What is it about the study of the past that makes it useful?

1. What is it about the study of the past that makes it useful? • To young people… • To society/the state/the nation…. • To the wellbeing of the human race?

2. What questions are worth asking? • Why was the draft NC for history as it was? • Why so ‘political’ and backwards looking? (Mandler, 2013) • Why ‘pull up the drawbridge’ at accession of MT and fall of Berlin Wall? • What should be the relation between past, present and future in school history? • Does ‘content’ matter? • Sincere but out of touch and misguided or….. ?

3. Short but necessary digression… • ‘Easily led..’ extract (page 1 of handout) • Since the advent of ‘democracy’, the sophistication with which information can be distorted and manipulated. Blair spin/Rumsfeld and Osama’s caves/NHS and ‘benefit tourists’ • (The role of ‘polemics’ in public life)

4. Proposition One: • A history curriculum based around a progress narrative of ‘Our island story’ misses out a lot of history that would be useful to young people, society, and the welfare of the human race. • (see, Adam Curtis, ‘The century of the self’)

5. 2nd proposition: • School history (and policy discourse about the history curriculum) pays insufficient attention to the important concepts or dispositions of veracity, knowledge warrant and open-mindedness

6. If everyone studied history until the age of 16, would it make the world a better place?

7. Depends… • ‘History, properly taught, can help men to become critical and humane, just as wrongly taught it can turn them into bigots and fanatics.’ Christopher Hill (1953) Suggestions on the teaching of history, Paris, UNESCO: 9. But, www.learnourhistory.com? There is a lot of bad history, (and ‘bad media’) out there.

8. Third proposition…. • Developing pupils’ understanding of ‘Interpretations, ’Significance’, ‘Enquiry’ and ‘Evidence’ has done a lot to improve the appeal and value of history to young people (QCA, 2005, Ofsted, 2010). • Understanding that more than one story can be told about the past (and present) is one of the things that makes school history useful to young people – and society (see quotations, p. 4-5 of handout).

9. 4th proposition: History should make links/connect the past to the present and the future (‘Big Picture’) • It is this facet of history which makes it useful (see Aldrich, McCulloch quotes) • (John Tosh 2008 – danger of infantilised and harmless ‘nostalgia’ and heritage history) If time, OIS extract

10. A neglected facet of school history - the importance of veracity, knowledge warrant and open mindedness • Keith Joseph (1984) ‘The teaching of history has to take place in a spirit which takes seriously the need to pursue truth on the basis of evidence.’ • Military historian Michael Howard (1982) ‘The first lesson that historians are entitled to teach is the austere one: not to generalize from false premises based on inadequate evidence.’ Ofsted (2005) ‘Using evidence critically and with integrity.’ • Millar, Mortimore – the shamelessness of politicians in using evidence about education • IB – importance of cultivating in pupils the disposition of open-mindedness

11. Aldrich (1997) The difference between good and bad history.. Page 3 of handout • Differences between good and bad journalists..? • Differences between good and bad politicians, SPADs, policymakers…? • Govemaths Gove use of PISA/TIMMS data Blair and WMD intelligence NCTL and school direct (page 2 of handout). (n.b film ‘Lincoln’) • Difference between good and bad researchers? • Differences between good and bad human beings…?

12. Many of the bad things happen in the world are done by people who are very clever, who did well in history at school, and have history A level, or even a degree in history, and who are at one level ‘good’ at handling evidence. However, they are not good at handling evidence in the way that Sir Keith Joseph suggested was important.

13. The proposals for the new National Curriculum for History are just one example of the bad things that can happen because of this neglected dimension of school history. • In school history and in research in history education, some emphasis should be placed on the importance of keeping an open mind and being scrupulous in the use of evidence, and about the knowledge warrant for claims made.

14. Implications for research in history education • Ben Goldacre has done us no favours BUT, it’s not just about ‘size’ and RCTs. • It is about the qualities outlined in Aldrich 1997 (see page 3 of handout) • And given that many people are ‘easily led’, it is important for the future health of democratic societies that young people get ‘the right sort of history’.

15. ‘It is time to re-establish the coalition of those who believe in history as a rational inquiry into the course of human transformations against those who distort history for political purposes.’ (Hobsbawn, 2005) • ‘Without evidence based theorisation of the relationship between historical consciousness and social identity, the evolution of history curricula will remain vulnerable to the ongoing incursions of hostile but poorly conceived political rhetoric.’ (Taylor and Collins, 2012)

16. ‘They know what they are doing.’Zizek, 2008 • (‘There are those who feel comfortable about teaching history as long as it remains firmly about the past.’ Gallacher, 2002) • Perhaps it’s not about ‘nation’/’Our island story’ etc – perhaps it’s about neo-conservative models of democracy. (Van Sledright, 2013) • Do those in power want ‘The history of democracy – part 2: what happened after people got the vote?’ to be part of school history.

17. Under the new proposed National Curriculum for history drawn up by the coalition government, young people will learn very little about the historical perspectives on the major issues facing the human race in the C21st, or how to make intelligent judgements about the mass of information that is available to them on these issues – climate change, population, peak oil, food supply, welfare, employment, power, globalisation. But they will know their kings and queens.