Creationism in the national curriculum
01Jun. 10
Cross-posted from Moth Eyes
Australia is in the process of creating a national curriculum, but the current draft of the history curriculum contains the following (emphasis added):
Students develop their historical skills in an investigation of TWO of the following controversial issues:
- human origins (e.g. Darwin’s theory of evolution and its critics)
- dating the past (e.g. radio-carbon dating, tracing human migrations using DNA)
- fakes and forgeries (e.g. Piltdown Man, the Treasure of Priam, Noah’s Ark, the Turin Shroud)
- the use and display of human remains (e.g. repatriation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander human remains, The Iceman, Egyptian mummies, Lady Dai)
- imperialistic attitudes towards archaeological property (e.g. Indigenous cultural artefacts from around the world)
- the ownership of cultural property (e.g. the return of Parthenon sculptures)
- the impact of war and terrorism on antiquities (e.g. the Buddhas of Bamyan, the looting of Iraqi museums)
- political and ideological uses of archaeology (e.g. archaeology under the Nazis and Fascists)
- a school-developed study of a controversial issue.
Students examine the nature and context of the controversy, including:
- the historical background
- the extent of the controversy (media coverage, nationalistic feeling, government involvement) and significant developments relating to the controversy
- different perspectives and their bases
- an assessment of the different perspectives.
Now, in terms of say, science, those first two are roughly as historical “controversies” such as Velikovsky’s theories, or ancient astronauts. So why are they in the curriculum? Well, it looks pretty much like — actually, exactly like — the “teach the controversy” campaign aimed at teaching students falsehoods in the US. Now, the points each look like they’re perfectly reasonable, and the intention is that look perfectly reasonable — but they give a creationist teacher an opportunity to teach or reward blatant falsehoods. It’s then a lottery as to whether you get a history teacher with the necessary scientific knowledge to accurately assess technical details on radiocarbon dating, or one who repeats long-debunked nonsense.
There’s also the Piltdown man in there, and again, that could work, just as long as you don’t get a creationist teacher. It is in there with other hoaxes such as the various “findings” of Noah’s ark or the Turin shroud, and that’s something at least.
Furthermore, these are scientific topics — why would they be introduced into the history curriculum, instead of the science curriculum? Well, as PZ put it:
The science side of the debate has gotten hardened by repeated attacks, and is usually better prepared to resist the foolishness, so they switch targets and catch history or philosophy off guard. Every academic discipline is subject to this corruption.
However, in this case, there is something you can do. The draft curriculum is open for consultation. The creationist questions can be found here, under unit 2 (you’ll need to register first).
Hat-tip: PZ Myers
Admin Note: I realise there has been two posts of similar nature in 2 days. This post was informative and built on Bastard Sheep’s post so I thought it would be beneficial.
June 1st, 2010 at 8:06 pm
I’d like more evidence that this is an attempt to “teach creationism”.
First, this is a significant “historical controversy”. It has huge historical importance, in some ways, teaching it as a “historical” controversy suggests that it is a “settled” issue. Second, reading the list, the author includes “noah’s ark” as a subject of “fakes and forgeries” — not something you’d expect from the creationists, who would insist on a “historical noah”.
Does PZed think that someone would be educated if they could not describe the “controversy” surrounding human origins?
Could you really understand Dawrin without also understanding WHY his idea is / was so “upsetting”?
I think not.
PZed has bigger problems as a low ranking prof at a low ranking school in a territory marked by backwardness and ignorance.
I’d like to be convinced that this isn’t actually the opposite of what PZ asserts, this is a work of a confident and intellectually robust educator who has confidence in the system to rise above the insanity that to PZ must seem insurmountable.
So, this feels a bit like a false alarm from a man conditioned (for good reason) to distrust anyone who comes near a curriculum.
Can someone dig up the national curriculum standards on science regarding evolution.
Someone tell Pzed that in Australian museums, they confidently put photos of naked women next to chimps and apes to make the relatedness of mankind with the apes crystal clear … something you aren’t going to see in MN … ever.
This ain’t kansas …
June 1st, 2010 at 9:47 pm
I think the inclusion of radiocarbon dating is the giveaway: that’s not something that was really culturally controversial, but a line of evidence for evolution that YECs had to oppose to maintain their position. And though the inclusion of Noah’s Ark, Shroud of Turin and so forth as fakes is certainly worthwhile, remember that this of course will have been the work of a committee.
The other issues in there are not things things that were controversial dozens or hundreds of years ago, but things which are controversial today about historical subjects. Now there are definitely ways of introducing the subject of creationism into a history syllabus that would actually be quite good, for example, looking at the nature of media coverage, or the epistemology of beliefs in the public, or even why Darwin had been controversial in the 1860’s, for example, but that’s not what’s listed in the syllabus.
Evolution in the science curriculum is under units 2 and 4 here:
http://www.australiancurriculum.edu.au/SeniorYears/Science/Biology
Nothing jarring (or surprising) in there.
June 2nd, 2010 at 12:53 am
Personally, I like agood reason’s first point. That is, if the creationism controversy is taught from a standpoint of a historic, and resolved, controversy. The real problem is how the topic can be warped by a few teachers to misrepresent the current debate. All one would have to do is stress some disturbing statistics from the US, and people will start to question things.
Also, a few of the topics don’t really belong in a high school curriculum. To teach controversies about something as complex as radioisotope dating and mitochondrial DNA is going to be a BIG stretch for your average history teacher. I’m a geologist, and only just got a real handle on radioisotope dating in my honours year. These should really be left for the science classroom. History is not natural history (or biology, evolution, palaeontology, geology, astronomy etc.), it requires events recorded by people, or at least artifacts of people to make a guess from.
And I do agree that this sounds notoriously like the Discotute’s thin edge of the wedge. I would couple this with the NSW rebuking of the secular ethics alternative for RE classes, even as a trial. Something is becoming very sick with the state of Australia’s educational future, and it seems like this is slipping under the radar for the general population. Soon we could be asking “how did we end up in Kansas?”
June 2nd, 2010 at 9:16 am
While the details of how carbon isotopes is advanced, the concept of HOW historians work (using chemistry to date objects), has to come up.
This is a foundational idea of history. How do we know what happened in the past?
How could we discuss this otherwise?
Any responsible historian of Australia would HAVE to mention of things like lake sediments, and carbon dating if discussing the story of people on the continent — and it is absolutely “controversial” — there is a legitimate and scholarly discussion about the date of human arrival in Australia.
Hardly makes it a crack though with Ray Comfort can slip his banana.
Are we suggesting that children in Australia should not be taught that the history of its own people is something science is sifting out of the sediments of time and is the active coal face in science today? Should we not tell them that right at this very moment someone is working on figuring this out (and give them some idea of “how” they are approaching the question?
In this case, I don’t see how the controversy that exists, supports a “creationist” narrative. Did humans arrive here with stone age technology from their origins in Africa, 40,000 or 60,000 years ago and how do we prove it? I’d be delighted if kids had that debate in high school.
Heck, Australia was one of the few places where Scientists were the first ones off the boats from Europe. The main order of the day was to measure stuff and collect plants for heaven sake.
Hell there have been French people killing beavers in PZed’s back yard for 100 years before anyone thought to catalog the plants there.
June 2nd, 2010 at 9:22 am
PZed’s comments completely miss the context of current scholarly discussion of Australian history. Radio Isotopes and DNA, are “in the news papers” with regard to humans and their arrival in Australia.
No such discussion is taking place IN THE NEWSPAPERS in America.
Someone should find the historian in Queensland who wrote those points and give them an award for good teaching and helping students understand their world.
June 3rd, 2010 at 7:37 pm
I think we should have a little more faith in our teachers. I was educated at a catholic college most of my school life. I was taught evolutionary theory as per darwin, by an ex nun.
I think this is an excellent opportunity for skeptical organisations to create teaching resources for the new curriculum, high quality info for those teachers not versed in such topics as carbon dating.
Just because they interview some religious idiot who thinks this means they can teach the controversy does not make it so. I am yet to be convinced this is a push for teaching ID as an acceptable alternative.
I think it an opportunity for a teacher like myself to talk freely about religious topics focusing on the science/evidence, developing critical thinking.
June 6th, 2010 at 10:59 pm
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