HWRK Magazine: Issue 03 - Spring 2018

CURRICULUM
In Defence of History
THE HISTORIAN
THOMAS ROBERTS insists it’s impossible to shape
minds for the future with no knowledge of the past
To peer inside any booksellers’
window or to take a quick glance
over the evening’s TV schedule
provides clear evidence that we
are fascinated by the past. With cultural
interest in history so strong it seems paradoxical,
or at the very least inconsistent,
that the academic subject continues to
face the threat of marginalisation in state
education.
I’d argue history, as a stand-alone discipline,
deserves to be a permanent and
treasured fixture within every school’s
curriculum. Not only does it enable young
people to interpret the contemporary world
around them, it can also serve to help protect
them from many of the modern perils
we as a society now face.
Compared to the rest of Europe, the
English education system is unique in allowing
pupils to drop history at the age of
14. For the majority of European children,
history is a compulsory subject throughout
secondary education. Our continental cousins
place real value in the study of a subject
that influences every aspect of society and
helps us to make sense of the cultural and
political world around us.
As every teacher knows, covering the required
content for an examination syllabus
while at the same time pausing to reflect
on the knowledge or practice the skills
that have just been acquired can prove a
challenge.
Current
practitioners
dealing with
the newly
introduced
GCSE history
specifications
will no doubt
testify to this
as vociferously
as
anyone.
Despite this obvious difficulty, however,
a strong case must be made for seizing
every opportunity to make the study of
history as relevant to the modern world as
is possible.
Take for example the ongoing debate
over the advent of technology and the replacement
of humans by robots in the workplace.
Any students studying the Industrial
Revolution are presented with fine examples
of the impact technological changes can
have upon
‘You dont know
where you’re going
until you know where
you’ve been’
the lives of
ordinary
people. An
understanding
of the Luddites
and the
questions they
raised about
the ‘fraudulent
and deceitful
manner’ in
which machinery was being used to exploit
labour practices can help to inspire and
inform opinions on the cautious approach
we must take with our own future.
A study of boom and bust in the United
States during the first half of the 20th
century offers so many direct comparisons
with policies from the current White House
administration.
In a recent Year 10 lesson I had my students
write a ‘letter of advice’ to the current
president regarding policies to deregulate
the economy, pull back from diplomatic
cooperation and curb immigration. The
advice they gave drew in part from their
understanding of the disastrous impact such
policies had in the 1920s.
Such an exercise provides an opportunity
for students to consolidate their knowledge
and understanding of the period while also
demonstrating how useful lessons from the
past can be.
Whether it’s the Industrial Revolution
or Republican Party policies of the roaring
’20s, it’s the job of the history teacher to
make it clear how up-to-date and relevant
history can be.
When talking to parents and prospec-
12 // HWRK MAGAZINE // Spring 2018
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