Little Manchurian Candidates

If you have children in your life this article is a must read - including the comments!

www.informationliberation.com...

I’ve been looking for answers, answers to why children are the way they are today.
I wanted to blame the economy - not one parent being able to stay home to raise the children, both needing to work.
I wanted to blame divorce, broken homes the lack of (Grand) parental influence.
I wanted to blame drugs, the government, television, video games, everything and anything.
I even wanted to blame, and ended up, (in part), blaming Disney but that’s for another post.
But I never thought to blame Dick and Jane and Kindergarten.
Please give this article a read.

It has occurred to me that the cause of America's illiteracy crisis has been discovered. It is the reading curriculum in our schools. Unfortunately, the damage to children appears to extend way beyond reading failure. One wonders if the hidden agenda in the readers has created our victim culture, a generation of withdrawn and resentful children, alienated from themselves, their parents, society, books and ideas.

When reviewing the school readers, I had noticed an impoverished vocabulary, composed mostly of three and four letter words. I brought this up with the teacher. She explained that the readers were integrated into a district policy that no more than five hundred new words be introduced to students during any grade level. The idea was to protect children from the dizzying and confusing effects of an overabundance of words and ideas.

Now after reading this next quote, go to next post for questions... See how well you do without looking back...

Example textbook: Once upon a time there was a little green mouse who hopped after a tiger onto a yellow airplane. The plane turned into a big red bird in flight, and the mouse turned into a blue pumpkin. The pumpkin fell to the ground and its seeds grew into pots and pans.

(cont.)

[edit on 8-9-2008 by silo13]

Now answer these questions... NO peeking.

1) "What color was the mouse?"

2) "Why do mice turn into pumpkins?"

3) "How do seeds grow?"

*************************

I don’t know what to say to sum it all up other than kids are *S* from the get go these days. They don't seem to even have a chance.

And for what reason?

You can only dumb down the population so much - then what is the population good for?

Why would the *powers that be* wish to ruin American's youth?

Is the answer staring me right in the face?





[edit on 8-9-2008 by silo13]

The powers that be do not want intelligent, free thinking, members of society. They want.....OBEDIENT WORKERS

Like George Carlin once said, they want you to be just smart enpugh to run the machines and work in the factories, but stupid enough to not notice the big red, white, and blue, d### that's being shoved up their behind.

reply to post by silo13


Excellent post. In less than 8 years, my outlook on homeschooling has completely changed. I really don't know what to think.

ColoradoJens

Does any one have any information about these first grade and second grade readers? that is Title and Author. Can anyone verify the information in the article?
It would be nice to know exactly what is being used to teach reading.

Love the thread.

Because schools have to teach to get higher scores on national tests, kids learn facts but not how to synthesize ideas to daily life or why the facts are important in the first place.

TRUE education is left to the parents who usually don't have that either, or are too busy working anyways.

reply to post by silo13


I just wanted to add the following to your conversation if I may.
It's a copy of an old post of mine from a now obsolete thread:

"This opinion may not comes as news to ATS members but I thought it's a worthwhile thought to share with you.

Congress, the president, and the department of education are only grandstanding when they declare that they want to improve the American educational system. In fact the American system of democracy can only function efficiently if the general population, especially the middle class has a medium amount of education. That is to say, the middle class must be educated only to the degree that is as little as possible to allow them to reach consensus in a simplified two party system. Too much education would breed independent thought and to little generates an apathetic poverty class.

We are often reminded of how ignorant the ordinary American citizen is. Not only through statistics but also through those "man on the street" kind of media clips where no one knows their state capital.

This state of relative ignorance is by intent. It is what allows not only for a two party system and oversimplifications like red state/blue state, but also for a population to be easily manipulated and placated by it's government. A middle class disinclined to question it's government as long that they have the relative safety of their green backyards.

From birth the American educational system breeds mediocrity, intellectual laziness, discourages inquisitiveness, creativity and independent thought. I'd like to point out that this dynamic does not make the American" public any smarter or dumber than anywhere else in the world. That is not a issue here. The issue is it to recognize the systemic conditioning of the American population from childhood which discourages and marginalizes questioning and intellectual ambition. I call it the "so you think you're better than me?" syndrome.

www.abovetopsecret.com...

This thread might also be helpful: www.abovetopsecret.com...





[edit on 9/9/2008 by schrodingers dog]

As a stay-at-home dad and a dad that helps his 10-year-old daughter with her homework...I totally agree.

I am constantly doing my best to influence her where school sadly lacks.

In encouraging her to ask me questions.
In making sure...ahem...bathroom reading material is cleverly disguised learning material.
I encourage her to express herself with art.
I make damn sure she's better than me at math!

Mostly by just being there to prod her into researching the answers she wants.

TV, and The Disney Channel are my sworn enemies. I have successfully taught her to turn off the TV and turn on music when it's time for homework. She uses the Music Choice digital music channels that we get with our cable and listens to all kinds of music. Bluegrass and Traditional Folk is climbing the Samantha charts all the time, but, in her heart, she's a rocker. I've gotten her into Blues, Jazz, Swing, and the one thing she has grabbed ahold of herself is Punk Rock. Her favorite bands are The Dropkick Murphy's, Me First and the Gimme Gimmes, The Pixies, The Presidents of the USA and my old band, SplendorLex.

Parental Interaction. YES! A-Number-One answer!

And turn off the TV. (It's the Devil)

Cuhail

Interesting. Usually I am all about the system being messed up in it's choice of curriculum, but for some reason the story of the Mouse, pumpkin, airplane and seeds struck me as a great opportunity for children to think in their own minds rather than be drilled into.

When I was in the 9th grade I had an english teacher who actually had the class close thier eyes and he took us on a "guided meditation" of flying out the schoolhouse window, seeing the terrain below, etc.....etc..........

Actually come to think of it this teacher may just be the reason I am so weird today!

Seriously though, just wanted to say that there is something good to be said as well as bad for the example given.

Interestedalways:

My Social Studies teacher sounds like your English teacher. He taught us to think - and then think more - and more again. That out-of-the-box thing.
He ended up being the single greatest influence on my young wee little self in Junior High.

And yes there is *good* to be seen also, thank goodness you do.

The bad side is - like you remembering your English teacher and me, my Social Studies? We were soooo impressionable when we were young!

I can’t even imagine where I’d be if I was forced to read some of the things in school these days.
The limited vocabulary.
The mind games.
EEkkk!

Oh and about that little story in my first post?
If I was forced to answer those questions after a single read?
I’d be stressed.

Thanks for your post!

The first impression I got from the "reading lesson" and attendant questions that the educators are looking for children who have exceptional recall skills.

In todays mass-entertainment world, is it unreasonable that such prospective canidates are being singled out at earlier ages for the ability to recall minutia? I'm sure if a child can recall such trivial details, they'll have no problems memorizing screenplays, scripts and other "directions" given to young actors/actresses later on in life.

After all, the "teen star" is todays hot ticket item.

Just two cents there.

An eye-opener article, it completely blew me away.


How bizarre, the 6-7 year old reader is NOT SUPPOSED TO make sense of what they read...

Dissociative, irrational thinking is set up as a kind of principle of education.

Notice how the first question is the only real one???

Once upon a time there was a little green mouse who hopped after a
tiger onto a yellow airplane. The plane turned into a big red bird in
flight, and the mouse turned into a blue pumpkin. The pumpkin fell to
the ground and its seeds grew into pots and pans.

1) "What color was the mouse?"

2) "Why do mice turn into pumpkins?"

3)"How do seeds grow?"

When a child-figure in the stories split away from his group, for
example, he would get rained on, his toes would get cold in the snow,
or he would experience some other form of discomfort or torment.
Similar material was repeated ad infinitum. Through their reading, our
students would feel the stinging rain and the pain of freezing toes.
They would learn the lesson like one of Pavlov's dogs: avoid the pain,
stay with the group.

Animal dads, moms, and grandparents were portrayed over and over
in various combinations as mean, stupid, unreliable, bungling, impotent
or incompetent. Relationships with their children were almost always
dysfunctional; communication and reciprocal trust were non-existent. A
toxic mom or dad, for instance, might have stepped in to help our
youthful squirrel repair his wagon, only to make matters worse and
wreak emotional havoc in the process.