the programming of young american minds: kindergarten

This is not an angry rant by some miffed guy who never went to kindergarten. It is simply the wish to pass along observations about the similarities between gardening and grooming young minds. By a guy who never went to kindergarten.
Its really very simple: as a gardener you want to grow the best plants. Whether it's ego, financial, or whatever reason is behind it, it's natural to want to grow the best. First there's "weeding" wherein the foreign or completely undesirable plants are removed. Next comes "thinning" which is the removal of the weakest plants so the strongest have enough room to fully grow. Finally- for this example anyway- there is the growth stage.
Don't we do this same thing in our educational system in America? We have A level or whatever you want to call it, but as kids get older they are placed into strata- the "gifted program" comes to mind.
When a gardener opens a seed package and throws out his seeds, his plants will have very similar genetics and will be easier to grow- same size, same watering requirements, same harvesting time and so on. Cloning is very big in the horticultural industry for this very reason. The bigger the garden, the more important it is to have genetically similar plants growing because you can't change the watering requirements daily for each and every plant when you're growing 100 acres of corn.
I can't help but assume this kind of mentality has crept in- or may have been the reason for kindergarten in the 1st place. If someone puts themselves in the position of "caretaker" of more than just a small number of kids
it must be only natural to ease them into conformity, at least to your own views if not society's. So how does the Czar of Education feel about his responsibility to millions of kids? I can't know, but I'll bet he sees them like a gardener- some great plants, mostly ok, and then some diseased ones. Kindergarten seems like the weeding out process. Not in a malicious way at all- no- in fact the 'weeding out' begins with the individuals who don't "play well" with others....right?
In contrast of course is the wilderness where everything is a probability and only some hyper dimensional being could even begin to appreciate every little difference instead of trying to see some sort of benefit.

reply to post by IandEye


Kindergarten is just a step above day-care.
It's a very basic learning atmosphere for the most part.

HERE is a Kindergarten syllabus.

It's all very basic introductory reading comprehension with some light touches in earth science, life science, physical science telling time, economics, manners, and other very basic skill preparatory for 1st grade.

reply to post by Druscilla


It is also an indoctrination camp. Why do you think they send out lists of school uspplies to the children's parents and then, the very first thing they do when the children arrive at school, is to confiscate all of those school supplies, inventory them and place then into storage only to ration them out to the children throughout the year?

My child completed kindergarten last year. After her first day of school she came out quite upset that her teacher had "Stolen" everyone's school supplies. When I probed deeper, I discovered that the teacher had every student pile their supplies on a table in the back of the room and she later locked them up in storage. Kind of shocked to hear this, I phoned the teacher and asked her about the reason behind this. Her response was VERY eye-opening!

Basically she stated that some children end up coming to school with either more or nicer supplies than the other children and that she wanted to prevent any of the children from feeling "inadequate". When I countered that I thought a more valuabel lesson would be to teach the children to be responsible with their own supplies and recognize that everyone has different things and to not be jealous of what other people have, she responded that it was more important that they learn the "Notion of community property and sharing". As a result all supplies would be everyone's supplies and that all would be shared equally. When I challenged her that this wasn't consistent with the real world and that we should be preparing them for the real world, she countered with something to the effect that 'maybe that is how the real world SHOULD be, and by teaching these students that this is the RIGHT way to live, then maybe someday it would be that way!"

Being suspicious that perhaps this one teacher had an agenda, my wife checked with other parents to discover that this was being done in all 14 kindergaten classes in the disctrict and had been this was for about a decade. More suspicious that perhaps it was disctrict issue, I contacted my sister who is an elementary school teacher in Florida only to discover that they do the same thing. When I pressed her she said that the distict's reasoning behind it was that they didn't want anyone running our school supplies before the end of the year.

Um, WTF!?!? Really!? To me, this smacks of socialism! This is not a good way to begin to teach our children about taking personal responsibility over their things. Teaching them to ration supplies to meet needs. That different people have different things and that it has no effect on performance. To not be jealous that what you have is different. Etc...

Just my $.02

reply to post by kozmo


So, what you''re saying is; the poor kids, the ones that don't have anything nice, need to learn their place, and learn to deal with the fact that other people have nicer things than them.

What you're saying is, it's okay to be greedy, miserly, selfish and not share with less fortunate people.

Aha.

You may wish to consider enrolling your children in a private school that teaches them the benefits of stepping on the backs of the less fortunate to elevate themselves for their eventual lofty seats in boardrooms if the concept of community, equality, and sharing is that appalling.

EDIT:
In cased you missed it, PUBLIC school IS a SOCIALIST program. Think about it.

Unless you're paying for private school, your children are going to a public school where all the other children go as part of the public social curriculum for education.

reply to post by IandEye


Some of the most important and helpful things in life I learned in Kindergarten....

Always say....

"please"

"may I"

"thank you"

Put things back where they belong. Don't steal or cheat and never.......


NEVER



run with scissors

Kindergarten is pretty obviously a nefarious socialist plot to indoctrinate our children... Marxist.. socialist... communist... assorted other hollow words without substance. It reeks of socialism!!!!!!

If those supplies came out of my own budget then my child should be able to use the exact supplies that I gave her. Sure, when I was in kindergarten we little ones fought over toys, etc..But we were always taught how to share and respect the other kids. Are the teachers now too lazy to teach kids how to behave in their classrooms?

If this is the typical response and all kindergarten teachers are doing this then why not hand out a note and say they have to get these exact supplies at this particular store so that all the children have the exact same supplies?

Originally posted by Druscilla
reply to post by kozmo

 

So, what you''re saying is; the poor kids, the ones that don't have anything nice, need to learn their place, and learn to deal with the fact that other people have nicer things than them.

What you're saying is, it's okay to be greedy, miserly, selfish and not share with less fortunate people.

Aha.

You may wish to consider enrolling your children in a private school that teaches them the benefits of stepping on the backs of the less fortunate to elevate themselves for their eventual lofty seats in boardrooms if the concept of community, equality, and sharing is that appalling.

EDIT:
In cased you missed it, PUBLIC school IS a SOCIALIST program. Think about it.

Unless you're paying for private school, your children are going to a public school where all the other children go as part of the public social curriculum for education.

edit on 19-8-2012 by Druscilla because: (no reason given)

Druscilla, I think in fairness we should ask ourselves: do we want our children prepared to live in the real world, or the fantasy world of psychologists and politicians? When we see kids do things that we say, "In my day that would never had happened", what we might should say is, "What has changed since we are kids that support this type of behavior?"

RE: the OP....have you heard of Charlotte Iserbyte? I mentioned her on ATS VERY frequently....and never even a nibble. Of course, i don't link to her or anything, usually just letting people who are interested Google her name....but this time i will actually post something on her:

Charlotte Iserbyt is the consummate whistleblower! Iserbyt served as Senior Policy Advisor in the Office of Educational Research and Improvement (OERI), U.S. Department of Education, during the first Reagan Administration, where she first blew the whistle on a major technology initiative which would control curriculum in America's classrooms. Iserbyt is a former school board director in Camden, Maine and was co-founder and research analyst of Guardians of Education for Maine (GEM) from 1978 to 2000. She has also served in the American Red Cross on Guam and Japan during the Korean War, and in the United States Foreign Service in Belgium and in the Republic of South Africa. Iserbyt is a speaker and writer, best known for her 1985 booklet Back to Basics Reform or OBE: Skinnerian International Curriculum and her 1989 pamphlet Soviets in the Classroom: America's Latest Education Fad which covered the details of the U.S.-Soviet and Carnegie-Soviet Education Agreements which remain in effect to this day. She is a freelance writer and has had articles published in Human Events, The Washington Times, The Bangor Daily News, and included in the record of Congressional hearings.

Of course, the above is her own handwritten bio.

And I have never seen a debunking of her. In fact, as I mentioned earlier, no one will respond when I point her out in context of these types of threads.

And an interesting quote:

Parents and the general public must be reached also. Otherwise, children and youth enrolled in globally oriented programs may find themselves in conflict with values assumed in the home. And then the educational institution frequently comes under scrutiny and must pull back.

— Dr. John I. Goodlad, Schooling for a Global Age-1979

Originally posted by Druscilla
reply to post by IandEye

 

Kindergarten is just a step above day-care.
It's a very basic learning atmosphere for the most part.

HERE is a Kindergarten syllabus.

It's all very basic introductory reading comprehension with some light touches in earth science, life science, physical science telling time, economics, manners, and other very basic skill preparatory for 1st grade.

Im not sure where you live, but the kindergarten my daughter attended was not just a step above day care...although she never attended daycare. She did attend pre-K which is more like what you are describing. My daughter's kindergarten had real school work - reading (books), writing stories, math and homework. In first grade, she was reading at jr. high level. In 2nd, adult level

Obviously each school and each school district is different....but I also sought out the school she is in, which is an Inernational Bacculaureate school...

Im sure some kindy classes are glorified preschools but not the ones in my district.

Originally posted by Druscilla
reply to post by kozmo

 

So, what you''re saying is; the poor kids, the ones that don't have anything nice, need to learn their place, and learn to deal with the fact that other people have nicer things than them.

What you're saying is, it's okay to be greedy, miserly, selfish and not share with less fortunate people.

Aha.

You may wish to consider enrolling your children in a private school that teaches them the benefits of stepping on the backs of the less fortunate to elevate themselves for their eventual lofty seats in boardrooms if the concept of community, equality, and sharing is that appalling.

EDIT:
In cased you missed it, PUBLIC school IS a SOCIALIST program. Think about it.

Unless you're paying for private school, your children are going to a public school where all the other children go as part of the public social curriculum for education.

edit on 19-8-2012 by Druscilla because: (no reason given)

Karl Marx? Is that you?

Let me break down your histrionics, point-by-point... And I will make every attempt to use unbiased language, unlike the suppositions you posted in your response.

To your first point, yes, ALL children need to learn that what other's have does not entitle them to it - be it nicer, neater, cooler or otherwise. The last time I checked, I don't drive a Mercedes to work like some of my co-workers but I no way feel entitled to it. Perhaps I learned that back in school... pre-indoctrination and particpation trophies?

I'm not sure in my post where I gave the assertion that "it's okay to be greedy, miserly, selfish and not share with less fortunate people." I would have excused it had you posted an appropriate punctuation, like a question mark. Instead you just asserted it. Interesting assumption, by the way. Instead, it would be nice for the teacher to ENCOURAGE sharing, not simply confiscating and redistributing. The former teaches community. The latter teaches entitlement. The former teaches the recipient to be grateful. The latter teaches children to expect hand-outs.

I have considered enrolling my child in a private school, but that would be simply caving in and admitting that socialism is an acceptable platform for our public education system. I'm sorry, but I believe that socialism has no place ANYWHERE in America - especially as the platform for public school. Unfortunately for you or others that apparently espouse socialism (And based on your post, I don't find this a far-fetched assumption either), MOST Americans agree with me, not you.

And finally, when the federal government got involved in education it did become a socialist program - which is why there is no mention of education in the Constitution. That was reserved specifically for the states to govern.

I think it's fair to say that your mis-guided opinions are what continue to inevitable creep of government into our personal and private lives. It also advocates for the improper teaching our children to learn to become self-sufficient. Perhaps you might think the repercussions of your opinions through to completion before voicing them... or are you advocating for socialism?

I would much rather my children be "indoctrinated" in public about basic concepts like humanity, decency etc. than to have them indoctrinated by "Christians" in home schools and church run schools around the nation.

In one place they learn tolerance and love thy neighbor (public school), in the other they are taught ignorance and unquestionable adherence to dogma.

Alternative reads to, say, 'How To Kill Your Atheist Mommy & Daddy'

God's Wisdom For Little Boys



From a review --- "If your hopes and dreams are for your son to grow into a Godly little boy and Godly man this book is for you!"


The ABC's of Handling Money God's Way



From a review --- "Each chapter teaches a lesson in a kid-friendly way. In one chapter, kids learn God owns everything. In another, that God wants everyone to be good stewards of the money and things he gives them. Later, children learn God wants them to work hard at whatever they do and that they should give away at least 10% of what they earn."

Originally posted by pajoly
I would much rather my children be "indoctrinated" in public about basic concepts like humanity, decency etc. than to have them indoctrinated by "Christians" in home schools and church run schools around the nation.

In one place they learn tolerance and love thy neighbor (public school), in the other they are taught ignorance and unquestionable adherence to dogma.

Obviously you've got it backwards - and obviously you are the product of public education! Catholic schools teach humanity, decency, etc... I should know, I've been to them and learned there. Your obvious ignorance of Christianity is shining through - bright and clear for the world to see. If you want to see ignorance, look in the mirror. Your hatred of people of religion is both obvious and disgusting. You wear neither hypocrisy nor ignorance well - consider changing.

By the way... "Love thy neighbor" is one of the Ten Commandments... a CHRISTIAN PRINCIPAL! I'm fairly certain I've seen the Ten Commandments on the walls of my Christian grade school whereas you will NEVER see it in a public school.

Speaking of school... if you are interested in learning your way through your ignorance, feel free to u2u me and I'll see if I can help!

Originally posted by kozmo

Catholic schools teach humanity, decency, etc... I should know, I've been to them and learned there.

Me too.

First, I attended a Catholic primary school run by nuns. I remember asking one of the nuns, "How can there be three persons in one God, Sister?" She thought hard and long then replied sternly, "Have faith."

My secondary school was a Catholic ‘College’ run by Christian Brothers. One of the Brothers used to single out certain boys to take to the stationery room to talk about masterbation, asking them in detail how they did it and to demonstrate. The 'certain boys' told the ugly boys (like me) about this. The headmaster (Christian Brother of course) found out about this, and the offending Brother was sent 'on retreat'. I learned after I left the school that this sort of thing happened regularly.

My sister went to a fee-paying nun-run Catholic Girls Convent. She wrote how she hated it there, crying herself to sleep, begging to come home. My parents received a letter from the headmistress shortly after saying my sister, "is very happy and settling in very well..."

I don't recommend the above type of schools - as someone once said, "I should know, I've been to them..."

reply to [url= by bigfatfurrytexan[/url]



thanks for the info texan- it's always nice when someone on ats contributes to edification and doesn't use it as some kind of insult-hurling platform.
I'll check her out on google.

To the OP, well, these days, maybe so, but not always, and perhaps not everywhere. When I was in kindergarten (yeah, I can remember way back then!), we played a lot, learned basic classroom rules, and did a few papers to get an idea of how school worked. That was it. That was also a long time ago. My older two (the only ones that ever saw public school) did keep most of their supplies, though items like boxes of tissue were held by the teacher, and used throughout the year for all. Of course, those two are 28 and 19 now, so again, a long time ago! These days, public schools are indoctrination centers at all grade levels, in many places. There are some schools that aren't as bad, but they are becoming fewer every year.

Originally posted by kozmo
reply to post by Druscilla

 

It is also an indoctrination camp. Why do you think they send out lists of school supplies to the children's parents and then, the very first thing they do when the children arrive at school, is to confiscate all of those school supplies, inventory them and place then into storage only to ration them out to the children throughout the year?
*snip*
Um, WTF!?!? Really!? To me, this smacks of socialism!*snip*

Just my $.02

I would throw a fit! Mine had their names on virtually everything, save the above-mentioned tissues. yes, very socialist, as is a LOT of what they are teaching the kids these days. I would even go so far as to state that this sort of "teaching" is responsible for the "flash mobs", that think they can simply take whatever they want, because they want it and someone else has it. Also for the many that think the government should support them. Not those that really NEED help, and some do, but those that take advantage. Those like the woman a relative of mine encountered, who was making drug deals on her smart phone while in the office applying for more welfare. Personally, I would yank my child from such a school. That isn't the reason we decided to home school, but it's a reason I am glad we did make that decision!

Originally posted by pajoly
I would much rather my children be "indoctrinated" in public about basic concepts like humanity, decency etc. than to have them indoctrinated by "Christians" in home schools and church run schools around the nation.

In one place they learn tolerance and love thy neighbor (public school), in the other they are taught ignorance and unquestionable adherence to dogma.

I think you have that backwards. As the other person I quoted shows, it is the schools that are using indoctrination techniques. As for the churches? Well, the one we currently attend just this past week finished putting together nice little "back to school" bags for the students, paid for completely with donations from members, and with quite a lot left over to give to the local district, for kids that can't afford supplies and need them. I would call that very humane and decent. personally. This same church also collects things for children in poor mountain villages in Mexico, for deployed soldiers, for the needy in the community. They have a regular drive for food for the needy. Love thy neighbor, in action. People freely offering from their money, their time, to help those in need, as opposed to being taught that they don't have a right to personal possessions. I will take freely given Christian charity any day over the government, or some socialist school, telling me what I will give, and what I am allowed to keep. Socialism is spread by indoctrination and dogma.

reply to post by Druscilla


Hmmm, I do not think that is what the previous poster was driving at. I grew up poor, there was no one making me feel better by giving me other kids school supplies. Because I grew up like that I am much more responsible and work very hard for what I have.

When you hand out in ration, your teaching entitlement or the very foundation there of. If you do not learn early on that if you lose it your SOL..you will never learn the type of personal responsibility that produces a strong slab on which to become a member of society that produces rather than leeches.

So in a sense, i can understand why the poster feels that way. And yes it is socialism with a hint of PC indoctrination. Everyone is not created equal...sorry to say. While you should respect others on the same keel...everyone is not equal. That is where public school goes wrong IMO. Everyone is a winner..there are no losers. It teaches you that everyone is special...when they clearly are not.

If you don't lose at all, how are you going to know when you made a mistake in your endeavors? How are you going to recognize that you must work harder to acheive that special feeling of winning as it should be?

Well, from my standpoint, kindergarten really is just a big daycare center. There isn't a whole lot of learning going on in a kindergarten classroom, compared to the higher grades, and its mostly just a waste of time in my opinion. A lot of the things learned in kindergarten can be taught to the child extremely easily by the parents. Every parent knows the extremely basic things taught in kindergarten, so it isn't really necessary anyway.

And seriously, going to school at only five years old? Most kids go to some kind of pre-school thing before kindergarten now too. Let the little kids actual start their lives without having apparently dire information that they must know being shoved down their throats already.

Here's a nice video from the legendary George Carlin that relates here: