How Do You Teach History?

Well, people, we are in February. The groundhog has reared his ugly head and we are in a leap year with lent starting weeks early and Beyoncé in the news during black history month, wink, wink to all my Adventures in Life, Love, and Parenting readers. 😉

I have been trolling the FB homeschool groups quite a bit lately looking for ideas for Black History Month and it got me to thinking about the subject of teaching history in general to our kids from the perspective of our culture.

I realized, I guess by high school, that American History was one sided. I was not a history buff and, quite honestly, I did not like history growing up. I didn’t know why, but it just didn’t interest me at all. When I went to college, I took every history other than American. I took the History of Mexico and the History of the Mexican-American. I found a new appreciation for history taking those classes. I found that the problem was not the subject of history it was the constant repetition of the same one sided stories. It was boring.

Taking those two history classes opened my mind and my eyes to a different perspective. I like learning about the dark truth about things. You cannot appreciate a situation if you only get one side and that side is sugar coated and filled with tasty strawberries.

If you have paid any attention to life around you, you must know that the history books lie. They have filled all of us up with a pretty view of all the bad things that have happened in this country from the explorer’s point of view. They do not portray them as evil, selfish, and greedy crooks who came to this country, stole it and forced the inhabitants to conform to their way of living instead of behaving like a guest in their home. They tell you that they had to teach the poor savages how to live and what to believe in because they weren’t doing well on their own before they arrived on the scene. How pretentious!

So, I wonder, as homeschoolers we all have an ability to teach our kids in the truth that we see. That is part of the reason why we homeschool. We have the freedom to teach our children the way we want. How do you teach your children history?

Do you teach them both sides of the coin or one side? Do you teach them from the perspective of your ancestors, whether your ancestors are Black, Native American, Hispanic, or European? Do you teach them
the ugly truth in an age appropriate way or do you sugar coat it?

I have noticed  a lot of moms in the Facebook groups go out of their way to educate their children on their culture. I believe this is how cultures live on in this country. The public school and private school kids do not get this privilege, of course, but our children do and that could make a difference in our society.

I teach Harmonie the truths as I see them culturally speaking and religiously speaking since our curriculum is religious based. We watch videos and movies as visual aids. I try to get her opinion on things to see where her head is on the subject. So, I just wonder, what do you all do?

How do you teach history to your kids? Do you go deep and in depth with the history of your people? Where do you get your research on this subject? Let’s chat about it!