Wednesday, October 23, 2002
The end of Western civilization!: Speaking of never-ending left/right debates, the state Board of Education has approved new guidelines for teaching history in lower-grade levels, with more emphasis on non-European studies. OK. Fine. Hub Blog firmly believes Americans don’t know enough about other cultures, especially African culture. Also, this issue tends to center around the teaching of World History, not American History, making an even stronger argument for including the study of the histories of Africa, Asia, India and other WORLD cultures in WORLD HISTORY. So the compromise approved by the board seems to make more than a little sense. But that’s not good enough for critics. They want less “facts” and more “context” when teaching about other cultures. One suspects -- since “context” is never really explained in the story -- that “context” actually means, in reality, a more politically correct interpretation of subject matter by using the magical "critical thinking" approach towards education.
Which leads Hub Blog to what has already become a mini-classic blog item (‘Today I Became One of Those People’) by Jim Lileks, who recently bemoaned the fact that his toddler at pre-school is constantly subjected to left-wing, politically-correct teachings, including a suggestion that a nice family-friendly event to attend might be local “Peace Marches.” (One strongly suspects the same teachers would be deeply offended if their children were being urged at school to attend family-friendly NRA rallies.) ... One last point: Hub Blog recently had its own Lileks Experience while watching Boston’s community-access channel. There’s a very cute show in which city teachers help students, on air, to figure out their math, grammar and other homework-related problems. One day, a teacher read to students about organic foods, pesticides and other environmentally-correct subject matters. On and on it went, relentless ideological rants and indoctrination, disguised as teaching. That PC segment was the exception, not the norm, for the program, it should be point out. And that’s Hub Blog’s overly long education BLEAT for the day.
Which leads Hub Blog to what has already become a mini-classic blog item (‘Today I Became One of Those People’) by Jim Lileks, who recently bemoaned the fact that his toddler at pre-school is constantly subjected to left-wing, politically-correct teachings, including a suggestion that a nice family-friendly event to attend might be local “Peace Marches.” (One strongly suspects the same teachers would be deeply offended if their children were being urged at school to attend family-friendly NRA rallies.) ... One last point: Hub Blog recently had its own Lileks Experience while watching Boston’s community-access channel. There’s a very cute show in which city teachers help students, on air, to figure out their math, grammar and other homework-related problems. One day, a teacher read to students about organic foods, pesticides and other environmentally-correct subject matters. On and on it went, relentless ideological rants and indoctrination, disguised as teaching. That PC segment was the exception, not the norm, for the program, it should be point out. And that’s Hub Blog’s overly long education BLEAT for the day.
