Yesterday we wrote about the lessons learned from OWSers. These lessons included violence is socially and legally acceptable when a person wants to ascertain his/her voice is heard for whatever issue he/she believes others should know about. These lessons included shoving elderly people to the ground, blocking traffic to impede folks from driving to their intended destinations, and shouting obscenities to those and about those who don't agree with their point of view.This is to be celebrated, because after all, we live in a democracy and "all" voices should be heard. I use the word "all" loosely, because the OWSers don't want the voices that don't believe what they believe to be heard or respected.
Why should we be writing about the OWSers on an education blog? Surely this doesn't include schoolchildren does it? It does concern schoolchildren and in a very troubling way.
From Education Revolution:
Ahead of their General Strike and Day of Action on Wednesday, Occupy Oakland has put together a really nice set of lesson plans, for students of all ages, about a variety of Occupy Oakland and Occupy Wall Street related topics, everything from democracy in society and the classroom to the history of strikes in political movements. It’s a great resource for radical educators, so I thought I’d share it here.
It's worth your time to link to the google document to determine what is in store for Oakland students (and perhaps other students nationwide) and their studies about the OWS movement.
Look at a few of the columns on what they want to teach and how they will teach it. One lesson plan that caught my eye for elementary through high school students was to teach:
Occupy Movement, Possibilities for change this movement is part of envisioning
The goal is to teach children how democracy is illustrated in the OWS movement. How will this be accomplished?
On the Elementary and Middle School level:
* Students will learn the definition of democracy
* Students will identify some ways democracy is practiced in the country, city/town and school and classroom
* Students will learn how the protesters at Occupy Wall Street are using democratic principles
* Students will consider ideas for making their classroom more democratic
* Students will determine the feasibility of their democratic ideas
On the High School level:
Students will:
* define democracy
* explore democracy by "doing" democracy
* read about and discuss democracy and the Occupy Wall Street movement
Social and Emotional Skills:
* active listening
* democracy: having all voices are heard
* compromise
* choose leadership/representation
* explore the idea of leadership
How exciting! And even math skills are covered for middle school students using the 99% mantra:
* Students will learn the meaning of 99% and do math problems calculating 99%
* Students will learn about the Occupy Wall Street Protest
* Students will learn about wealth and wealth disparity
* Students will learn what some of the protesters want and need and why they are angry
* Students will learn how to make an infographic
Will this sort of Math make our kids STEM ready? Are the OWSers lessons of "wants and needs and why they are angry" appropriate for math lessons? Are you feeling confident this nation will become globally competitive with these type of lesson plans? When did the chant of we "want and need and why we are angry" supplant the goal of what we as citizens and individuals could do to contribute to society and our families?
These lessons may be taking place in Oakland with "radical educators" but in many of these exercises, we might seeing this in Missouri as well. Remember what the standard in Missouri is for social studies? Our students learn they live in a "constitutional democracy". Nowhere in the standards does it teach students they live in a republic. Nowhere in the teaching resources listed in the above google document does it mention a republican form of government. Could Missouri DESE consist of "radical educators" as well?
If you have children or grandchildren in the public school system, it's up to you to teach them how America was set up to operate. America is not supposed to be what "democracy looks like". America was set up to operate as a republic, not a democratic form of government.
DESE in Missouri and apparently teachers in Oakland aren't teaching the constitutional version of history. America was not founded on OWS lesson plans, Missouri DESE bureaucrats, and teachers who support OWSer demands.
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