History Lessons and Worldviews

'Japanese teachers begin with setting the context of a given set of events in some detail. They then proceed through the important events in chronological order, linking each event to its successor. Teachers encourage their students to imagine the mental and emotional states of historical figures by thinking about the analogy between their situations and situations of the students' everyday lives. The actions are then explained in terms of those feelings. Emphasis is put on the "initial" event that serves as the impetus to subsequent events. Students are regarded as having good ability to think historically when they show empathy with the historical figures, including those who were Japan's enemies. ...
American teachers spend less time setting the context than Japanese teachers do. They begin with the outcome, rather than the initial event or catalyst. The chronological order of events is destroyed in presentation. Instead, the presentation is dictated by discussion of the causal factors assumed to be important ("The Ottoman empire collapsed for three major reasons"). Students are considered to have good ability to reason historically when they are capable of adducing evidence to fit their causal model of the outcome.' (from Richard E. Nisbett's The Geography of Thought)

Our history lessons used to be a mixture of the two. Ms. Ng would present infomation in chronological order, essentially telling a story, during the lectures. Then during tutorials we would dissect everything, spread it around and recombine the parts in a rather more analytic framework. The consensus view of what historical thinking was was closer to the analytic version. In a way, it reflects Singapore's hybrid culture--and perhaps the slight tilt towards the West is indicative of RJ's relatively skewed position within the hybrid.
And then of course the Kwok was just being quite completely scatterbrained. What came out was more towards the American style overall, but not at all well-executed. Maybe that wasn't even his intended effect. I can't tell.