Parents Concerned Over Religious Curriculum In TN 7th Grade Public School Class

Interesting. I agree that Religion / Doctrines should not be part of public schools. If you want religion taught, send them to a private religious school or teach them in home / church because otherwise you have to teach all religions in school. (All or Nothing) and I don't really think anyone wants that.


columbiadailyherald.com...

Brandee Porterfield has a daughter in seventh grade at Spring Hill Middle School. She said her daughter brought home school materials containing the Five Pillars of Islam. While she agrees that Islam is part of history and does not have a problem with schools teaching about the religion, she said the lesson skipped a chapter about Christianity.

Porterfield said school officials moved past the chapter because it was not part of the state’s standards.

“I have big problem with that. From a historical point of view, that’s a lot of history these kids are missing,” she said. “Also, for them to spend three weeks on Islam after having skipped Christianity, it seems to be that they are making a choice about which religion to discuss.”

The mother said she was concerned about her child being taught the “Shahada,” the Muslim profession of faith which was contained in a foldable teaching material.

One of the translations of the creed reads, “There is no god but Allah; Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah.”

“I have no problem with the teacher at all. It’s just that yellow foldable seems to be teaching our children religion in schools, and only that religion,” Porterfield said. “From a religion point of view, if the schools are going to be teaching religion in history, they need to teach them all equally.”

Joy Ellis, who also has seventh-grader at Spring Hill Middle School, said she was aware students were studying Islam but took issue with the Shahada section.

“To me, a Christian child should not be made to write that,” Ellis said.

Ellis believes religion does not belong in schools, but if it is going to be taught, then Christianity should be taught because it is the most common in the United States.

To put this in perspective, imagine the outcry from the ACLU, Freedom From Religion Foundation (FFRF), and other atheist organizations if a study guide stated, “Jesus is the Son of God,” and forced children to recite the Lord’s Prayer. These organizations would be beside themselves claiming indoctrination of our public school students.

This seems to be standard for learning Arabic culture. I'm not certain why however immersion programs do this as well.

I think the issue should be how the material is presented rather than the material being presented at all.

a reply to: infolurker

To put this in perspective, imagine the outcry from the ACLU, Freedom From Religion Foundation (FFRF), and other atheist organizations if a study guide stated, “Jesus is the Son of God,” and forced children to recite the Lord’s Prayer. These organizations would be beside themselves claiming indoctrination of our public school students.

I don't think the teacher was trying to convert the students, but I agree that you should have to spend time teaching about all religions if you want to keep it strictly academic.

I took a religious history course in high school and I never felt like the teacher was trying to convert me, but then again we didn't focus on only one religion.

a reply to: infolurker

Ever wonder about how G0VERNMENT is similarly powerful over people as RELIGION is? Crazy how something that's supposed to be/stand for good can cause human beings to commit atrocities against all types of other living things

You can teach that Islam is the faith of the many Middle Eastern countries without teaching the actual tenets of that faith.

It seems they feel that most kids are automatically going to church and getting the Christian stuff, so they must compensate by presenting the Muslim stuff. I think that's a mistake.

If they need to make this a standard, then create an elective called comparative religions and teach them all there.

a reply to: infolurker

From the article:

“I honestly don’t want my child learning about Islam at all, but if they’ve got to learn about it, I would like for them to learn about the historical aspects of it and definitely nothing about the religion - See more at: columbiadailyherald.com...

THIS type of attitude is part of the problem here...

How can you possibly learn about it (Islam) and NOT learn about it (Islam)?
Bury heads in sand and then one day when your children, hopefully, travel farther than the 8 states that border Tennessee they will have no clue about other people. None!

The middle school supervisor said it best when he said:

“It’s part of history. If you don’t talk about it, then you are leaving out the ‘why,’” Hanvey said. “Children need to know the ‘why,’ and they need to be able to learn and know where to find the facts, instead of going by what they hear or what they see on the Internet.” - See more at: columbiadailyherald.com...

SMH once again...Christianity was NOT discussed at the time maybe who knows why? Maybe so there wouldn't be a onslaught of negativity and the topics could be addressed without being muddled with anger and hatred. That is not exactly how I meant it but...

Children in TN will hear about Christianity, believe me...

Tennessean

There are over 900 in the Nashville area yellow pages alone!

Super Pages



On the other hand there are 15 homeless shelters...
Suntopia

a reply to: infolurker

To put this in perspective, imagine the outcry from the ACLU, Freedom From Religion Foundation (FFRF), and other atheist organizations if a study guide stated, “Jesus is the Son of God,” and forced children to recite the Lord’s Prayer. These organizations would be beside themselves claiming indoctrination of our public school students.

They probably would be, but...

The chapter on Christianity was not skipped over but was put off until a later date, she said. The textbook’s chapter layout does not drive instruction. Instead, teachers use a pacing guide that may be different from chapter chronology, Hanvey said.

and...

Islam is discussed for about one day of the three-week period, Hanvey said. By the end of the year, students will have studied Buddhism, Hinduism and other religions, she said.

I agree with you that religion shouldn't be taught in (public) school, but it's kinda hard not to broach the topic, if you're going to teach history. Things don't really seem so out of bounds here. At least they're covering the major religions. Though I'm not so sure why students would need to write the Muslim creed. But as long as they give Christianity and the others the same treatment, I don't see any real issue.

a reply to: TNMockingbird

Again, you can learn about Islam without learning it's belief systems. Teaching the Shahada is like stating that Christ taught that He was the way, the truth and the light, and no one comes to the Father except through Him. If you want to go that far, then you should have comparative religions.

You can teach that there was a man named Mohammad who claimed to be a prophet who started a religion that spread through the Middle East and Africa. Those are facts without getting into the beliefs.

a reply to: infolurker

I don't see why this parent thinks that "Christianity" needs to be taught. She clearly states that her child is a Christian, and therefore, shouldn't be forced to write "There is no God but Allah". Doesn't her 7th grade daughter know her religion well enough that it should be taught in her history class? Besides, you can bet that opens a can of worms. since Christians can't even agree on what they believe, plus to put Jesus in any kind of actual historic setting is going to cause havoc, both ways!

They can't teach that Jesus was a real historic person, without catching flack, and they can't NOT teach that Jesus was a real historic person without catching flack.

At any rate, DID a Christian child have to write "There is no God but Allah", or is this a "preemptive strike"?

What would a secular 7th grade text book have to say about the history of Christianity, I wonder? Would they address Constantine, the Council of Nicaea, Counsel of Trent, the slaughter of the pagans; the Nazarenes; the Cathars.... inquisitions, crusades, Papal Bulls and international law?

No way around it, teaching Christian history to secular 7th graders HAS to be a logistical nightmare!

I say take them all out or have them all in. And ya not sure how you can learn about the history without the religion as religion is what drove much of the history.

I agree with the parent here, if you're going to teach one you must teach them all. As long as it's not in a proselytizing manner and is in the context of history then I have no issue with religion being touched on in schools.

And you're right OP, the ACLU would probably be all over this if it were the other way around. Let's see how they react to this.

SNOPES.

While the original story reported by Spring Hill Home Page is accurate, many of the details were lost as the article was aggregated by various outlets. For instance, one persistent claim is that Spring Hill Middle School gave lessons about Islam for three weeks while neglecting all other religions including Christianity. Dr. Jan Hanvey, Maury County Public Schools middle school supervisor, told the Columbia Daily Herald that while students spend about three weeks learning about the geography and culture of the middle east, they only spend about one day talking about Islam. Furthermore, Hanvey said that the Chritianity was not “skipped,” as some publications have suggested, rather that it was moved to a later date: Read more at m.snopes.com...

a reply to: ketsuko

Except that basic one line description of a religion would be over on the first class.

________________________________________________________________________________

I have no problem with looking deeper on what each believe or how they view their god.

Its not like the teacher stands in front of the class and says..

"ok kids repeat after me!"
“There is no god but Allah; Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah."

I think this what these ignorant fools believe is happening.

SNOPES

Learning about the Five Pillars in a historical context does not convert students to Islam any more than learning about Martin Luther’s 95 Theses converts them to Protestant Christianity. m.snopes.com...

a reply to: ketsuko

I suppose but what if the question is asked "why" did he start that religion? How did it spread so far?

I think that christ taught more than just those points and

I agree

Those are facts without getting into the beliefs

but I feel that is lukewarm. Why not give ALL of the information available?
Just hitting on the highlights isn't always good enough, is it?
Okay well it is not a class on religious studies so...I get that.

Maybe we should teach history and social studies without mentioning religion at all.

7th grade syllabus

a reply to: 3NL1GHT3N3D1

They are teaching them all so the aclu won't care.

a reply to: infolurker

Over reacting my son is in 7th grade not to far from there. And he had similar material. But it was in an historical context. They were discussing the crusaders and even discussed the pope and his decision to send knights to jarusalem. Next they went into even the Knight templars had to hear a lot on that one lol.

same thing happened in college. the subject: world religions. we discussed every religion except christianity. heaviest emphasis was on hinduism because the professor was a hindu. even had a visit from a wiccan "high priestess" which wiccans claim isn't possible since they don't have an organizational hierarchy. she claimed she was a high priestess, anyway.

i do recall learning about "christianity" in public high school, but it was just about how bad the catholic church crusades and catholic church inquistions were, however, it doesn't seem to do much in the way of differentiating the rcc and the rest of christianity. most of the christians that came to the usa were protestants and various other sects, like gnostics, deists, etc, trying to escape from the catholic church inquisitions.

a reply to: undo

You obviously were either poorly educated, or indoctrinated with lies, because literally every statement made in your post about The Catholic Church is blatantly false. None of it is true.

The Catholic Church, started by Jesus Christ, is the single greatest "institution" that has ever existed in human history. (ironically, a sysytem for schooling children? Instituted by The Catholic Church). Virtually every single positive aspect of modern humanity can be traced back in some way to Jesus' church, The Catholic Church.

Heaven forbid we actually ask a 7th grader to start thinking on a deeper level, that is, to start thinking spiritually. Here would be my first lesson, and it should be drummed into their heads for those 3 weeks..."You're ALL going to die some day....what's next ?"

"Wisdom is vindicated by all her children"..... (if you went to a government, errr, public school, in the USA in the last 50 years, you may need to look this up to see what it means, google it:-)