I'm rather surprised it's so underestimated in the USA, though of course I know there're good US historians working on this subject.
It's actually more of an example of how poorly the public school system deals with History. History and Social Studies was my favorite course - but I was always taken out of it for speech therapy or whatever. It was the course the school system gave the least amount of time or support to. Used to drive my father, a frustrated history professor nuts. (My father had a Master's degree and post-graduate work towards a Ph.D in American History and has read history his entire life.) He'd visit with my history teachers and discover that they didn't have degrees in History, they had them in physical education and were often coaches of some sport, and got asked to teach history. I took honors history in school and found a few good teachers here and there. But the curriculum was poor. We only had so much time - and the focus was primarily on American History. I did get some world history in the Sixth and Fifth Grade and was incredibly happy.
Prep Schools or private schools are different matter.
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branchandroot
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Date: 2012-01-18 01:40 am (UTC)It's actually more of an example of how poorly the public school system deals with History. History and Social Studies was my favorite course - but I was always taken out of it for speech therapy or whatever. It was the course the school system gave the least amount of time or support to. Used to drive my father, a frustrated history professor nuts. (My father had a Master's degree and post-graduate work towards a Ph.D in American History and has read history his entire life.) He'd visit with my history teachers and discover that they didn't have degrees in History, they had them in physical education and were often coaches of some sport, and got asked to teach history. I took honors history in school and found a few good teachers here and there. But the curriculum was poor. We only had so much time - and the focus was primarily on American History. I did get some world history in
the Sixth and Fifth Grade and was incredibly happy.
Prep Schools or private schools are different matter.