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Politics
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By Charmere Gatson Maryland Newsline Friday, April 2, 2004 COLLEGE PARK, Md. -- In September, getting back to the books will take on a new meaning for some 60,000 Maryland elementary and middle school students. Nearly 100 classrooms around the state will be stocked with books rich in the history of the black experience. This history will be introduced as part of a new curriculum designed to allow students to explore more than 30 black history lessons developed by the state Department of Education’s Museum Task Force. Together these lessons will comprise “An African-American Journey,” a series of educational sessions and activities designed for fourth- through eighth-graders. The curriculum is set up as a pilot this school year. After the one-year pilot is complete, the task force will prepare coursework for use during the 2005-2006 school year, said A.T. Stephens, director of education at the Reginald F. Lewis Museum of Maryland African-American History and Culture, scheduled to open in Baltimore in December. “Young people should know about the African-American experience, about the levels of segregation that existed in American society, and they should know or be able to assess how far we’ve come and how far we still have to go” since the Brown vs. Board of Education decision 50 years ago, said task force Chairman Charles Christian. Amy Rosenkrans, liaison between the state Department of Education and the museum, said the curriculum partnership between the two is the only one of its kind in the nation. In addition to providing information about the black experience, the lessons will prepare students for visits to the museum, she said. And the museum experience, in turn, will add depth to the classroom experience. The curriculum “will serve as a much more creative and richer resource for students and teachers to use more frequently” when teaching black history lessons, said Linda Bazerjian, Maryland Department of Education spokeswoman. Currently, black history is primarily taught using basic history texts or during Black History Month, she said. “It really varies from school to school.” Curriculum Development Task force members appointed by State Superintendent of Schools Nancy S. Grasmick include educators from Maryland public schools and universities and staff from the museum and the state’s Education Department. The curriculum was developed around the museum’s three major themes: labor that built a nation; arts and enlightenment; and family and community. It was reworked over the course of the year by some of the state’s curriculum specialists and by a panel of scholars and black historians. From June 30 to July 2, the nearly 100 teachers who have been accepted to participate in the pilot program will attend an institute to prepare them for the fall. Content and Focus The lessons primarily focus on the history and culture of blacks in Maryland, but materials also place people and events into a national context. While incorporating the disciplines of history, art, music, geography, economics and literature, the lessons will introduce students to the lives and accomplishments of famous Marylanders, including mathematician and astronomer Benjamin Banneker, who assisted in the first survey of Washington, D.C.; Harriet Tubman, who escaped slavery and escorted hundreds of slaves to freedom via the underground railroad; and Thurgood Marshall, the first black Supreme Court justice. Many lessons can be used across more than one discipline, Rosenkrans said. For example, under the The Great Migration topic, social studies lessons could focus on the “push-pull factors” that led to the movement of blacks from the South to the North, while related music, art and literature lessons could focus on the Harlem Renaissance that emerged as a result of the migration. Some lessons will overlap time periods and topics. Lessons will begin with Colonial days and move through the Antebellum period; Civil War and Reconstruction; the early 20th century; the Great Depression; World War II; and the modern civil rights era. The task force hopes to see the curriculum grow and expand to reflect new findings in black history, Christian said. “If any teacher teaches Reconstruction, we can’t imagine that he or she would ignore the African-American curriculum. Likewise, if anybody is teaching the Colonial governments, it’s impossible … to teach it well without understanding the African-American experience,” Christian said. “Over time, any teacher who is really good will find it necessary to include the African-American experience in order to continue to be effective in teaching history.”
Banner photo courtesy Joseph Douglas Collection, Kansas Collection, Spencer Research Library, University of Kansas Libraries Copyright © 2004 University of Maryland Philip Merrill College of Journalism
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