Posted on 11/22/2007 1:46:19 PM PST by Coleus
Thanksgiving's coming and you're concerned that your third-grader doesn't know much about the Pilgrims. Join the club. Educators in North Jersey and across the nation say social studies have been given short shrift in today's classrooms -- neglected in the drive to spend more time preparing for math and reading tests mandated by the federal No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act. Just 27 percent of high school seniors were deemed "proficient" in civics and 53 percent had "below basic" knowledge of U.S. history, according to a federal report last year. Anecdotal evidence of a lack of civic knowledge seems to be everywhere -- from Jay Leno's man-on-the-street, where passers-by can't identify the nation's vice president, to classrooms in North Jersey.
Jayne O'Neill says her students at the Passaic County Technical Institute in Wayne come to high school with minimal social studies literacy. "You're lucky if they've even heard of Lewis and Clark," O'Neill said. "They just don't see how history plays a role in their daily lives, and they don't read the newspapers."What's going on in local schools? Students, parents and teachers are invited to share in this forum.
NCLB -- a hallmark of the Bush presidency -- was passed in 2001 in an effort to hold failing schools accountable. It started by testing math and reading comprehension, and expanded to science this school year. The poor showing in social studies, however, predated the law. NCLB's supporters say the focus on the basics has improved literacy, which is the basis for understanding any subject matter. They say those improved reading skills contributed to slight gains fourth-graders made in social studies last year.
But educators have long complained that they wind up sacrificing creativity in "teaching to the test." In many districts, particularly lower-income schools, huge blocks of time have been devoted to reading and math drills. In some surveys, more than 40 percent of principals have reported less time spent on social studies -- the broad umbrella encompassing history, civics, economics and sometimes geography. "If you're not testing it, you're not teaching it," laments Ira Oustatcher, assistant superintendent of schools in Clifton and a former social studies teacher.
Oustatcher said other subjects, such as world languages, have suffered as well. "There are five major subject areas," he said. "For the federal government to recognize two is a mistake." President Bush has stood behind NCLB, which is up for reauthorization. It likely won't be changed significantly despite much congressional debate and hand wringing. "I'm in touch with hundreds of social studies supervisors in New Jersey and they all have been complaining about this," said Arlene Gardner, director of the New Jersey Center for Civics Education at Rutgers University. "We've basically pushed social studies out of K-8, certainly out of K-5."
Peggy Altoff, immediate past president of the National Council for Social Studies, agrees: "The elementary schools were hit particularly hard," she said. She worries about the future. "For newer teachers trained under NCLB – some of them don't even think social studies are important. There's cumulative neglect, and it's going to have an effect." An exception may be found at some of the region's higher-performing districts such as those in northern Bergen County. Hank Bitten, social studies supervisor at the Ramapo Indian Hills Regional High School District in Franklin Lakes, said he has not seen a drop-off in social studies literacy.
Likewise, John Kline, a social studies teacher at the public school in Norwood and the state's Teacher of the Year, said his district has been supportive. Kline goes out of his way to bring the subject alive for his seventh- and eighth-graders. He sometimes dresses the part in covering a historical era and offers his students as many interactive experiences as he can. The week prior to elections, he invited the town's mayoral candidates to class so students could pepper them with questions.
"You need to make it real," agrees Gardner, from the civics center. "History has to be taught to encourage citizenship." But most educators say the lack of time -- particularly under NCLB -- leaves little opportunity for innovation and interactive learning. Teachers increasingly are pulled from social studies classrooms when they are needed to help students prepare for the tests, they say. Gardner is advocating that four years of social studies -- rather than more math -- be required in high school. Some say the emphasis on math, while important for those entering certain careers such as engineering or computer science, is short-sighted if it means other areas are slighted. "Everybody is going to be able to do calculus but they won't know about the world we live in," Gardner said.
* * * Many not 'proficient' in civics
Although bright spots were reported in a few places, overall a minority of students were deemed "proficient" in civics in recent federal testing. Some results:
• Fourth-graders: 75 percent knew that only citizens can vote in the United States, 41 percent identified that peace treaties are signed by the federal government and 14 percent recognized that defendants have a right to a lawyer.
• Eighth-graders: 80 percent identified a notice for jury duty, 63 percent determined an instance of abuse of power and 28 percent explained the historical purpose of the Declaration of Independence.
• Twelfth-graders: 72 percent analyzed a historical text on the importance of education, 50 percent identified the outcome when state and national laws conflict and 43 percent described the meaning of federalism in the United States.
Source: The Nation's Report Card: Civics 2006, National Center for Education Statistics
>>Twelfth-graders: 72 percent analyzed a historical text on the importance of education, 50 percent identified the outcome when state and national laws conflict and 43 percent described the meaning of federalism in the United States.<<
So 43% of 12th graders understand something that most congressmen do not. Perhaps there is hope.
This is a red alert indication that the standards have to be officially lowered! /s
Yep
How much time is wasted on leftist indoctrination, ass clowns? The kids learn all about every crisis -global warming, homelessness, sexual inequality, illegal Bush war for Cheney Halliburton oil, hate crimes, you name it, they’re wasting time on it.
And as far as teaching our kids about the Pilgrims and Thanksgiving, many school districts have gone politically correct anyway, and teach politically correct history. So regarding Thanksgiving, they would focus on grievances of American Indian activists if they talk about it at all.
Hey it might be a good thing if less time is spent on social studies. That’s less P.C. history that they are exposed to.
>>> This is a red alert indication that the standards have to be officially lowered!
>> Yep
There is precedent. I believe they did it some years back for sperm counts that ranked as fertile. Or maybe it was the gold content of karat gold? I always get those 2 mixed up! :)
It’s a cryin’ shame! Thirty years ago I had to supplement my children’s education, especially in history, by purchasing books on the early presidents. This year I’ve purchased Bill Bennett’s “America, the Last Best Hope” for both my grandsons, one in high school, the other in college.
If we don’t know where we’ve been as a country, how can we see the dangers in where we are going?
I teach junior-high social studies in Missouri. I, for one, am grateful that social studies is not on the fed’s (or my state’s) radar. It means that I am still free from a state-mandated curriculum, unlike my colleagues in math, English, and science. They spend all of their class time teaching to the test. Problem is, they can never be sure what is going to be included on this year’s test. No matter how well they teach their subjects, a quirk in this year’s test may brand their efforts a failure. I think it is worst in science. The science teacher must test a little of everything, depth in nothing.
George Orwell would be amazed that education is so double-plus-ungood.
BUMP
Civics lessons in public school are bad....but wait till you hear how they handle teaching you about Islam.
I was 12 years old on 9/11, and had never heard the word “jihad” until shortly after the attacks, and it wasn’t in public school. The first time I heard that word in public school was in 11th grade, and it wasn’t in a textbook, it was on a list of terms and place/people’s names the teacher gave us. The definition he gave was “holy war,” but of course had to quickly include the other meaning—an internal spiritual struggle.
When I first heard of Islam I was in 6th grade, but they didn’t dare tell us it’s TRUE teachings, they just basically said it’s a religion dominant in the Middle East that worships this guy called Allah and started by this guy called Mohammed written down in this book called the Koran. No mention of its violent nature of the versus in the Koran that called for jihad against the infidels.
And, back to 11th grade, we studied the “life” of Mohammed....actually it was only the snipets of his life that were deemed safe to tell us. They made it sound like he was a really great guy who tried to save the Arabian peninsula from its sins by starting a peaceful religion. HAHAHA! No mention of his violent conquest to spread his faith, no mention of his beheading and capturing of those who refused to submit and his stealing of the wealth from the people he conquered, no mention of his own perverted lifestyle, none of that. They only told us he married ONE lady, I forget her name, but she was rich. I didn’t know Mohammed had 11 wives until I read it on TheReligionofPeace.com.
Oh, and they never dared use the word “terrorism” when talking about Muslims. That’s taboo in the public school system.
But I still have my brain, they didn’t fool me.
Heck, they don't spend time teaching anything ...
Based on my experiences, the US public education system is little more than a series of liberal-brainwashing centers.
The teachers waste all of the time on “diversity” education instead of US history.
She is a radical, communist, lesbian while I’m a hardcore, Christian conservative.
She is also a college professor who is now in the process of brainwashing America’s youth.
The last time we got together I told her that should I ever have stepchildren (and that if I had the power to decide their schooling) that I would homeschool them cause schools nowadays are nothing more than Marxist indoctrination camps. She went ballistic and damn near got us into an auto accident (she was driving).
I think Orwell would be surprised at more than that. One of his themes in 1984 was that you could control how people think by controlling what history they were taught. But Orwell was presuming that there would be people in the future (his future, our present) who would actually care what history has to say.
And the kids STILL can't read or do math! Test or no test, it doesn't make any difference to the rampant incompetency in the public schools. Stop using state-standardized tests as an excuse. Stop whining and do your job! You want Federal money? Then show what you're doing with all that dough.
As if no other generation of teachers or students had to deal with standardized tests! Heck, we used to get NATIONALLY-normed tests, never mind state-designed tests. And if you went to Catholic school, you got to take many, many more tests.
The solution, of course, is to give up on teaching "social studies" at all. Maybe someone should try teaching history.
“Educators in North Jersey and across the nation say social studies have been given short shrift in today’s classrooms”
‘The solution, of course, is to give up on teaching “social studies” at all. Maybe someone should try teaching history.’
Indeed. Though some educracts claim this never happened, the record is fairly clear:
EDUCRAT SHUCK AND JIVE:
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=950DE2D6143AF93BA35752C0A96F948260
Social Studies: A Bit of Background
Published: January 8, 1989
‘’The schools ain’t what they used to be, and never was.’’ - Will Rogers.
Marc Mappen’s otherwise interesting and informative account of the founders’ forgotten debate over whether to locate the United States capital near Trenton (’’Jerseyana,’’ Dec. 11) is marred by an aside that is both uninformed and misleading, and that has little bearing on the substance of his article. Professor Mappen writes: ‘’As every schoolchild knows (or used to know, before ‘social studies’ were substituted for history in school),’’ the late 18th century ‘’was an era when great leaders grappled with great issues.’’
A more than vague familiarity with that field of education would reveal that, on the contrary, ‘’social studies’’ were never ‘’substituted for history in school.’’ A few comments on the historic development and current state of ‘’social studies’’ are instructive.
As a pedagogical approach, the social studies had its origin during the second decade of this century in the work of a subcommittee of the Commission on the Reorganization of Secondary Education. The social studies was conceived as the educational application of history and the social sciences for the purpose of preparing enlightened citizens for a democracy.
This concept has been critical to the work of leading thinkers in the field. The social studies would enable students to use knowledge from the disciplines to make informed decisions about critical public issues, both historic and contemporary, facing them as citizens. That is, the social studies would have young citizens - many of them future leaders - ‘’grapple with great issues.’’
Significantly, research and experience have demonstrated that students who study the same material in a social studies format tend to learn subject content as well as and even better than their peers who underwent conventional history instruction. The social studies students are more inclined to be involved in following public issues, as well. Incidentally, this is exactly what many of our nation’s founders had in mind when they called for ‘’institutions for the general diffusion of knowledge.’’
The rub is that this approach to teaching history and the social sciences never fully made its way into our schools. Only the name ‘’social studies’’ did. Genuine social studies curriculum and instruction are the exception, not the rule. The fact is that conventional history instruction - teacher lectures on and students rehash a lengthy parade of names, dates, events and places - continues to dominate the ‘’social studies.’’
Furthermore, as college students, teachers of ‘’social studies’’ typically majored in history or another social science and minored in education. On the job, they tend to attribute their teaching styles and methods to their history professors, whom they emulate, and in the same breath dismiss their ‘’social studies’’ methods courses as irrelevant. Schoolteachers generally identify themselves with their subject - in this instance, history - and not with the field of education - in this instance, social studies.
It seems, then, that if a case can be made that schoolchildren are learning less history these days (popular sport right now among some academics), the evidence is inadequate to indict the social studies. On the other hand, the discipline of history would most likely have a rough day in court. The social studies, as conceived by its leading advocates - among them the famous historian Charles Beard - rarely happens in our schools.
Flip remarks like Professor Mappen’s perform a disservice to the public schools and to the public, and do more to reflect the bias of scholar-specialists than to advance teaching and learning in our schools. Academics need to work with our schools, as Charles Beard did, not against them. WILLIAM G. WRAGA District Supervisor, K-12 Social Studies Bernards Township Public Schools Basking Ridge
A CLEARER VIEW FROM A TEXAS OBSERVER
http://www.texaspolicy.com/commentaries_single.php?report_id=415
In Texas It’s Social Studies that’s the Enemy of Good Textbooks
August 26, 2002
(A commentary written for the History News Network.)
By Chris Patterson
During the past 20 years, history has been removed from public schools and replaced with social studies. This new subject crams geography, psychology, sociology, religion, culture, government, and history into the 55 minutes that schools once devoted daily to teaching the past of our state, nation and world.
The National Council for Social Studies says the multi-disciplinary subject helps students “construct” the knowledge, skills, and attitudes required of good citizens. Social studies focus on “contemporary conditions of real life,” facilitate “specialized ways of viewing reality,” and promote the “common good” of all people.
History is missing from the topics that the Council recommends for classroom learning, passed over for “Individual Development and Identity,” “Culture” and “Global Connections.”
Knowledge of history is dwindling. The National Assessment of Educational Progress’ latest History Report Card shows few high school students know why the Civil War was fought or why the Continental Congress met. Only 10% scored on grade-level, a number unchanged from 1994 when the history test was first administered. Fourth and eighth grade students scored a trifle better; nearly 20% scored as “proficient, but fewer than 25% of 4th graders knew about the Boston Tea Party and less than 50% of 8th graders knew why Americans were able to win the Revolutionary War.
Fully 73% of college graduates surveyed at three Arizona universities recently failed a history test based on the NAEP. Only 14% identified James Madison as Father of the Constitution, although 93% recognized Snoop Doggy Dogg. Historical illiteracy is a national affliction, according to studies commissioned by the American Council of Trustees and Alumni. Over 80% of seniors surveyed at 55 of the nation’s most elite colleges and universities failed a similar test in 2000.
The relationship between historical illiteracy and social studies seems fundamental. Schools don’t teach history—students don’t learn it. But this connection eludes educational pundits who call for more social studies and blame schools (inadequate course requirements) and teachers (insufficient credentials) for the amnesia of Americans under the age of 30.
Research recently published by the Texas Public Policy Foundation offers a sobering warning about Social Studies. The next generation of social studies textbooks proposed for use in Texas and the nation are miserly about history. Textbooks not only begrudge history, history is tainted with errors and partial facts that sacrifice objective interpretation for brevity.
This spring, the Foundation commissioned 16 experts to review Social Studies textbooks submitted for adoption by the State of Texas. Twenty-eight textbooks were reviewed: Grade 6 World Cultures, Grade 7 Texas History and Grade 8 American History before Reconstruction, American History after Reconstruction, American Government and Economics. Each textbook was examined by two reviewers: a Social Studies teacher and a university scholar teaching or published in the subject. Among the reviewers is a research fellow at the Stanford University’s Hoover Institute and the Director of the American Textbook Council. Reviewers were selected on the basis of academic qualifications, without political litmus, and asked to determine how well textbooks meet Texas’ requirements for classroom learning. Their unedited evaluations are published online.
What conclusions did reviewers reach? Textbooks with a broad range of quality can satisfy state requirements. All textbooks contain errors but some textbooks contain more than others. Some errors are simple; one text identifies John Marshall (not John Jay) as the first Supreme Court Justice. Other errors are complex; another text states that Rosa Parks took a seat in the middle section of the bus where both African-Americans and Whites were allowed to sit (falsely suggesting integrated busing - so why bother to boycott?).
Meeting state requirements, all of the textbooks lacked sufficient history to meet them well. Although only 25 % of Texas’s Social Studies standards pertain to history, reviewers produced a 972-page list of the historical facts needed to ensure students acquire sufficient knowledge to recognize the importance of key events and people. Some omissions are grievous: no mention of Abraham Lincoln in a description of the Civil War and no use of the term “free enterprise” in a section on the U.S. economy.
The textbook review identifies the history missing from Social Studies and offers an instructional supplement for teachers who want students to feast on history instead of pop culture and self-exploration. The review also offers a blueprint for reviewing textbooks with objective criteria, combined perspectives of practitioners and academicians, and independent scholarship. Most importantly, the review reveals the need to restore history in public education if students are to become literate.
Reviving history education will not be an easy task, based on the reception that our review has received in Texas. The Texas Council for Social Studies petitioned the State Board of Education to disregard the findings. The Texas Freedom Network, an organization founded to oppose Christians and funded by the Texas State Teachers Association Political Action Committee, is waging an aggressive “I Object” campaign in state and national media. They cast the textbook review as a veiled effort of “religious conservatives” to “censor” textbooks. Their unfounded, dishonest criticism deflects public attention away from textbook content and undermines a forthright effort to improve curriculum.
Some social activists think Henry Ford was right when he said, “History is more or less bunk. We want to live in the present and the only history that is worth a tinker’s damn is the history we make today.” For some, teaching history is not only bunk, it’s dangerous and they’re right. Knowledge of history binds Americans to E. pluribus Unum - shared culture, allegiance to democratic ideals and common identity.
More importantly, history is education. George Santayana’s words, speaking from the past, offer wisdom today. “Progress, far from consisting in change, depends on retentiveness. Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”
If history is to matter, public schools must discard social studies or refocus the studies on history. Texas’s textbook adoption, determining the textbooks that will be used throughout the nation, offers an opportunity to restore history education and reclaim America’s memory.
Mrs. Patterson is the Director of Education Research at the Texas Public Policy Foundation.
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