Texas' attempt to change their textbooks

crimsonace brings up the biggest problem with this -- the influence Texas has over textbooks elsewhere in the country.

 

Any clue if it's been like that for a while, or is that a product of NCLB?

 

Those conservatives who voted to change the curriculum should eat a hamburger with a dead rat as a condiment. They actually want to teach how regulation hinders business.

Now, I know that regulation can be a pain in the ass at times. But seriously, don't these people have any clue at all about history?

 

First they remove all references to the Alamo from the Texas History curriculum, and now this #kingofthehill LOLZ I USE HASHTAGS TO SUBTLY EXPLAIN REFERENCES I AM SO INTERNET COOL

 

Neutral history, crimsonace: You mean the proposal to put Jeff Davis' speeches right up there with Abe's -- "for context," you know. Or the one to recognize Stonewall Jackson for his great leadership abilities?

By the time this crew is done, Cinco de Mayo will signify the three-day party that commenced when Mexico willingly and gladly gave Texas its freedom over a pitcher of margaritas.

 

NCLB changed a god bit of what the teachers here do now, and the emphasis they can put on certain areas.
There is little doubt that prior to NCLB, teachers had much more freedom to teach as they saw fit, from classroom to classroom.

 

The district in which I substitute teach uses a district-wide middle and high school English curriculum that is essentially teaching right out of the book -- so much so that most teachers throw the workbook on the overhead and have the students follow the steps for that day's lesson. It's great for standardization but that's about it.

 

Sounds like an exaggerated version of most of my education, which makes it amazing to me that I even made it to college.

 

I read a fascinating book in college (What Johnny Shouldn't Read by Joan DelFattore) about how the size of the textbook markets in Texas and California mean those two states end up having an enormous influence on what the textbooks all across the rest of the country end up looking like. And it went into detail about how Texas' textbook adoption process in the late 70s through the 80s allowed it to be co-opted by a husband and wife pair of ultra-conservative activists whose highest level of educational achievement was one high school diploma, between the two of them. I can't remember specifics -- it's been 10 years -- but the things they were insisting be included or excluded were ludicrous even compared to the current debate.

Part of the educational reforms that Ross Perot led in Texas in the 80s made it harder for the process to be co-opted, but as we're seeing now, apparently not impossible. That means those of us in other parts of the country may be stuck with whatever sub-par books come out of this hugely political process.

 

The U.S. history text I had in high school in California (this would have been 1990) went into the Reagan years, but had no mention of Robert Kennedy, Martin Luther King or anything on the Civil Rights or women's movement. There might have been a paragraph on Susan B. Anthony. This was in an AP US History class.

 

I recall my high school history classes being the Pilgrims for one month, the Revolutionary War for two months, the Civil War for two months, the Hawley-Smoot tariff for one month, and 1945 to the present in two days.

 

This is how I remember it:

1492, 1620-1770 or so - Two months
Revolutionary war through War of 1812 - Two months
James Monroe through James Buchanan - Two weeks
Lincoln, slavery, Civil War - Two months
Andrew Johnson through William McKinley - Two days
Theodore Roosevelt through WWI - Month
Depression, WWII - Month
Kennedy/Vietnam - Month
Nixon/Ford/Carter/Reagan - The remaining time...