16.06.03
History
students concentrate excessively on a few key topics - such as the
Nazis - says Charles Clarke
Charles
Clarke, Secretary of State for Education, has warned in the July
issue of 大象传媒 History Magazine (on sale 17 June) that GCSE and A-level
history students are failing to develop a broad sense of historical
context.
In
the exclusive interview with 大象传媒 History Magazine, Mr Clarke said
he had been struck by complaints that pressures of exams and timetables
were encouraging people to study similar topics at GCSE and A-level.
He said: "A lot of people - people I respect - say that there
isn't enough of a sense of timelime in history, so that pupils have
too much detailed history of particular eras, and not enough of
a sense of context for what happened."
"That's
not simply an appeal to go back to dates and kings and that sort
of thing, but it is saying by key stage three (ages 11-14) children
should have a pretty good appreciation of history in this country,
of Europe, and the context within which things happened. That doesn't
work against the more detailed study, but is the context in which
the study has to take place."
Mr
Clarke did however rule out making history compulsory in schools
beyond the age of 14. But he adds: "I would like to see history
playing a bigger part in the (14-19 curriculum), I think history
teaching is generally done well and I think it's important. I'm
pretty sceptical about putting more requirements in the curriculum
after the age of 14. If you cannot encourage students to want to
study things at that age, it's difficult to force them."
The
Education Secretary was recently reported as criticising the teaching
of medieval history at universities. He maintains in 大象传媒 History
Magazine that these claims were "ludicrous".
"I
was trying to promote a discussion about the nature of universities
in which I used the word `medieval' and this was suddenly (reported
as) an attack on medievalism, or medieval history and so on, which
is wrong. I didn't say it; I don't believe it."
Notes
to Editors:
大象传媒 History Magazine is Britain's best-selling monthly history magazine.
Launched in April 2000, it has a monthly circulation of 51,146 (ABC:
Jan to Jun 2002) and is published by 大象传媒 Magazines - a division
of 大象传媒 Worldwide Ltd.
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