Tales of a Public School Nothing

[Ilyanna]

Oh, and apparently we will be reading The Diary of Anne Frank in Language Arts. That in itself isn't bad, but our favorite English teacher began by showing a video allegory of the holocaust (The Terrible Things), then went on to proclaim that it is wrong to stay silent in the face of oppression.

Kumbaya, people, Kumbaya....

OK so I might be extremely dense today, but where is the problem with that other than you thinking you're seeing a pattern? That's pretty much the SOP thing to get across with regards to Anne Frank, isn't it?

 

[Friday]

Ilyanna, when I read Anne Frank in school decades ago, we discussed the book. We did close readings, analyzed text, discussed context and character motivations. My teacher never once interjected right or wrong to the story. We were allowed to develop our own opinions of what transpired, and were encouraged to voice them, regardless of what they were. My teacher taught Anne Frank as literature, not as a tool to foment change.

A teacher's role should be to open young minds to all possibilities, not to foist a self serving agenda onto unsuspecting students.

CKLT--I teach because I believe an educated mind is an empowered one. True, I don't like the direction education in the US has taken. I stick with it in the hope that those few students who I can get through to will make a difference themselves.

 

[Friday]

You should do what my younger brother did and teach science. When a science teacher tries to foist cultural or personal (or, more often, religious) bias on a curriculum, it's a lot easier to laugh them out of the room --and in some cases, out of a job.

My field is Special Education. For most of my career, my students were low functioning, and my job entailed teaching activities of daily living. More recently, however, my students have been high functioning, and I am more frequently exposed to regular education.

Sometimes I wish I still was in Plato's Cave. What I am not cognizant of can't piss me off.

 

[Friday]

Just an addendum.

It turns out the whole last half of the year in Language Arts could have been renamed Black History 101. Every damn short story, novel, passage, documentary, film we saw or read was related to the African American experience. Every real life example she gave entailed African American public figures/celebrities.

I could not hide my disdain after awhile. I was silent, but my body language spoke volumes. By the end of the year she wasn't even acknowledging my presence.

 

[Mirah]

One of my writing/reading classes last year was all based on feminist studies/media studies-
On one hand they were nice reads-on the other hand I felt insulted every time I read that because Cosmopolotin has skinny models means that my daughter will be anorexic.
As if I cannot raise my daughter to know better!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!