The history of slavery in America continues to be inadequately thought in schools nationwide, a reality that's causing damaging ramifications on student learning and present day racial tensions.
8 percent of 1,000 surveyed high school seniors identified slavery as the central cause of the civil war. Further, only 22 percent knew protections for slavery were included in the constitution and just 39 percent correctly acknowledged that slavery shaped the fundamental American beliefs about race.
To understand the world today we must understand slavery. Slavery is our country's origin and was our country's Achilles' heels. Schools are not adequately teaching the history of American history. Educators are not sufficiently prepared to teach it. The author of this article Lauren Camera shared the ideas that slavery was and is currently being wrongfully looked at. The article targets the young civilians known as teenagers. This article was produced on February 1, 1998.
I'm so sorry to inform students that their comfort may be violated as they reach things such as the news, everyday life, current events and the real world. Comfort shouldn't be a necessity to students when learning about the past or even present day. The reality is that our past is horrifying and completely uncomfortable, that's the POINT of it all, the fact that this is horrible and must be remembered so it will never happen again. Reflecting back on present day, we will see things everyday that will never be okay or comfortable but it's our duty to stop those things, there will never be a quiet, comfortable way to change things that are horrifying or ruthless. You can't pretend problems don't exist because they make you feel "uncomfortable" or because their not your problems to begin with. Truth before comfort, always.
ReplyDeleteI totally agree. Learning about what our country did wrong in the past helps us know what not to do in the future.
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