Oh gawd, now I feel old!!!

[dothawkes31]

my 10 year old Grandson has just told me who he is studying in his History lessona in year 6!!!
Which of the following do you think it is:

1) Henry V111
2) Emperor Napoleon 1
3) Queen Victoria
4) Winston Churchill
5) John F. Kennedy
6) John Lennon.

I'll give you a clue, he was born in Liverpool

[cazzz1975]

lol, john lennon per chance?? my daughter studied him as well when she was in year 6 :o

[pericat]

Can you imagine how yoko feels ?

[Clanad]

I'm schocked and surprised that you didn't include Garth Brooks in the list... I would have expected home-tutoring for your grandson in that subject! Besides Grath would have been a whole lot more interesting and educational than Lennon, no?

[jno]

maybe they could get Paul in as a Visiting Lecturer?

[mike b]

I remeber one of the famous Schott's Miscellany lists; Famous Assassinations of the 20th Century - it missed out Anwar Sadat and Yitzhak Rabin, but included John Lennon...
Anyway, Churchill is a bulldog who advertises insurance, so he's not really History...

[ELVIS68]

4)

[fredpuli47]

Never knew JFK was born in Liverpool. I think Gladstone was LOL. Anyway, the man was John Winston Lennon, so studying him gives an introduction to Leonard Spencer Churchill ! [It was Leonard, not 'Lennon' wasn't it ?]

Surely, Lennon is being studied as an example of the culture and people of the time, not as a unique subject AS history. That method is an old one, applied to teaching all periods of history to young pupils.

[jake-the-peg]

All the others that you've posted are Heads of state or Leaders.

This echos a view of that history should concentrate on this sort of political history. It's a view of history that tries to concentrate on a sort of narrative of a country or the world.

A more modern sort of history also focusses on social history. The things that affected the lives of everday people, attitudes ways of living abd behaving.

The sixties were obviously very important in the beginings of "youth culture" John Lennon's a good hook to focus such studies on.

He has the great advantages of being very influential and very dead.

I mean you don't want to use Paul McCartney as a focus - for all you know he could turn up on TV tomorrow ranting some lunacy. Historians always seem to prefer their subjects cold.