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This wasn't true in the UK when I was at school 20 years ago. Admittedly, the 'general' history we did in the first 3 years of secondary school (11-14) we cove
by mattmanser 8y ago
This wasn't true in the UK when I was at school 20 years ago.
Admittedly, the 'general' history we did in the first 3 years of secondary school (11-14) we covered mostly western history, but it covered Romans, Greeks, Egyptians, etc. We did some English history (Boudicca, Alfred, is all I can remember now).
In the optional GCSE History I did (14-16) we did little English history as far as I remember and covered inter-war Germany + rise of Hitler, Vietnam war, Chinese Communist Revolution, formation of Israel, Cuban Missile Crisis and probably some more I've now forgotten.
EDIT: I actually now remember we did cover Cromwell + English Civil war as well as William the Orange and the Suez crisis, probably at least one of those in GCSE. Slightly modified to reflect this.
A lot of those do directly impact the UK, although when we covered China, it was still fairly weak compared to its present position in the world.
- amaccuish 8y agoLeft school 4 years ago now. At primary, it's mostly kings and queen's, magna carta etc. Secondary it's mainly WWI/II (including "roaring 20s US" and Weimar). For sixth form it's the USSR, America, and I think China (I didn't do A-level history). (This was the AQA course anyway) Weirdly we learnt almost nothing about the British Empire, which I think is sad because some people have a rose-tinted view of it. You can't begin to form an actual opinion until you know the history, the good and the bad etc.
- mattmanser 8y agoIf the exam boards still work the same way, different boards have different historical subjects, and I think they might even have a range of historical subjects that the teacher can be pick from, so not every school is the same. I've learnt a lot of my English history from Bernard Cornwell historical fiction books.