The importance of teaching History

That's what always made history interesting to me. Without having the proper context of the historical events understood, it just becomes meaningless names and dates. That's also the challenge of the teacher, IMO. I love studying history by the way. And it put me to sleep (literally) in high school.

I studied it on my own because it was fascinating...I never had a teacher who I think even understood it in context

I always find Leno's Jaywalking segments to be hilarious--and disturbing: alleged high school and college graduates who cannot identify what century the US was founded, let alone the year.

I'm not that long out of the public education sector, and I was required to learn--what's the deal?

I had a great Biology teacher and English teacher, a very weak History and Math teachers. Under tenure, you are on a trial basis your first three years teaching, after that, it is very hard to get rid of an incompetent teacher. Under NCLB (The Bush Kennedy education bill) The emphasis is on improving Math and English, and history is often one of the casualties. Add the fact that many of the people who teach History are looking for the easiest subject to get a credential in so they can coach, add that to the sometimes intentional indoctrination that takes place in college, and it all adds up to very weak history education in most (but not all) schools. It isn't universal, but widespread enough to be a serious problem.

I learned a few things! You are right about tenure at the college level. However, because of the Unions it's hard to get rid of bad teachers period.

What did you think about Biden's proposal during the last debate, that his administration would pay all teachers $40,000 and up?

I absolutely agree with you on this, and am actually quite passionate about this issue. History does more than teach about the past, it teaches about how we come to the present. It is more than facts, it is about our identity.

Many nations indeed use it as indoctrination, specifically, to show how evil certain groups are. Look at many communist nations.

We cannot let the teaching of our history go. We must be honest about it, but we must be honest about. In other words, we must acknowledge when we are/were wrong (ie Trail Of Tears), but we MUST celebrate what we have done right, which is far more than what we have done wrong.

I do not personally feel underpaid. I make 37K a year. (I probably shouldn't say that publically, but oh well) I teach 176-180 days a year, this works out to 205 dollars a day. I work from 7:30 to 3:30, minus 1/2 hour lunch, this is 7 1/2 hours a day, for a pay rate of $27.33 per hour. I spend approximately 20 hours a month at manditory meetings, extra curricular activities, and things like hall duty, adding back my 10 hours of lunch per month plus 10 more. At 8 1/2 hours per day, my pay dips to $24.12 per hour. I spend anywhere from 1-4 hours a night preparing lessons, grading papers, setting up labs, researching to supplement the weak crap that is found in my textbooks and such, but this is wholly my choice, many teachers spend 0 out of class hours in preparation, so compensation for this is not feasible.

$24 per hour over 50 40 hour weeks in the "real world" would be $48,000 a year, which is comparable to how much I could earn with my chemistry degree entry level in a crime lab, pharmaceutical company, or other such employment. I do what I do because I love the job and even though I spend my summer working 2 jobs to try to make up some of the gap, I have no complaints about it.

Biden (and most Democrats) are sucking up to unions and care nothing for paying teachers, only for the political support of people who pay union dues. You want to pay teachers well, give incentive pay to teachers who teach in tougher schools, who teach tougher subjects, and who go above and beyond in giving students a quality education. Merit pay and school choice would do more to educate kids than any number of across the board pay raises. I am all about incentives rather than paying the teacher who shows movies and sits at his desk drinking coffee the same as the teacher who passionately prepares lessons and inspires kids to greatness.

I mention what i think is the best bet to improve history education. I also think that parents (like you and me) can and should instill a love of History and a perspective of what it can teach us in our own kids. Last spring when I visited my parents, I took my family to the Tillamook (Oregon) Pioneer Museum. In it were artifacts of the old west, as well as a room dedicated to Tillamook County Veterans of every war from the Spanish American to the current one. I explained to my daughters (who were only 5 and 7) what we were looking at and why it was important, and even though they are so little, they were fascinated. Too many parents forget that they are their childs most important teacher.

And I think it a great idea. I am not yet ready to give up the fight in schools. They must be addressed.

But you are right in your last post, we as parents are the best teachers to our children. And any time we fail, we fail our children badly.
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But history is how we define ourselves today.

Excellent essay. My experience has been pretty much what everyone else is reporting. I got interested in history as an adult. In high school, history would be taught by a temp, a coach or the assistant principal. In other words, it was fluff. If we can't teach history in this country, and I would rather we didn't than teach our kids the Marxist garbage being peddled these days, we should at least teach civics and include arrows pointing to historical sources to research for those who are actually interested in understanding why things are the way they are.

you sound like the kind of teacher I'd want to have teach my own children. And you are so right about the need for genuine and accurate teaching of history.

My husband and I are hoping to have the financial means to send our boys to a private school rather than public. There is one near us that uses old text books -- those prior to the 1960-70s sanitization or re-writing of history when they decided to include less on the 'oppressive slave-owning white men' and more on those poor, oppressed but very important non-whites like Sacajawea (sp?).