Current History Teaching in Turkey: Curricula, Debates and Issues

Abstract

The aim of this study is to review the current situation with history teaching in Turkey after the education reform introduced in 2004. Accordingly, this study mainly focuses on the structure and problems of history teaching in Turkey bothat primary and secondary levels after the education reform, following confrontational debates about the role of history teaching in the construction of citizenship, and in the context of international relations, which is related to collaborative projects undertaken with a number of countries to rewrite history textbooks in a peaceful way. Current research trends in this field are also mentioned briefly. Some researches show that in history teaching in Turkey the common issues that occur are related to text books, the intensity of knowledge/objectives relationships, insufficient weekly course hours and the unfamiliarity of teachers with both new history and constructivist approaches. New history textbooks and curricula continue to be a conflict area between their respective defenders who claim in turn that history teaching should either be a vehicle for constructing national identitity or that it should be a vehicle for constructing global, pluralist and democratic citizenship. On the other hand, mutual work with some Arabian countries to rewrite the common past in textbooks,is on Turkey's current agenda to enhance the international context of this perspective. Some researches also show that apart from debates about the nature of history's social aims and the problems of history teaching as already indicated, teachers seem ready to adopt the new history approach. In addition to this, every passing day there is a marked and rapid increase in research into history teaching and the variety of related research subjects are hopeful improvements.