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Frankly it's amazing you would try and draw a parallel between putting a developmentally disabled person in advanced math with understanding that when you put 20-30 diverse kids into a room they are going to learn about each other.
"Could you please ask Billy to not talk about his moms or have them pick him up together from school - I'm not able to communicate such concepts to my kids"
This isn't educational approach, it's life experience and creating a comfortable environment for all your students.
Simply grow up.
Reminds me of my cousin. My unwed sister was pregnant, and our cousin was having all kinds of trepidation at her small children seeing her. We were going back to visit and our cousin told my sister and our mother it might be best if Sis did not come to the family party being planned. "In our world," our cousin explained, "Mothers are married." Her older kids were five or six, and she was utterly perplexed how to explain my sister's condition to her fragile children.
Kindergarten is much much much to early to tell a child about such matters. It is impossible for her to understand any of it. The teacher should be told not to read that book to kindergartners.
I'm gay, but honestly so much openness about gay partnerships is "new" to me. In the years prior to the gay marriage legal decision, I adapted really well to the "not out," "don't ask don't tell" kind of life. I was comfortable in that.
I still have a hard time getting used to being open with people. I still have a hard time understanding that even grade schoolers and high schoolers, and college students, and athletes, might be accepting of my orientation instead of immediately judging me. I have a hard time realizing that there are are liberal communities, libraries, principals, coaches, churches, and schoolteachers who talk openly and non-judgmentally about gay partnerships like your child's kindergarten teacher did. It's like for me, it hasn't sunk in yet, that this change has happened.
It's great, of course, and so good for the young people who are a generation or two younger than me, who will never know the kind of hate and discrimination that my generation did.
So, I guess I'm not a good person to ask about this question.
As a gay person, I'm still adapting to this new reality, myself.
I'm not conservative, I'm really liberal in my politics, but this dramatic change in our country's culture is so new to me.
I didn't think our culture and national laws would change all at once. But it did. I thought rights would get added and battles would be won, in small steps. I thought ENDA (the employment non-discrimination act) and Housing laws would change, before Gay Marriage legal standing would change. I thought that civil unions would be approved and we would have those for many years before moving to marriage. I was wrong about all of that. I can't believe it happened so fast. One fell swoop, and our entire culture changed regarding GLBTQ relationships.
This also changed the gay culture. A lot of the gay community was bonded together based on the discrimination that we felt, and we formed close friendships and supportive bonds with each other, because we were facing a lot of suffering together. We were forming friendships with each other in order to feel safe and secure. Now that the landscape changed, gay people don't automatically seek out other gay people for safety, support, and friendship. It actually seems harder now to have closer friendships within the gay community. Isn't that so strange how things turned out?
It obviously is a lot less stressful for me, when others (like teachers) are helping bring acceptance and tolerance in society to a higher level. But I wouldn't know how to talk to a kindergartner about same-sex marriage. I really wouldn't! So God bless those who are brave enough to try. I don't think any of us really know the right answer yet. We're figuring out how this works, as we go.
Kindergarten is much much much to early to tell a child about such matters. It is impossible for her to understand any of it. The teacher should be told not to read that book to kindergartners.
I think you are confused about what they were talking about. They weren't talking about sex, they were talking about different types of families. Thinking they aren't old enough to be exposed to different families is like saying they can't leave the house or meet people. Heck, they shouldn't even be able to meet their uncles and aunts or cousins, etc.
Just a thought before you make a comment, maybe you should click on the link and look at the book in question. It's not about sex or gay people, it's about families.
Well, then I would expect there to be a book for every possible family combination represented, including kids raised by an aunt, a grandmother, a friend, a stepdad, a mom and dad, a stepmom and dad, a stepdad and mom, a foster mom, a single mom who is gay, a single mom who is straight, an interracial couple (well, that could take up the entire school year covering all those combinations and sexes together), a gay male couple who is interracial .... and let's include all the religions, too, Amish, Catholic, Muslim, Jewish, Kwanzaa, Pagan, all sects of methodists/presberterians/lutherans ... because all family dynamics must be covered.
Just so all kids are "socially aware" and no one feels left out. They really don't need to know how to read, add or spell. Or think for themselves.
This book has many of the combinations represented. Did you look at the book they are talking about. It's NOT about gay marriage specifically, but about different combinations of families and they use animal illustrations not human ones at all.
See spot run. Why aren't they reading these kinds of books?
Social engineering at it's finest.
Legal or not, there are plenty of parents who do not believe same sex marriage is okay.
And they're welcome to their beliefs. However the US government, the Supreme Court, your state government, your city/town government, and your government funded, public schools, are very clearly in lockstep together that gay marriage is legal.
If you want to keep your children in a bubble, that's your choice, you can homeschool or find a private school.
What you can't do is ask that a PUBLIC school alter their curriculum and/or purposely exclude homosexual parents.
Quote:
Originally Posted by nana053
This book has many of the combinations represented. Did you look at the book they are talking about. It's NOT about gay marriage specifically, but about different combinations of families and they use animal illustrations not human ones at all.
Exactly! I really, really wish it wasn't a copyright problem because I would love nothing more than to post the images here because it's obvious that far, far too many people with such strong opinions don't even know what the book is actually about.
Finger Laker you are missing the point. NO ONE is suggesting that little Billy not discuss his moms, or be segregated from the class or kicked out of school.
The point is: Should Billy's moms be the main focus of a lesson that is taught to all the kids in the class? Why is that needed? If David's mom is 10 years older than David's dad, should that be the main focus of a lesson? If Sally's dad is from the Middle East and her mom is from Ireland, should that be the focus of the lesson? If Kiera's mom is Jewish because she converted and now lives with uncle who is Catholic, but her aunt is Muslim and has two kids from a former marriage, should THAT be the focus of the lesson?
People are different and have different backgrounds. SO WHAT? Why is that the sole focus of the classroom for only certain populations? I'd rather kids be taught to respect ALL (no hitting, no name calling) and MOVE ON TO ACTUAL LEARNING AND CRITICAL THINKING. You know, what schools are supposed to be doing and failing miserably at because they are spending so much time on issues, not academics.
And you failed -- telling me to grow up? Well, that's not respectful, tolerant or mature. Perhaps if your teachers taught you respect instead of reading books that have zero academic value, you wouldn't feel the need to name call or insult me. You might be better able to stick to the issue at hand and focus on THAT.
Ironic. Seeing as how you clearly didn't read the OP carefully, have no clue what book or "lesson" is being discussed, and define "teaching respect" as no hitting or name-calling...yet you have the gall to chastise another poster.
Fascinating. I can't wait to hear more.
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