When you probe the directory of this school system's social studies curriculum there is no context at all as to where this book is coming from (and a very heavy left-wing bias in other areas by the way). I personally would be less concerned if they were having kids read a Cold War book on Communist quotations (by a realist here in the U.S.: there were a number put out by certain top military analysts in the 1970s and 1980s: Brassey's defense publishers was the publisher if I recall) in proper context (e.g., to illustrate the inherent evils of Leninism and Stalinism, or the absurdities and failures of Marxist thought). Here, the premise is that they are using a Soviet textbook, not on Cold War history, but on the Civil War and its aftermath -- that is, skipping the totalitarian, ideological, or world view contexts entirely to jump right into using base propaganda to offer an "alternative" viewpoint on the Civil War and its aftermath. What's next an Iranian version of U.S. history? How on earth is any of this useful for PUBLIC educational purposes -- in 2005?
All of this "comparativist" history and social studies nonsense has got to go...It's obviously not working in a country where public school children, even in top school systems, still graduate with huge gaps of knowledge about simple facts and dates in U.S. and Western Civ. history.
As a person studying to be a history teacher myself, I am rather disturbed at your failure to understand the need for students to gain critical thinking skills.
That is what this teacher is doing. He isn't indoctrinating kids in Soviet thought.
It is a great way to teach and much more interesting than having a kid read a textbook and call it good. That is lazy teaching. Dates are not important in most cases except for context.
There are some dates are that important: Dec. of Independence, D-Day etc. But, most are not something that people must know.