Source: The Guardian

http://education.guardian.co.uk/schools/story/0,,1728032,00.html

On March 10, 2006 The Guardian reported, "The Islamic civilisation, according to the curators of a national exhibition that opened this week, has made an enormous but largely neglected contribution to the way we live in the west. The project, 1001 Inventions: Discover the Muslim Heritage of Our World, supported by the Home Office and the Department for Trade and Industry, uncovers the Islamic civilisation's overlooked contribution to science, technology and art during the dark ages in European history. It lifts the veil on hundreds of innovations - from kiosks and chess through to windmills and cryptography - that are often popularly associated with the western world but originate from Muslim scholarship and science. Based on more than 3,000 peer-reviewed academic studies, the exhibition charts Islamic innovations during ten decades of 'missing history' spanning from the 6th to the 16th century and covering an area stretching from China to southern Spain. Tailored to appeal to school children and their teachers, and accompanied by a book and online resource, the project was launched at Manchester's Museum of Science and Industry and will tour the country... The organisers, the Manchester-based Foundation for Science, Technology and Civilisation, hope to use the compilation to bring about an audit of the national curriculum to ensure it recognises Islamic achievements and the full extent of knowledge transfer between civilisations through the ages."