ABSTRACT
History is the curriculum area to which special attention must be paid in any study of teaching about Europe in British secondary schools. In England school history courses have long displayed a tendency to be strongly nationally based. Where modern European history is concerned, courses and syllabuses in England are often negative and problem-centred giving far more prominence to wars, crises, conflicts and problems generally than to post-war moves to cooperation and unity. It is natural that English books should see the history of self-government in Europe as a preponderantly English phenomenon, and should say little about democratic developments else-where. Within European history itself, there are positive steps which can be taken to reduce national bias and selectivity in history courses. The growth of European consciousness and the severe questioning of nationalistic frames of explanation has important implications for the development of history curricula and syllabuses.
