SPM Sejarah and I have some issues to settle

Just 2 months ago, my mother gave my brother and I the excruciating task of coaching my little sister for her exams. Science and math are pretty much subjects we're able to coach her in with one eye closed. Give us history and we balk at the sound of it.

Clearly History and I were never the best of friends.

Anyway, I decided to tackle it since it's only Form 4 history. Sejarah Dunia. I never liked mugging dates, but world history was my favourite part of it, due in part to my love for art museums and other boring hobbies like spending 7 hours exploring mummies in the British musuem.

However I reeled in horror when my sister showed me her textbook. What used to be 4 or 5 glorious chapters on everything from the Reformation up till Imperialism and the brink of World War I, had been squashed into 1 chapter. And in place of all that was several chapters on Islamic history. Huh?!!

Now I don't abhore Islamic history. I'm pretty proud of the fact that I know the Ottoman empire was not a revolution of footstools. When I was travelling in Andalucia, I bored Lionel with more facts than he wanted to know about the great Islamic empire before those Catholic brutes came in and wiped them out. I know the life of Prophet Mohammed and I can name early Islamic Mathematicians and Astronomers and I know they invented the concept of zero (the nothing that is).

However, my impressive (pea-sized) Islamic knowledge aside, what is the point of this as we begin to prepare the next generation to face an ever-shrinking global world? My sister knows close to nothing about world history. She doesn't know the effects of the Renaissance, she thinks the industrial revolution is solely defined by the car and paper making industry, she doesn't know about the cold war nor about Napoleon. And it doesn't help that she doesn't read any books that aren't teen-lit!

After ranting for awhile about my sister's blinkered education to my mother who wasn't listening (and has frankly given up on Malaysian education after three children who bluffed their way through the system), I started wondering why no one has complained about the new history syllabus.

A quick check on the internet turned up... nothing! I can't find the new syllabus anyway. I mean, I didn't spend like half a day searching, but you'd think that it shouldn't be too hard to find. The MOE website returns nothing. In fact clicking on a link to Secondary School Education gives you a blank page. Clicking on Examinations tells you nothing either. I think I'm doing it all wrong. Search engines don't like me.

Anyway, if you find out, let me know.

I know I could just ask my sister, but she currently thinks I'm a trouble making nerd.