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The decision of the Malaysian government to make it compulsory for students to pass History at the Sijil Pelajaran Malaysia level in 2012 has attracted a positive response from Malaysian people. General public opinion on making history compulsory seems favourable on all sides of the social and political spectrum, but there remain many questions to be answered regarding the content of the history syllabus. Certain quarters have pushed for a re-evaluation of the syllabus that includes, amongst other things, the history of each Malaysian race and its leaders. This paper provides a comparison of the successes and failures of history education in developed countries including Britain, Australia and Canada, to consider whether Malaysia can learn from their experiences. It also provides an evaluation of Malaysia's history syllabus at Form Five level, particularly in terms of what, should properly constitute Malaysian history, as well as exploring the relevance of history teaching to the country's educational objectives. Finally, it explores problems of teaching history at school level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]