A Special Issue: The Bradley Commission on History in Schools || Building a History Curriculum: Guidelines for Teaching History in Schools

THE BRADLEY COMMISSION on History in Schools was created in 1987 in response to widespread concern over the inadequacy, both in quantity and in quality, of the history taught in American elementary and secondary classrooms. While other social science disciplines and many new fields, such as sex and health education, driver education, and computer education, have expanded their roles in the curriculum, the number of required courses in history has declined. Currently, 15 percent of our students do not take any American history in high school, and at least 50 percent do not study either World history or Western civilization. Since 1982, a score of major books and studies, commissioned by such diverse organizations as the Council on Basic Education, the National Commission for Excellence in Education, the Carnegie Foundation, the American Federation of Teachers, and the National Endowment for the Humanities, have called for a more substantial academic core for all students and for more varied and imaginative approaches to teaching that common learning. Documenting the serious declines in achievement in reading, writing, mathematics, and science, they have endorsed the need


Society for History EducationBuilding a History Curriculum: Guidelines for Teaching History in SchoolsAuthor(s): The Bradley Commission on History in SchoolsSource: The History Teacher, Vol. 23, No. 1, A Special Issue: The Bradley Commission onHistory in Schools (Nov., 1989), pp. 7-35