Holocaust history dropped in some UK schools to avoid offending Muslim pupils

Hey, the fight’s not over yet!

There’s no link above to the article about schools and history, but here’s the link from LGF: Teachers drop the Holocaust to avoid offending Muslims.

This is a column on the results of:

The study, funded by the Department for Education and Skills, looked into ‘emotive and controversial’ history teaching in primary and secondary schools.

It mentions either two or three schools (the article seems unclear). And concludes by saying:

But Chris McGovern, history education adviser to the former Tory government, said: “History is not a vehicle for promoting political correctness. Children must have access to knowledge of these controversial subjects, whether palatable or unpalatable.”

The researchers also warned that a lack of subject knowledge among teachers – particularly at primary level – was leading to history being taught in a ‘shallow way leading to routine and superficial learning’.

Lessons in difficult topics were too often ‘bland, simplistic and unproblematic’ and bored pupils.

INC on April 1, 2007 at 11:03 PM

Here’s more from the County Report from last year:

The State of Holocaust Education Overall
In the last 12 years since the Holocaust became mandatory, there has been a noticeable improvement in how and the extent to which the Holocaust is taught in English schools. Alongside this, the amount of resources that have become available have made a marked difference to quality and approaches.
(This is also the case for the Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland.)

Although it is right to remain critical of the level of teaching of the Holocaust and there is no clear way of monitoring what is happening, there are a number of indicators. These are (in no particular order):

Requests for Holocaust Survivors to go into schools
The London Jewish Cultural Centre: more than 150 visits in the academic year 2003–2004, resulting in over 240 talks, reaching more than 14,000 students.

The Holocaust Educational Trust:

Visits to Holocaust exhibitions
(Imperial War Museum, Anne Frank in the World, Beth Shalom, and the Jewish Museum)

The number of schools conferences

Requests to all the organisations for resources
The London Jewish Cultural Centre, 2003–2004 more than 200 requests
The Holocaust Educational Trust, 2003–2004, 260 requests
(For both of these organisations, some of the requests were for joint resources.)

The Future

There is a real concern for the future of Holocaust education once eyewitnesses to the event are no longer present. They currently add insight and reality, as well as a definite link to that period. Although there are a number of initiatives under way to preserve their experiences for the long term, their age and eventual deaths will leave a gap in the educational process.

There are questions of whether it is still appropriate to emphasise the Holocaust when more recent genocides have occurred are sure to be raised.

There is no threat to the Holocaust’s status in the National Curriculum, especially with the arrival of Holocaust Memorial Day. However, the style and symbolism of the Holocaust is likely to alter in future decades.

INC on April 1, 2007 at 11:31 PM