Faith in Action

This is really an intriguing and thought provoking read.  So interesting in fact, that I bought it as a birthday present for my 15 year old brother who is having some struggles in AP European History.

Loewen suggests that the way American History is taught in American schools is boring to students and devalues the weight of this nation’s experiences by trying to “teach” ready minds soundbytes of dates, selected personalities of historical persons, and opinions presented as facts.  He posits that the most valuable component in teaching American history are the “ideas”.  Ideas have a greater ability to transcend time and retain present day applications.  For example, he says that if teachers shared with students the ideas, conversations, and debates surrounding the Vietnam War that students would be able to ,on their own, draw parallels to America’s invasion and occupation in Iraq.  He also dispels some of the myths associated with  Columbus (I still have that erroneous, “In 1492 Columbus sailed the ocean blue” poem in my head from the 4th grade!), Washington (the great slaveowner himself), and Lincoln (the opportunistic “emancipator”). 

While I don’t agree with all of his assertions; I appreciate his attempt to tackle the conditioning that goes on in America’s public schools.  He didn’t mention this, but it would be a very engaging discussion to compare private school education to public school.  If curricula were compared between the schools where our nation’s leader’s kids go and where our nation’s worker’s (and unemployed) kids go they would see that “privileged” kids are trained to be critical thinkers while “underprivileged” kids are conditioned to be mindless “fact” quoters.  The result?  One group is put on the path to lead and the other on the path to follow.  Being able to regurgitate “facts” is one thing; being able to THINK is something totally different.  The regurgitaters will not be able to reach their fullest potential in the global community.

This book reminds me of seminary in a sense.  We were encouraged to ask questions of the text - the who, what, when, where, why questions that help inform the true intentions of the writer, it’s impact on the readers, and more accurate meanings of the message.  We would do well to read everything with these questions ever present in our mind.  I fear that we too often just digest whatever is served even if it is to our own demise. 

I’m not Oprah, but I would definitely recommend this book.