Posted on 04/17/2003 10:32:53 AM PDT by Remedy
It hasn't been easy teaching children about homosexuality in the Newton schools because many parents are not happy with the plan, a social worker told the attendees at one of the Fistgate sessions held this year at Tufts University.
"I work in the Newton public schools, and a lot of times it can be a very reactionary group, and it has not been easy at all," said Laura Perkins, who is a social worker in the schools.
Her session at Fistgate 2003 was about introducing six-year-olds to homosexual concepts. She shared books and sample lesson plans. The session was titled, "Developing Lessons that Help Young Students Understand Human Differences."
"What I do is to go into classrooms and teach kids about respect for human differences and to teach social skills lessons," she said, adding, "I have been asked to train new teachers in how to do some of these lessons. The new teachers are being trained to do this."
Several participants were from Brookline's public schools, including two first-grade co-teachers from the Devotion School and a 3rd-through-5th grade learning center teacher.
"It seems like the climate at the [Devotion] School is much more open than a lot of schools," commented Perkins, who then lamented the obstacles she faces in Newton.
She asked group members what teaching methods they currently use in their classrooms. One of the Devotion School teachers replied that she already does "a lot of stuff about similarities and differences . . . sort of getting [the children] to broaden their definition of what's smart or what's good or what's acceptable. And we talk a lot about teasing, and a lot about rules that people think there are, but that really aren't there. Like, people think there's a rule that boys can't like pink or wear pink or like to do certain things. That rule really doesn't exist, but people behave as if they do. So in this class, there isn't a rule, and we're not going to pretend that there's a rule."
Perkins said that children, who have language-based learning disabilities or who are mentally retarded, tend to think in such literal terms that they "really sometimes do have trouble grasping these ideas" that "a family can have two moms or two dads. So, sometimes it takes working with the parents as well to help them to talk to their children about it, so that they're hearing it in different places." Get In Front of Parents Early On
Perkins recommended educators take a pro-active lead in setting ground rules with parents during the first open house of the school year:
"It's good just to state it right at open house. Talk about the kind of climate that you're trying to create in the classroom. Let parents know that you're going to be intervening if there's any teasing or name-calling, and that occasionally kids do use terms like 'retarded' or 'gay' as insults, and you will intervene and have a discussion about that if that happens."
Should parents want to know what a teacher is going to say in that situation, Perkins advised, "I would at that point tell them that I would define those words for the kids, and they're going to want to know how you define it.
"So the definition that I give to parents of an elementary school person, and this is what I use for the kids, is I say to kids that someone who is gay is someone, is a man who would be in a loving or romantic relationship with another man rather than a woman, and a lesbian is a woman who would be in a loving or a romantic relationship [with another woman], which she isn't necessarily in a relationship, but that is who she'd be in a relationship with."
Perkins conceded that she does not use the term "sexual orientation" with kids because, "It's too charged for the parents. I think if it's charged for the kids, it's really charged for the parents."
She actually does explain the difference between friendship and romance to children: "And parents will say to me, 'They're little kids, how do they know about romantic? What does that mean?' And I'll say, 'Well, I actually do explain that to kids.' You know, I say, 'Does that mean that if you're friends with a boy who's friends with a boy, does that mean he's gay?' And they'll say 'No.' And I'll say, 'That's right, it's different, that's a friendship. I'm not talking about friendship. I'm talking about moms and dads who've fallen in love, and then they want to live together and raise a family.'"
One method Perkins uses to explain the difference between friendship and romance to small children is fairy tales: "Again, with learning disabilities, you're dealing with sometimes kids who think very literally, so I'll say things like, 'In Cinderella, the story of Cinderella, the relationship between the Prince and Cinderella. . . that's a romantic relationship, or Sleeping Beauty and the prince.' And they get [that]. That seems to help them grasp that idea that it's not a friendship; it's a different concept."
When asked by one participant if she has ever had negative reactions from parents, Perkins agreed she has, and illustrated the ostracism some children face when their parents refuse to let them be indoctrinated: "I've had parents who've been kind about it and great about it, and I've had parents who've asked that their child be removed from any lesson in which we're going to deal with that.
"In fact, there's one parent who's asked that his child not have anything to do with me, so that child has had to be removed. I do social skills lessons in grades one and three, and that child had to be removed every time I came to do that in the classroom. We found something else for her to do, like go to the library and water the plants. I felt so bad. She was one of the kids who loved the lessons the most."
Perkins added, "There are always parents whose religion actually says that it [homosexuality] is a sin. I don't want to disrespect anyone's religion, and I'll tell parents that, but we do want every child to feel safe and comfortable in the school.
"If kids are getting teased and harassed, they're not going to be able to work. They're not going to be able to concentrate on their learning. So this is actually for the protection of people's learning so that they're able to learn best. So it really does go along with the goals of education, that every child has the right to be comfortable."
Perkins passed out several children's books for class participants to examine. She called Families are Different a "wonderful book" for kindergarten and first graders. However, "It does not show gay and lesbian families, so what I'll do is, I'll read the kids the book, then ask them if there are any kinds of families that are not represented. I actually have kids who have lesbian parents who do not say that their family wasn't represented, which is troubling to me. I question, are they getting the idea that I'm asking, or are they ashamed or are they uncomfortable? So then I'll sit and talk about families with two moms and two dads."
Good books for introducing the concept of "allies" include Oliver Button is a Sissy for first graders and Teammates, a story about African American baseball player Jackie Robinson, for third graders.
"When a child is being laughed at," said Perkins, "it's important to stop the class and say, 'Is there anybody who's going to be this child's ally? Something is going on; someone needs help. Who is going to show their support by being an ally?'
"I've had a whole class practically dissolve in laughter in front of me because I used the word 'gay'. And when that happens you have a choice: Should you stop or should you just go on and ignore the issues or stop and discuss it? And I stop and discuss it and ask them why they're laughing. And they'll really try to avoid the subject, but then usually someone will spill the beans, and then I'll go into the definition, and why it's hurtful to laugh about it."
Another resource Perkins recommends for first graders is Zinnia and Dot, a "conflict resolution" story about two mother hens who fight over a single egg after a weasel steals the others in their nests. When the chick hatches, the hens realize that it does not matter who originally laid the egg. The story reads, "Never before was a baby chick so loved, growing up with not one, but two mother hens." When Perkins finishes reading the story, she asks children, "Does this look like a happy family?" When the kids answer "Yes," Perkins explains, "This story is about a hen family, but in some human families there are two moms or two dads."
Perkins admitted that My Two Uncles, the story of a girl who does not understand the conflict her grandfather has with his gay son (the girl's uncle) and his male sex partner, may be too sophisticated for first and second graders because of its explicit definitions of "gay" and "lesbian," but "I have great discussions in third grade with kids about it." She noted that one of her former principals asked her not to use the book because of parents' negative reactions.
Chicken Sunday, for grades 3 through 5, talks about the Holocaust and shows a drawing of a man with a concentration camp tattoo on his arm. Perkins said she uses the story to talk to children about groups of people who were persecuted in Germany during World War II, "and that one of the groups was gays and lesbians, and I'll define it for them, and [talk] about how it seems like all that persecution was about fear of differences and about not understanding people who are different, and that is one of the reasons we are emphasizing understanding differences."
Perkins, who identified herself as "straight" during the session, concluded, "I think it's more the parents who should go to a psychiatrist to become comfortable with who their child is."
Thomas Jefferson on Sodomy Sect. XIV. Whosoever shall be guilty of rape, polygamy, or sodomy* with a man or woman, shall be punished; if a man, by castration, a woman, by boring through the cartilage of her nose a hole of one half inch in diameter at the least. Peterson, Merrill D. "Crimes and Punishments" Thomas Jefferson: Writings Public Papers (Literary Classics of the United States, Inc. 1984) pp. 355, 356.
BURGER, C.J., Concurring Opinion Decisions of individuals relating to homosexual conduct have been subject to state intervention throughout the history of Western civilization. Condemnation of those practices is firmly rooted in Judeo-Christian moral and ethical standards. Homosexual sodomy was a capital crime under Roman law…. During the English Reformation, when powers of the ecclesiastical courts were transferred to the King's Courts, the first English statute criminalizing sodomy was passed…. Blackstone described "the infamous crime against nature" as an offense of "deeper malignity" than rape, a heinous act "the very mention of which is a disgrace to human nature," and "a crime not fit to be named." W. Blackstone, Commentaries . The common law of England, including its prohibition of sodomy, became the received law of Georgia and the other Colonies. In 1816, the Georgia Legislature passed the statute at issue here, and that statute has been continuously in force in one form or another since that time. To hold that the act of homosexual sodomy is somehow protected as a fundamental right would be to cast aside millennia of moral teaching.
Hundreds rally for '10 Commandments judge' The effort is in response to the Alabama high court's unanimous decision to reject a lesbian mother's child custody petition. Moore wrote a separate concurring opinion, repudiating homosexuality on religious grounds, calling it "abhorrent, immoral, detestable, a crime against nature, and a violation of the laws of nature and of nature's God."
More than a dozen briefs filed at the United States Supreme Court this week oppose the declaration of a new constitutional right in Lawrence v. Texas.
Alabama, South Carolina, and Utah (State Attorneys General)
American Center for Law and Justice
Jay Alan Sekulow, Counsel of Record
American Family Association
Stephen M. Crampton, Counsel of Record
Center for Arizona Policy
This brief refutes the errors expressed in the opposing amicus submitted by the American Psychology Association.
Len L. Munsil, Counsel of Record
Center for Law and Justice International
Pat Monaghan, Counsel of Record
Center for the Original Intent of the Constitution
Michael P. Farris, Counsel of Record
Concerned Women for America
Janet M. LaRue, Counsel of Record
Family Research Council & Focus on the Family
Robert P. George, Counsel of Record
Legislators, State of Texas
Kelly Shackelford, Counsel of Record
Liberty Counsel
Mathew D. Staver, Counsel of Record
Pro Family Law Center
Richard Ackerman, Counsel of Record
Texas Eagle Forum; Daughters of Liberty Republican Women of Houston, Texas;
Spirit of Freedom Republican Women's Club
Teresa Stanton Collett, Counsel for Amici Curiae
Texas Physicians Resource Council, Christian Medical and Dental Association, Catholic Medical Association
Glen Lavy, Counsel of Record
United Families International
Paul Benjamin Linton, Counsel for the Amicus
They are not happy? Give parents Prozak and Ritalin for the kids!
Yes, you need to start early if you want to hook them up.
Is Newton represented by........Barney Frank by chance?
Newton is representing Barney Frank. I don’t know which perverted area Frank represents.
Wow, really? So in Newton there are other religions than Unitarians and Reformed?
Do you support teaching small children to "eat or wallow in" feces? Are you a homosexual?
Some reporters know stenography.
You can stop trying to deny what was said. This same crap was being shoveled last year and nobody could dispute its content because it was recorded, and despite all the pissing and whining nothing was done about it because nothing could be done about it.
The fact is, it does not matter how this information is being attained. You know homosexuality is being taught in elementary schools (as seen in post #46). That may be well, good, and perfectly acceptable to you, it is not to every responsible parent.
We have all been shown by example just exactly what homosexuals have in mind for our kids, and our response should be clear:
They should stay the forking hell away from our children. Period. No if's. No and's. No but's. No grey areas. No middle ground. No discussion. No debate.
And yet, most of your posts in this thread challenge the credibility of MassNews and how they got this information, strongly implying they made it all up.
Allow me to quote the American Heritage Dictionary:
denial SYLLABICATION: de·ni·al PRONUNCIATION: AUDIO: d-nl KEY NOUN: 1. A refusal to comply with or satisfy a request. 2a. A refusal to grant the truth of a statement or allegation; a contradiction. b. Law The opposing by a defendant of an allegation of the plaintiff. 3a. A refusal to accept or believe something, such as a doctrine or belief. b. Psychology An unconscious defense mechanism characterized by refusal to acknowledge painful realities, thoughts, or feelings. 4. The act of disowning or disavowing; repudiation. 5. Abstinence; self-denial.
Sound familiar?
"Post #46" was just one of the propaganda ponies galloping through.
No, it was excerpts from two reviews of a book written by two people who are obviously interested in advancing the homosexual agenda in the public school arena. Your assertion is as bogus as calling Larry Kramer's direct quote condoning pedophilia propoganda simply because I mentioned it.
If elementary schools "teach" that gays actually EXIST and that they are just as deserving of human rights and respect, then I have no problem with that.
You know, it is really not a good idea to play ignorant. Not here. Not if you want to be intellectually kicked around like a soccer ball at the World Cup.
The debate is in your interpretation of events. It is a fact that you have opinions... but that does not make your opinions fact.
You know, when I read things like this, you attempting to blur what is absolute and obvious, I cannot help but wonder if you are a troll or actually sincere about the things you say.
But then again, it was not all that long ago you actually tried to defend the North American Man-Boy Love Association in public, so perhaps the latter is true.
Keep digging that hole. The farther down you get, the less happy you will be with what you see.
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