When I was in school, yes we did have history books and, in retrospect, they were pretty white-washed. I will say that, growing up in Los Angeles, I did have super radical history teachers (one of whom kept getting in trouble with the school, but she was awesome, lol; she was the only teacher who taught a bit of LGBT history and identity in class, and as a gay kid I was really grateful for it) who had really amazing in-class activities and discussions, challenging things like manifest destiny, etc. Keep in mind that I didn't have as much access to the Internet at that time, so I really relied on those teachers to expose me to different perspectives.
With Common Core now, however, history has really focused on first-hand sources. In fact, students as early as 6th grade are answering document-based questions and writing full essays (I honestly didn't write a 5-paragraph essay until, maybe, 8th grade). I think that the current curriculum, and standards, lend themselves very easily to a critical lens from which to study history. I hope this makes sense.
All I know is my aunt who was a first grade teacher hated the fuck out of Common Core (and no child left behind) if all you have to teach is brushing your teeth, basic sentence structure, how to make change, and vocabulary and you dont have enough time to go indepth its probably not a great system.
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2 to the 1 from the 1 to the 3, a fitting end for a monster like me.