Regarding the new history curriculum, according to RNZ, "On Wednesday, Education Minister Chris Hipkins urged New Zealanders to check out the content and provide feedback before it was finalised."
It isn't the easiest website to navigate but I eventually found, from the 'draft curriculum', the 'progress outcome by end of year 10'. This is what students - akonga - will 'know' by that stage:
"I have built my knowledge of stories iwi and hapū tell about their history in the rohe, and of stories about the people, events, and changes that have been important in my local area. For the national contexts, I know the following:
Whakapapa me te whanaungatanga
Migration and mobility
Aotearoa New Zealand has a history of selective and discriminatory practices to control migration, with little negotiation with Māori as tangata whenua. Nineteenth-century immigration schemes were designed to create a British colony and consequently shifted the balance of power from Māori to settlers. Immigration policy has been used to exclude some peoples and to restrict conditions for entry and citizenship.
Identity
Contested ideas about identity have come from youth challenging social norms, and from social actions addressing injustices and societal divisions over values. Māori have communicated their distinctiveness through cultural practices that have sometimes been appropriated and used inappropriately.
International conflicts
Our attitudes towards and reasons for participation in international wars, and the impact they have had on our society, have changed over time. The ways that we have commemorated these conflicts have reflected these changing perspectives.
Tūrangawaewae me te kaitiakitanga
Land, water, and resources
There have been contested views about developing Aotearoa New Zealand and its economic resources. This is especially evidenced by our environmental history.
Mana motuhake
New Zealand’s settler government and the Crown were determined to undermine mana Māori, especially by acquiring Māori territories. The New Zealand Wars and the legislation that followed demonstrated their willingness to do this by any means.
Tino rangatiratanga me te kāwanatanga
Te Tiriti o Waitangi
In 1840, the Treaty promised to protect tribal rangatiratanga. By 1900, it had become the means of regaining what it had promised – rangatiratanga, mana motuhake, self determination. It also underpinned iwi attempts to remedy injustice by working inside, alongside, and outside the Crown system.
The Waitangi Tribunal investigation process and subsequent settlements by the Crown have led to economic, political, social, and cultural growth for iwi. The settlements have also provided an opportunity for reconciliation.
The state and the people
When people and groups have campaigned on or asserted their human rights, it has forced the state to act. This has been evident in the actions of workers’ groups and organisations of women and of wāhine Māori. It has also been evident in law reform in relation to gender identity.
The state and the Pacific
Aotearoa New Zealand has acted in the Pacific in line with its own political, strategic, economic, and social interests. But its actions have also been an expression of whanaungatanga.
In my learning in Aotearoa New Zealand’s histories, I can:
• construct and compare narratives of cause and consequence that place historical events, people, and changes in an extended sequence with links to the present
• actively seek out historical sources with differing perspectives and contrary views (including those that challenge my own interpretation), giving deliberate attention to mātauranga Māori sources. While doing so, I identify missing voices and draw conclusions that capture the diversity of people’s experiences
• make an informed ethical judgement about people’s actions in the past, giving careful consideration to the complex predicaments they faced, the attitudes and values of the times, and my own values and attitudes."
What do you think?
I'll make one response (though I have more).
I thought that making ethical judgements belonged to the study of philosophy.
4 comments:
Gee, I find reading that sort of stuff really hard going.
I am never quite sure what they mean.
Just seems like lots of impressive sounding words splattered on a page.
I suppose reading Michael King's "Moriori - A people Rediscovered" might cover off some of that "actively seek out historical sources with differing perspectives and contrary views" .
Just as an aside, as an Aussie, if you are interested in any readable Australian history try anything by Geoffrey Blainey
Hi Aussie, I'd be happy with anything by Michael King being in the syllabus. Thanks for the recommendation, and thanks for caring. I fear this proposed inculcation will steamroller over the sheeple.
The two major problems I see with this history telling is that it is collectivist, not individualistic, and that it ignores the most significant features of recent history: that people should be free under the rule of law and economic development and technological change.
The history is about groups and identity. Groups of people do things and have things done to them. That's true in a trivial sense but each person is making choices for themselves and that adds up to the group. We are teaching kids that they are determined by their group and their identity. They can't choose to be a good person, or a bad person, a productive person, or an unproductive person. Their thinking is set or conditioned by their identity unless, of course, it's their sex -- which they are free to choose.
I very much recall learning growing up about good people and bad people and the ability to choose who to be. Of course, there are groups and cultural differences and norms but individuals from the Greeks down have understood these groups can be studied by individuals, compared and evaluated, and the individual can choose.
The concept of freedom doesn't figure. The concept of reason. The way in which knowledge can grow and develop is ignored. Freedom and reason is the great story of history.
And technology and economic growth. The absolute marvel of what has occurred in the last few hundred years. The actual story of human civilisation.
Our children are being denied the opportunity to think and to wonder and to be the great people they have the potential to become.
Rodney Hide
Bloody hell you are good Rodney.
By which I mean I agree with you and you can put it into words betterer than I ever could.
Just last week, while mowing the lawn, I listened to the podcast you did with Leighton Smith around November last year. Brilliant.
Also a note to the host of this blog.
I have been reading it for years now.
I like the clear subject focus and the quality commentary.
(same Aussie as post 1)
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