Portland Public Schools may add the book to the new social studies curriculum for eighth-graders
Portland Public Schools is poised to adopt a new curriculum today, making the district the first in the state to use a http://www.wvwnews.net/story.php?id=316’s racial history.
“This is not your traditional Oregon history kids may have learned in social studies class in fourth grade,” said Marcia Arganbright, district director of curriculum and instruction.
“Beyond the Oregon Trail: Oregon’s Untold History” is one of four books recommended for eighth-grade social studies classes.
Arganbright said the district did not seek out a curriculum that dealt with racism but found that “Beyond the Oregon Trail” accomplished the district’s major goals: highlighting Oregon history and analyzing various perspectives of historical events and issues.It took the book’s three authors nearly a year to take a topic that makes most adults uncomfortable and create language and content to suit the 13-year-old intellect and emotional maturity.
Each chapter in the 10-unit book for teachers starts with http://www.wvwnews.net/story.php?id=4402 of notes, advice and guidelines on building ground rules, safe spaces for conversation and relationships with students. And each lesson introduces students to vocabulary words such as empathy, bias, racism and privilege. The lessons are mainly divided into experiences of minority groups such as Native Americans, African Americans, Asian Americans and Latinos.
Some of the lesser-known historical facts could provoke strong feelings and discussion.
For example: After slavery was declared illegal in Oregon in 1844, residents passed the “Lash Law” requiring African Americans to be whipped twice a year until they left the state.
That law was changed in 1862 to charge African Americans, Chinese, Hawaiians and multiracial people an annual tax of $5 to live in the state. In today’s terms, that would be asking primarily unskilled workers to pay an annual tax of $770.
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