Developments in the History Education in Latvia

Dzintra Liepina, active Member of the Latvian HTA, has written a detailed report on the recent developments in the field of History Education in Latvia. During the last 3 years teaching of separate subjects „World history” and „History of Latvia” was tested in 43 schools in Latvia. There was no clear methodology how to assess the results of this experiment, however the Latvian Ministry of Education, History of Latvia and World History will be two seperate subjects for pupils in grades 6 to 9 (12-15 years old).

 

Under "Read more" you can find the full report.

The only message from the Ministry was that comparing results from all the schools during the State examination after the grade 9 it will be possible to see if there are better results in knowledge of history of Latvia at schools where subject has been taught separately. The results in exams after this 3 years period this spring show us that there is no difference in knowledge if we compare schools where the new approach was tested and the others where the subject was taught in integrated way.
Anyway the Minister of Education and Science Tatyana Koke supports the separation of history subjects emphasizing that changes would heighten the patriotism of young people. She said during the meeting with representatives from schools which took part in the testing of new approach that „Latvia is the only place in the world where we can start with learning history of Latvia, where we can create, strengthen and develop our Latvianity”.
The main argument part of history teachers used against changing the teaching approach is that history of Latvia shouldn’t be taken away from the world context, and the second- that the programme used during the experiment in 43 schools was too „compressed”- it means in age of 13 the pupil should comprehend the complicate history of 20-21-st century. (The separated standard meant teaching the World history in grades 6-8(only 1-st semester) 2 lessons per week and history of Latvia- starting with 2-nd semester of grade 8 also 2 lessons per week).
At first Ministry planned to introduce the new approach already with the next school year, but after the meeting in Ministry with representatives from HTA of Latvia and experts it was decided that it is necessary more time to work out the new approach more carefully, developing teaching materials and preparing the teachers. There is no information yet if the content of subjects will be changed after the separation.
In Secondary school (grades 10-12) History will be taught as an integrated subject.