Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
So, I agree with the OP that a good education includes being made uncomfortable or being prodded to think about something other than one's own small world.
In Jr. High (dating myself here, nowadays it's called "middle school"), we had a music teacher who took us through Wagner's entire Ring of the Nibelung, telling the story and listening to the music. I loved it, but at one point, Mr. P. said "God is a myth". I remember him.grinning and casting his eyes around the room for a reaction. He didn't get one there, but some of the kids went home and told their parents, and I think there may have been a bit of a kerfluffle over it. We were a small borough known in the area as "the town of churches".
But it did make some of us think about how at one time these stories were believed to be as real as we believed Christianity to be.
That sounds like a great class! I wish I'd had a music class like that in school!
I don't understand why you'd get "upset" about things you learned in school. I never remember taking any of it personally. But today there seems to be an extraordinary sensitivity about how exposure to whatever information will make students "feel." A particular bugaboo on the right is supposedly making white students "feel bad" about slavery and whatnot. But my question is why they "feel" anything about the information?
On the left, there is a lot of concern about "inclusivity" of LGBTQ, especially the "T" and the "Q," going way out of their way to over-accommodate a very small population. E.g.: I don't feel the need to announce my pronouns. I will call anyone whatever pronoun they want but they need to tell me, and probably remind me a few times if they do not "look" like the pronoun I immediately associate with them. I'm not going to go to all these lengths to indicate that I am tolerant of gender diversity. Although I will step in in a second if anyone is saying disparaging things about transgender or whatever. The reason we are told to do these actions is because of the way the LGBTQ students may "feel." I'm solicitous against insulting, demeaning, or being prejudicial against them but I am not going out of my way to accommodate their feelings. A lot of people have angst about all kinds of aspects of their identities and we don't accommodate that.
The right also freaks out about said inclusivity, but doesn't even want the subject discussed at all, going as far as banning books that discuss such things. They have no good reason for this, besides their opinion that it's "icky."
Last edited by redguard57; 01-30-2023 at 02:05 PM..
There will be. Don't know when, but there will be.
So what. Why does that mean that you want to take away a person's right to feel upset? Talk about communism and mind control! You don't seem to want people (including students in school) to have a right to their emotions.
So what. Why does that mean that you want to take away a person's right to feel upset? Talk about communism and mind control! You don't seem to want people (including students in school) to have a right to their emotions.
They can be upset if they want. That should have no effect on the course syllabus. Tough tookies, kids. You're going to have plenty to upset you through life. Get used to it, and get used to it now.
I'm tired of everyone tiptoeing around like school kids are the most fragile precious Venetian glass, when I know what they're really like. They'll torture small animals, do the nastiest thinkable things to each other, without even the faintest whiff of remorse unless they've been stood on, hard, from earliest childhood on, and now we're worried that when they learn about reality they'll be "upset"? Give me a break.
They can be upset if they want. That should have no effect on the course syllabus. Tough tookies, kids. You're going to have plenty to upset you through life. Get used to it, and get used to it now.
I'm tired of everyone tiptoeing around like school kids are the most fragile precious Venetian glass, when I know what they're really like. They'll torture small animals, do the nastiest thinkable things to each other, without even the faintest whiff of remorse unless they've been stood on, hard, from earliest childhood on, and now we're worried that when they learn about reality they'll be "upset"? Give me a break.
I didn't say it should have an effect on the course syllabus. Did I?
Part of growing up is learning how to deal with the adult world as it comes at you. A major reason to study literature is to explore the human experience and the various types of conflict in which people find themselves. Ideally, doing this in a controlled way in school every kid at just the right time in their development learns about the hardships and tragedies of life in a way that they can process it at the time. In reality, we educate them in batches, and the batch a kid is in isn't always the best match. We slap a bit of organization into it, call it age-appropriate (whatever that means), and hope for the best as kids haphazardly make their way to adulthood.
When I think back on the one time that what I learned at school really bothered me, I realize how much of the learning experience depends on the teacher. I think that a better teacher could have helped me understand better and process the traumatic content that we were reading. As it was, ridiculing students who got upset ended up with me refusing to finish the assignment and just taking the test based on what I had already learned and what was discussed in class. I wasn't ready to process it on my own, and as always, I had no help.
What I take from the whole situation now is that this is just another instance of the infantilization of children as they should be maturing into capable young adults ready to face the world and whatever it throws at them. The world doesn't give one whit about how upset a young person can get over whatever issue concerns them. That is extremely unfair. But what is even more unfair is young adults reaching the age of majority in loving homes and capable schools who still crumple when faced with the harsh realities of day-to-day life.
When my students would tell me that I had hurt their feelings, I would make a genuine apology if I had indeed gone too far. That was seldom, as I tried to choose my words carefully at all times. Most of the time I chose to tell them to grow a thicker skin. For many of them, it was the best advice they had gotten all day.
When you go around with your heart on your sleeve, where you have no poker face, and feel like everyone is going to be nice to you all the time, Reality bites, and being bitten constantly can wear you down. I'm not trying to turn kids into little cynics, but I do thing that being forewarned is being forearmed. That is part of the point of learning upsetting things in the first place.
I'm really stuck on a phrase from a show I recently watched: "And when I am afraid, I will master my fear." If I were still teaching, I would use it in class when appropriate.
Maybe we could focus on helping kids learn how to act when they feel strong emotion rather than having them avoid situations that cause strong emotions. We could help form another great generation.
Part of growing up is learning how to deal with the adult world as it comes at you. A major reason to study literature is to explore the human experience and the various types of conflict in which people find themselves. Ideally, doing this in a controlled way in school every kid at just the right time in their development learns about the hardships and tragedies of life in a way that they can process it at the time. In reality, we educate them in batches, and the batch a kid is in isn't always the best match. We slap a bit of organization into it, call it age-appropriate (whatever that means), and hope for the best as kids haphazardly make their way to adulthood.
When I think back on the one time that what I learned at school really bothered me, I realize how much of the learning experience depends on the teacher. I think that a better teacher could have helped me understand better and process the traumatic content that we were reading. As it was, ridiculing students who got upset ended up with me refusing to finish the assignment and just taking the test based on what I had already learned and what was discussed in class. I wasn't ready to process it on my own, and as always, I had no help.
What I take from the whole situation now is that this is just another instance of the infantilization of children as they should be maturing into capable young adults ready to face the world and whatever it throws at them. The world doesn't give one whit about how upset a young person can get over whatever issue concerns them. That is extremely unfair. But what is even more unfair is young adults reaching the age of majority in loving homes and capable schools who still crumple when faced with the harsh realities of day-to-day life.
When my students would tell me that I had hurt their feelings, I would make a genuine apology if I had indeed gone too far. That was seldom, as I tried to choose my words carefully at all times. Most of the time I chose to tell them to grow a thicker skin. For many of them, it was the best advice they had gotten all day.
When you go around with your heart on your sleeve, where you have no poker face, and feel like everyone is going to be nice to you all the time, Reality bites, and being bitten constantly can wear you down. I'm not trying to turn kids into little cynics, but I do thing that being forewarned is being forearmed. That is part of the point of learning upsetting things in the first place.
I'm really stuck on a phrase from a show I recently watched: "And when I am afraid, I will master my fear." If I were still teaching, I would use it in class when appropriate.
Maybe we could focus on helping kids learn how to act when they feel strong emotion rather than having them avoid situations that cause strong emotions. We could help form another great generation.
I'll just point out that the hand wringing in this thread...is by adults.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
