionally there will be bibliographies of books to read to fill gaps and counter textbook misinformation. The materials will be provided in pages under this general page.
Finally there will be a section on how to deal with your American history teacher. I don't want students to get punished and I do want students to be informed on some of the typical rationalizations American history teachers give students to accept a given approach to American history.
I have 22 American history textbooks which range from bad to really horrible.
"Indeed, in my experience, the more history a student has taken in high school, the less able s/he is to think sociologically. Some college history professors agree. A friend who taught the U.S. history survey at Vermont nicknamed its two semesters "Iconoclasm I and II," because he had to break the icons -- the false images of the past that students carried with them from their high school history courses -- to make room for more accurate information. He actually preferred students form other countries, who knew no American history at all or, as in often the case, knew it more accurately and more analytically than do American high school graduates.
In no other discipline do college professors prefer students with less preparation! "
The Counter Class pages are devoted to providing critical reviews of American history textbooks and study materials to counter the rubbish which is taught in American history textbooks and to put an end to the problem which James Loewen describes.
There will be pages with Counter Class study materials and pages with reviews of specific American history textbooks. Additionally there will be bibliographies of books to read to fill gaps and counter textbook misinformation. The materials will be provided in pages under this general page.
Finally there will be a section on how to deal with your American history teacher. I don't want students to get punished and I do want students to be informed on some of the typical rationalizations American history teachers give students to accept a given approach to American history.
I have 22 American history textbooks which range from bad to really horrible.
Some general resources
The following are some resources which cover the teaching of American history more generally.
1. "History on Trial: Culture Wars and the Teaching of the Past," Gary B. Nash, Charlotte Crabtree, and Ross E. Dunn. This is an excellent book on the politics and issues faced in the teaching of an accurate history. It is in print and available in paperback. This book I recommend for those wanting to do a deep dive into the topic. For the general reader however I recommend the two following books by James Loewen.
2. "Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American History Textbook Got Wrong," James W. Loewen. This is an excellent book about the rubbish American history textbooks teach and why publishers produce such rubbish. It is available in both paperback and electronic. It has sold more than a million copies.
3. "Teaching What Really Happened: How to Avoid the Tyranny of Textbooks and Get Students Excited About Doing History," Multicultural Education Series, James W. Loewen. This is an excellent book and it also talks about how racism is taught in our American history textbooks. This is available in paperback.
This book is also a great book about racism in public education. Loewen needs to explain racism in the public schools so he can explain why textbooks are so bad.
A quote from page 10 in commenting on American history classes. Loewen is commenting because of the poor textbooks and its sanitized history, American history classes are usually considered very boring. Loewen further explains, "Students from out-groups hate history with a special passion and do especially poorly in it." Yes, who would like a class which asks you to intellectually eat dog turds. This is how students are alienated from education.
Another quote from the book:
This is from a section in which a student teacher is teaching a historically accurate account about Thanksgiving. What Loewen notes is that nonwhite students are alienated from history. If going to school means teaching you poison, what will you think about school?
"Bill took over the class. As soon as he announced the topic of his unit, one pupil, seated towards the back of the room, put his head down on his desk and clamped his hands over both ears. Bill walked over, seeking to learn the source of the boy's manifest alienation, only to elicit the following sentence: "My father told me the real truth about that day and not to listen to any white man scum like you!" The book looked white but was not -- he was a member of the Abenaki nation. Luckily, Bill was not teaching the usual Thanksgiving claptrap and could explain this to the pupil and bring him back into participation with the class. But that episode shows how the usual tripe that we teach about Native Americans, such as the $24 myth, offends them. Indeed, I think stories like these put off everyone who is not in the in-group. The alienation of non-Indians is more subtle, to be sure, but real enough. It helps explain why nonwhites and nonaffluent white students perform so much worse in history than in other subjects."
Strongly recommend that this book should be read if you are seriously concerned with with the teaching of history in the public schools.
4. "The Confederate and Neo-Confederate Reader," edited by James W. Loewen and Ed Sebesta. It supplies information to correct the mythologies about the Civil War, Reconstruction and the Confederacy taught in the public school books. The reference to the "Great Truth" in the books full title is a snarky reference that the great truth is that the Confederacy and so-called Confederate "heritage" is about white supremacy.
1. "History on Trial: Culture Wars and the Teaching of the Past," Gary B. Nash, Charlotte Crabtree, and Ross E. Dunn. This is an excellent book on the politics and issues faced in the teaching of an accurate history. It is in print and available in paperback. This book I recommend for those wanting to do a deep dive into the topic. For the general reader however I recommend the two following books by James Loewen.
2. "Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American History Textbook Got Wrong," James W. Loewen. This is an excellent book about the rubbish American history textbooks teach and why publishers produce such rubbish. It is available in both paperback and electronic. It has sold more than a million copies.
3. "Teaching What Really Happened: How to Avoid the Tyranny of Textbooks and Get Students Excited About Doing History," Multicultural Education Series, James W. Loewen. This is an excellent book and it also talks about how racism is taught in our American history textbooks. This is available in paperback.
This book is also a great book about racism in public education. Loewen needs to explain racism in the public schools so he can explain why textbooks are so bad.
A quote from page 10 in commenting on American history classes. Loewen is commenting because of the poor textbooks and its sanitized history, American history classes are usually considered very boring. Loewen further explains, "Students from out-groups hate history with a special passion and do especially poorly in it." Yes, who would like a class which asks you to intellectually eat dog turds. This is how students are alienated from education.
Another quote from the book:
This is from a section in which a student teacher is teaching a historically accurate account about Thanksgiving. What Loewen notes is that nonwhite students are alienated from history. If going to school means teaching you poison, what will you think about school?
"Bill took over the class. As soon as he announced the topic of his unit, one pupil, seated towards the back of the room, put his head down on his desk and clamped his hands over both ears. Bill walked over, seeking to learn the source of the boy's manifest alienation, only to elicit the following sentence: "My father told me the real truth about that day and not to listen to any white man scum like you!" The book looked white but was not -- he was a member of the Abenaki nation. Luckily, Bill was not teaching the usual Thanksgiving claptrap and could explain this to the pupil and bring him back into participation with the class. But that episode shows how the usual tripe that we teach about Native Americans, such as the $24 myth, offends them. Indeed, I think stories like these put off everyone who is not in the in-group. The alienation of non-Indians is more subtle, to be sure, but real enough. It helps explain why nonwhites and nonaffluent white students perform so much worse in history than in other subjects."
Strongly recommend that this book should be read if you are seriously concerned with with the teaching of history in the public schools.
4. "The Confederate and Neo-Confederate Reader," edited by James W. Loewen and Ed Sebesta. It supplies information to correct the mythologies about the Civil War, Reconstruction and the Confederacy taught in the public school books. The reference to the "Great Truth" in the books full title is a snarky reference that the great truth is that the Confederacy and so-called Confederate "heritage" is about white supremacy.