AHI

Today's discussion came after reading parts of Chapter 1 in Howard Zinn's The People's History of the United States entitled Columbus and Human Progress. Zinn uses the diary of Columbus to portray a different look at the explorer than the one taught in grade school. We finished the lesson with writing a journal in our history notebooks on what the students learned about Columbus and their reaction to this new information revealed in Zinn's book. Most of the class were surprised to learn how Columbus exploited the indigenous Arawak people of the Bahamas, but they generally agreed that this more critical look at Columbus wouldn't be appropriate to teach young children.