Revised AP history standards will push 'American exceptionalism'
Source: The Guardian
The board that oversees advanced placement courses for US high school students has revised its US history standards to include a section on American exceptionalism after significant backlash from culture conservatives who said the exam wasnt patriotic enough.
The advanced placement (AP) history framework, revised in 2014, triggered a nationwide debate over how American high schoolers should learn about their nations history, pitting conservatives who found the curriculum anti-American against teachers and students who rejected the changes as revisionism.
In response, the new framework explicitly introduces the concept of American exceptionalism, and highlights achievements of US history through this lens. It also includes direct references to the names and roles of the nations founding fathers, including George Washington, Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin a flashpoint in the debate. It does, however, maintain roughly the same number of references to slavery as the 2o14 exam.
Every statement in the 2015 edition has been examined with great care based on the historical record and the principled feedback the College Board received, the College Board said in a statement posted on their website on Thursday. The result is a clearer and more balanced approach to the teaching of American history that remains faithful to the requirements that colleges and universities set for academic credit.
Read more: http://www.theguardian.com/education/2015/jul/30/revised-ap-history-standards-push-american-exceptionalism
"Patriots" aren't patriotic. They're embarrassing.
restorefreedom
(12,655 posts)swilton
(5,069 posts)The rest of the world knows more about the US (through study of English, history and politics - i.e., the humanities) than we know about ourselves.
As Sanders points out but in my own words, it makes us the least capable to lead the rest of the world.
YOHABLO
(7,358 posts)Many of the comments we have heard about the framework reflect either a misunderstanding of US history or a very limited faith in history teachers command of their subject matter, the letter said. The Curriculum Framework was written by and for AP teachers individuals who were already experts in US history and its teaching.
The letter explained that the framework was intended as a general guide of the themes AP US history teachers should explore with their class.
The pushback was forceful, especially with states threatening to defund the course. And in October, the College Board said it gathered feedback from teachers and the general public on the exams standards during a review process.
The new edition has been embraced by educators, the College Board said in its statement, including AP US history teachers who reviewed it at the recent AP Annual Conference.
This from the article.
So they had a limited faith in history teachers, and now it is a plus that these history teachers embrace it?
Nice to see we are starting the teaching of hate and race early. Anything in there about our genocidal early settlers murdering native folk and eating each other? About how religion turned into something evil?
Poor little vanilla heads
uhnope
(6,419 posts)there are countless examples... I am not in favor of arrogance but I see this happening again and again. You can't slam America and then in the next breath ask "why doesn't America do something" about X and Y and Z...
starroute
(12,977 posts)The exact term "American exceptionalism" has been in use since at least the 1920s and saw more common use after Soviet leader Joseph Stalin allegedly chastised members of the Jay Lovestone-led faction of the American Communist Party for their belief that America was independent of the Marxist laws of history "thanks to its natural resources, industrial capacity, and absence of rigid class distinctions". However, this story has been challenged because the expression "American exceptionalism" was already used by Brouder & Zack in Daily Worker (N.Y.) on the 29th of January 1929, before Lovestone's visit to Moscow. . . . American Communists started using the English term "American exceptionalism" in factional fights. It then moved into general use among intellectuals.
Gothmog
(145,839 posts)bemildred
(90,061 posts)bananas
(27,509 posts)We won the Cold War, and now are the global peace-keepers.
Pax Americana!
The phrase "the empire on which the sun never sets" has been used with variations to describe certain global empires that were so extensive that there was always at least one part of their territory that was in daylight.
It was originally used for the Spanish Empire, mainly in the 16th and 17th centuries, and for the British Empire, mainly in the 19th and early 20th centuries. Especially in the 20th century, the phrase (usually without the word "Empire" has been transferred to refer to American power.
Georg Büchmann traces the idea to a speech in Herodotus' Histories, made by Xerxes I of Persia before invading Greece.[1][2]
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