Like out of some horror movie.
Invasion of the soul nappers.
Posted on 12/26/2005 8:11:14 AM PST by Conservatrix
To the Editor:
"Last week I substituted at a local elementary school in Lebanon County. The lesson plan required me to read the 1882 poem “The Night Before Christmas” by Clement Clarke Moore to two classes of students. While I can appreciate the poem for its literary value, the subject matter is offensive to me, and the reading of this poem to the children imposed values upon me which are against my deeply held religious beliefs. I could not in good conscience present the notion of Santa Claus as a truth to the children, and stated so.
No public school teacher should be required to teach a belief, or custom, or religion that he or she believes to be false, or be required to pass those purported falsehoods onto impressionable children, without the right to state a disclaimer. Furthermore, freedom of speech and religion, no matter how unpopular the speech or against cultural norms the religion, are protected rights under the Constitution of the United States. A secular public school should not be propagating any kind of religion. The belief in Santa Claus as a divine, magical, omniscient, powerful, giving, loving father-figure, to which children are taught to make supplications and requests, is a religion indeed-- a distorted substitute for the Judeo-Christian God; a false form of Christianity; a zealously-protected American idol.
In presenting the poem, I gave the children quick historical background about the Santa Claus myth-- its evolution from the historic Nickolaus, Bishop of Myrna in Asia Minor, who died in 343 A.D., to its amalgamation with ancient Western pagan traditions of German, Scandinavian and Dutch origins, to the current manifestation in the secular Christmas culture of today. (Dutch children, for example, would put their wooden shoes out at night for “Sante Klaus” to fill with candies.)
The current Santa Claus figure was popularized in the late 19th Century by artist Thomas Nast of Harper’s Weekly Magazine, who depicted “Saint Nick,” not as an elf, but a rotund, pipe-smoking man in a red and white suit. This is the deity to which countless public school children today are taught to make supplications, and about whom they sing their many songs at annual public school Christmas programs.
If people are upset about the revelation to children that Santa Claus is a myth-- which all children who are taught this lie find or figure out eventually-- perhaps it is because Santa is that zealously-guarded idol of their own modern religion. Therefore, as a religion, let Santa be kept out of the public school classroom (no more “Dear Santa” letters to line those school hallways)--or perhaps, in the interest of “diversity,” make his mythical, oversized personage share equal representation in literature, and song, and Christmas programs, with the other Person of the season: the Lord Jesus Christ, God made flesh, God with us."
Including evolution?
"Bullfinche's Mythology": How offended must have been my teachers to include in our curricula, reading about beliefs with which they did not personally agree!
http://www.bulfinch.org/fables/welcome.html#Contents
How painful it must have been for my teachers to assign readings and to lead discussions of classical and contemporary literary works, about ancient beliefs and fables and gods and goddesses and metaphors for gods past and present. No John Donne, John Milton, Chaucer, Shakespeare! No Beowulf! No Iliad or Odyssey! No Kipling! Tennyson! Blake! Emily Dickinson! Robert Frost! No "Diary of Anne Frank"! No CS Lewis and "Narnia"! No Tolkien and "Lord of the Rings"...
No Judeao-Christian belief in the classroom! And no end runs around judeao-Christian beliefs by thinly veiled allegory in my classroom please!
Oh, the misery of the educator! Oh the responsibilty to speak from conscience and to disabuse the ignorant child from beliefs held irrelevant by the educator! Oh the agony of being excorciated for refusing to teach against matters of conscience!
As this teacher argues, no one should have to teach .... or to learn ........to that about which they do not personally believe.... right?
If you think those reindeer get the run of the place, boy are you mistaken~!
There's at least one a day. They all know what's best for us.
Hope you had a great Christmas....Santa Claus et al!
The key error in the substitute teacher's analysis is that this is literature. It is NOT claimed to be true. To teach the story is not to claim that it is true, any more than to teach Tom Sawyer is to claim that IT is factually accurate. This teacher could easily have avoided the issue of whether Santa Claus is "real" by directing the students to their parents. This would have illustrated a sensitivity that is generally expected of teachers, especially teachers of very young students.
It was a POEM for crying out loud!!
What is she --- Mrs. Scrooge??
Are you the Santa Claus patrol today?
Is there any reason you're on TWO different Santa Claus theads, insinuating you KNOW both the people who have made Santa an issue this season?
Yes, but as a substitute teacher, she should have just read the poem and asked the children to talk about it and leave her input out of it unless she wanted to guide them in the structure of it, etc.
I never told anybody's children who believed in Santa Claus that it was a lie as I don't believe in perempting parents' rights. They find out soon enough.
Seems to me if you support her stance because you happen to agree with it, you'll also have to support other stances you may not agree with as long as it's presented with their conscience and beliefs. Can't have it both ways.
L
1. The teacher's own statements here make it quite clear that this is not a matter of a brave woman standing up for her beliefs. Instead, it's just some delusional person who sees a "religion" where one doesn't exist, and decided that "Since I can't teach my religion to those kids, then I'm sure as hell going to screw up theirs!". In short, she's a sanctimonious hypocrite who took out her own psychological issues on a bunch of innocent kids.
2. Regardless of any other issues raised by this incident, there's only one that truly matters at the end of the day: This person has pr oven herself wholly unsuitable to hold the position of schoolteacher. Anyone who would do this to a class full of six-year-olds either was too stupid to realize that this sort of outcome was preordained, or was fully cognizant of that fact and proceeded to do it anyway out of spite. That's not the sort of personality type that ought to be in charge of any group of kids under the age of 12 or 13.
Like out of some horror movie.
Invasion of the soul nappers.
What if she had stated she did not want to read the poem because in her belief the Santa myth reflects the values of God and Christianity. Therefore it is against her values to read this poem to them BEFORE she discusses with them the myth of Christianity and how it has become engrained in Western Culture over the years and in responsible of comercialism...violence down through the ages and religion in general is evil and Santa is a reflection of the lies..etc.
Now...there are people who think this way. Suppose SHE was one of them. Would you STILL be OK with her standing up for her beliefs and reading a poem after she went into a long diatribe...or would you rather her just omit that part of the lesson plan and stand up for her beliefs that way. Can you see how others would like to control what the beliefs their children are taught at school?
If you want it ONE way...don't get made when the she gets put on the OTHER foot. And it will.
"What would be your response if your child's teacher told your children that you are a liar and that there is a god? "
I'm too old to have schoolaged children. People are forever teaching things to children that conflict with what their parents tell them. Teachers, aunts, uncles, lots of people.
Parents hear about this stuff, and deal with it themselves, in their own way.
The fact is that Santa Claus is a myth, and should be taught as one. It's like all fairy tales. We tell them to our children, but we help them to understand that things like elves and fairies and unicorns are not real creatures but "pretend" creatures. Santa, too, is a "pretend" person.
Folks who believe in deities of one sort or another just teach one fewer "pretend" story to their kids. Jews and Christians teach them that "God" is a real thing, but teach them that Santa is a "pretend" person. Same with believers in other religions.
I just happen to feel the same way about deities. Children trust their parents, and will, generally, believe what their parents tell them over what they hear elsewhere. At least they will do this for a while. Eventually, however, if parents lie to children, they will figure it out, much to the detriment of the parents.
Religion, on the other hand, is something that can stick throughout one's life, and that's a good thing, in most cases. Most people believe in a deity or several deities, even as adults. That's fine with me, even though I don't.
Santa Claus, however, is not a deity. He is a "pretend" character, just like the witches, fairies, gremlins, and unicorns. Easy enough to teach that.
I think it all comes down to this one question. That's exactly why everyone is so mad, this person had no right to inflict her beliefs on these innocent children. If she disagreed with the lesson, she should have taken it up with adults.
It also goes back to what one was saying above, if this teacher was an athiest, should they have been allowed to present that God does not exist? We all know the answer to that.
Conservatrix, I am very interested in your answer to the above question. Isn't this a matter for the parents to decide? I agree with most of us here, she overstepped her bounds.
That's exactly right. She trumped the parents and dispelled something that they had decided to allow or perpetuate.
Doesn't matter what I tell my kid. If I want to tell him that dogs can secretly talk to each other, I have that right.
If he asks her and she says "no they can't", I still have no problem with it-- even though my fun would be done.
If she knows, however, that I'm perpetuating that particular myth, and decides to take it on herself to effectively convince my kid that I'm a liar-- not to mention destroy our collective fun-- I'll sure as hell have a problem with her.
I wasn't arguing that Santa is real, and you didn't answer my question.
Surely you don't agree that it is the role of a substitute teacher to tell a class full of children that their parents are liars?
That's what happened here, a substitute teacher decided that she knew better what to tell the children. You teach your children what you want, I'll teach my children what I want, but the substitute teacher can just read the stupid poem.
"Six year old kids don't believe in Santa? The ones who went home crying still believed."
Could be. First lesson in reality for them, then. Lots more lessons like that coming, I'd guess. First grade is the time when lots of myths start to come apart for children. For the first time, they're hearing from folks who are supposed to be teaching them facts.
Santa is not a fact. Santa is a myth for toddlers. Had this teacher not told the real story of Santa, they'd have heard it anyhow within a year from their fellow students.
If she's really offended, she belongs teaching in a private religious school. Preferably one founded by a bunch of tight assed enemies of Fun.
I also notice she wasn't offended enough not to take the school districts money. I guess her belief system stops at her checking account.
L
And I noticed you didn't respond to my post #117. Gee, I'm beginning to believe that YOU are the teacher!
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